Crime Scene

Here's a piece I did for the Crime Scene show at the SOIL Gallery in Seattle, last year. Nice and bloody.

I always liked the story of Snow White for the simple fact that she was the ONLY fairytale princess who wasn't a blue-eyed blonde. As a brunette kid with two blonde stepsisters, I was painfully aware of the anti-brunette, anti-stepsister bias of most fairytales. Now that I'm a stepMOTHER, things are even more slanted.

I found this discussion to be pretty interesting. The idea that perhaps the stereotype of the stepmother came from people freaking out over the idea that Mommies might be the evil ones, so they had to change it...well, as someone who isn't a Mommy, I find that very interesting.

Being a stepmother is pretty rough at times. Ironically, the kids themselves aren't the problem; most of the time we get along fine, because I have no interest in being anyone's mother, and if they get mad or sulky about something I don't agonize over it. I regard 'em more as pesty little brothers than anything, a dynamic I'm quite familiar with from my own childhood.

The part that sucks is "Adults". People have the weirdest freakin' expectations of What A Stepmother Is. You're supposed to Love The Children Like Your Own, but never forget they're not yours. You're supposed to put them first all the time, at the expense of your marriage,  your life, yourself, even though they aren't yours. You're not supposed to discipline them, even if Daddy isn't home and they're acting like monkeys on crack.  Then there are all the exciting issues of how you're supposed to deal with their mother, because don't forget; you marry a guy with kids, you get his ex-wife, too.

If you've never been a stepmother, kindly keep your ill-informed opinions to yourself, because you have NO idea what the issues are. It's one of the most maligned, thankless jobs you can take on, and only the strong survive. And it's not the kids that make it that way. It's the little cracks that blindside you, like a radio report of a cold front coming in that the weatherman oh-so-cleverly labels "the Stepmother". The stupid, thoughtless comments, the cliches, the FAIRYTALES.

Comments

[Tomb]

Nice, bloody and it SOLD! Blood in art is good, as long as that one stepmonkey don't see it.

[Beans]

The Stepmother always get the fuzzy end of the lollipop, and yet the Stepmother has made a choice to be there, where as quite often the "Mom" choses not to be.