The most common thread in fairy tales is the deception. The Beautiful Queen that has a heart as ugly as sin. The Ugly and common serving girl who has a heart so kind and pure that it can be seen through her exterior.
It's the evil step mother in Snow White and the common scullery maid in Cinderella. Beauty and the Beast would probably be the first parallel to leap to most people's minds. For me the tales that leap to mind most are a little more obscure. The girl with the silver hands is a fairy tale that i hold very dearly to my heart. It's not only about deception but also about holding on no matter what.
A woodsman is out chopping wood... as they do (all woodchuck jokes aside) when a troll appears and says if you don't chop this one tree i will trade you your home full of gold and jewels for whatever is in your backyard. It's no contest. The woodsman has a cherry tree out behind his house and that is all, so he thinks. He makes the deal quickly and gladly. Returning home his house is indeed filled with gold and jewels, busting out of drawer and flowing out of closets. He tells his wife what happened and what he bargained away for the new riches. She begins to panic. Their daughter had been out behind the house then, sweeping the back step. The girl is resourceful, she doesn't run away but takes a piece of chalk and draws a pure white circle around herself that the wizard may not cross. Wizard? What? The wizard had only appeared to be a troll to seem more trust worthy. Taking you a moment to consider a person who appears more trust worthy as a troll... You know, that creepy junkie you picture down a dark alley who would kill you to sell your organs and has no love of personal hygiene... that would be the troll. The wizard orders her father to leave her without water so the chalk line she draws will be dirty. She weeps over her hands and wipes them clean with her hair. Nice little allegory there to the woman washing Jesus' feet with her tears and her hair. The wizard returns and the chalk line is clean, he may not cross. He the orders the father to chop off her hands so that the chalk line will be bloody... this would probably be why this is one of the less known fairy tales.. her father does it.
Woah, wait... he what? Her father chops off her hands because the evil wizard who gave him money said so. Imagine Disney trying to deal with that concept the way they nicely sidestepped a prince wandering through the world blinded by thorns healed by Rapunzel's tears splashing into them, or Pinocchio squishing Jimmie Cricket in the first few pages of the original tale. She cries all night long (we're going to act surprised now), and when the morning comes her stumps, exposed bone and the chalk line are all shiny and clean. The wizard pretends he's beat and walks away. The girl leaves home, either because she doesn't like her new nickname of "stumpie" or maybe it was something her parents did... She wanders through the world hoping to find a place she'll be respected for her mind. A helpful fairy appears and guides her to an orchard where she can eat the fruit right off the tree, no hands required. But, the orchard belongs to a King who doesn't much like the local wildlife picking off his pears. He assumes it's a deer and lays in wait to make venison jerky of it when he sees the girl and the fairy. He is taken by her beauty and moved by her story and marries her, having the best silversmith in all the land fashion her a pair of prosthetic hands. It would be lovely if i could say the story ended there, that they lived happily ever after... this just isn't one of those fairy tales.
Either there was some kind of recession going on or, this young lady has the worst luck since Job. The king has a wizard on staff and having no hands our heroine can't quite put her finger on it but he seems familiar. Most of the evil wizard protagonists have their own castle, rotting and in disrepair but castle none the less, this wizard needed a day job?
So in place of the happily ever after we are going into Rumpelstiltskin territory, she gets pregnant and the wizard still wants to make her pay. He sends the King off to war ala the crusades and starts playing telephone with their letters, shifting them this way and that so the no one knows what his right hand is doing. When the babies are born the King's mother sends a message of his son's birth, the father gets a message from the queen mother saying that his son is born an abomination. The father sends back that he will love him anyway but it's changed mid delivery to kill him by the wizard. Back and forth go the messages until the King's mother is convinced her son has lost his ever loving mind and tells the girl to take her kid and run. She does and finds herself in an enchanted bed and breakfast making the beds to pay for room and board. When the down comforters are fluffed it snows... and so forth. The King returns, learns what has happened, figures it out, has the wizard disemboweled and sets out in search of his wife and son. For 14 years he searches, 7 years symbolizing forever the 14 might be a bit of overkill. He wanders half dead into the enchanted bed and breakfast to rest and sees the bed maker but doesn't believe it is his wife, one or two characteristics were different about her; she'd put on a little weight, we all know what nursing does to your breasts, something different with her hair and this woman had hands. Drunk and tired one evening the King blubbers out the whole story to the bed maker who gets up an leaves him only to return with a case in her hands containing the silver hands the King had commissioned for her. He's overjoyed, she's overjoyed, the kid is happy to finally have a daddy and the mouse considers the rights to the screenplay.
Long story, but if you can get your hands on it... sorry... you might really enjoy it. Back to my cover though.
We have set up in our heads how people are supposed to react, archetypes for personality and behavior based on fairy tales, sitcoms and other stories we tell each other. Father's and Mother's are supposed to love and support their children, even hacksaw aside the girl's parents don't act as we feel they should. The thing we lose over and over again in these archetypes is that the person you are interacting with isn't. They're people, faulty, suspicious, cruel, arrogant, lost people. I've heard a lot the past year about how people are supposed to act because of their job, their volunteer work, their hobby, their religion, but none of these things in and of themselves are very good indicators of what lies beneath the surface. People i particularly trusted lied to me and to others, which of course got back to me. I lost the ability to walk more than a few feet without pain and people thought i was drunk or high, but instead of asking me, they assumed. I mowed the lawn for 3 months while i was simultaneously on crutches, no one cared until they wanted me to be leave the entire post behind, but of course they asked me to stop out of the goodness of their heart and genuine concern for me and my well being right? The previous 3 months they didn't care about my well being? We all wear masks, the difference is the friend being more patient than they feel for the sake of their friend's well being and the evil wizard who has to look like a troll to be trusted. Do you ask? or do you assume? I've had problems with my legs for 10 years now, chronic severe bilateral Achilles tendinitis, straphitis and bursitis. If you can picture having carpel tunnel from behind your knees down... the medicines i take make me sleepy and dizzy. The best medication of all is resting them, getting up rarely and not going far. But, and this is important, i am NOT Job. No wall has crushed my family, i am not homeless, i don't have leprosy and i am not beaten. It's so much easier to blame God, or to blame archetypes for not acting as they should. I'd rather hold those who lie and assume rather than ask personally responsible for their actions, not in relation to their archetypes but in relation to basic human decency.
Like picking up a book of fairy tales, some are short, sweet and resolve without much stress into a happily ever after. If true happiness, unparalleled happiness means waiting twice as long as forever i guess i better start saving up to move Australia and hurry forever along.
