There are a triplet of components to my job as costumer. One is to teach sewing to a handful of students twice a week. Easy. Another was to create the wardrobe for the fall show which coincidentally was The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. Done. The third is consuming much of my attention lately, which is to come up with the five hundred articles of apparel that will transform fifty three teenagers into multiple characters for the musical, Shrek. The process involves measuring, taking pants in, letting seams out, so that everything fits. Happy Villagers need a bonnet, blouse, bodice, shawl, skirt, pinafore, and apron. Duloc citizens each require gloves, tights, a skirt or shorts, kerchief, shirt, and slippers. Fiona and the ogres have more specialized outfits. The dancing rats have tailcoats with tails, leggings, top hats, tuxedo shirts, cumberbunds and bow ties. They already own tap shoes. Then there are a parade of fairy tale characters including Pinocchio, Peter Pan, the Three Bears, and Humpty Dumpty. 

Having a costume does not actually swivel a sixteen year old into a Fairy Godmother, but it is a place to start. Learning the songs helps too, plus memorizing the dialogue. In January it is a safe bet to say that the girl who is Fiona does not feel impatient, or curious, or angry, or tender. But by the time she has recited those particular lines for three months, with other players on stage saying theirs, she probably will. I know that by the end of fall production I was a believer. Teary every night. 

Practice precedes emotion when it comes to theater. If the cast shrugged their shoulders in the second week of rehearsals because they just weren't feeling it, no show would ever make it to opening night. But in the arduous repetition of the story, it comes to life. 

There are days when my routine seems like a charade. I go through the motions, but it is not from altruism. Sometimes John will meet me with a basket of clean laundry with his tag line of appreciation. 

"You are so kind."

If kindness had nothing to do with it, the words feel ill fitted. Yes, I did push dirty sheets into the machine, and transfer them to the dryer. But it was wooden. 

Still it occurs to me that saying benevolent words before I own them is the only thing that gets me from the third balcony to being real.