This is the first of a few tales that come from Mr. Salt family in Dinetah. Dinetah is Mr. Salt's home, the Navajo reservation.
Mornings in the Mr. Salt/DineBoo residence go something like this:
DineBoo: Get up! Sleeping Woman was crawling all over you!
Mr. Salt: I know. She had me wrapped up pretty tight. I had to get Sleeping Man to come get her off me.
When you have trouble waking up in the morning (or just waking up period like I do), it is said that Sleeping Man (or Woman if you're a guy) has you all wrapped up tight and is not letting you go.
Sleeping Man and Sleeping Woman are said to be foul, smelly people. Just really rank and dirty. Their breath stinks (morning breath) and they have matty hair (bed hair). That dried, crusty matter in your eyes after you wake up either dried drool from your respected Sleeping person or something else entirely. Mr. Salt can get creative with what that 'something else' is, so I'll just leave it as other body fluids and continue on.
Sleeping Man is always trying to get with Sleeping Woman, but if she rejects him, he'll find someone else to be with for the night. Same with Sleeping Woman. So you (or your partner) need to shake him off and chase him away.
When you're waking somebody up you need to shake them hard so that Sleeping Man will go away and find another person to be with for rest the night. The harder it is to wake the person up, the harder you need the shake the person awake. You might say some really gross things (like Sleeping Man's drool is all over them) so that they'll wake up faster. Mr. Salt says this works great with kids.
It can also be a sign of laziness when you are told that Sleeping Man(or Woman) is always around you. It means you're sleeping too much and not getting ready for the day!
-DineBoo
