International Women's Day

Today is International Women's Day (March 8, 2013). As I am in an undeniably cranky mood, I am tempted to point out depressing rape statistics, the lack of female leads in Hollywood blockbusters, the sad state of female representation in comics (both as characters and the women who work in that industry), but I won't. The blogosphere is rife with such articles, and written by people who've ferreted out more statistics than I care to at the moment.

Instead, I give you a supervillainess of my own creation:

I freely admit, I am no illustrator, but this sketch turned out pretty much as I wanted it to. There she stands, plump in her white uniform and comfy shoes, her apron emblazoned with her bakery's logo... holding the cupcake bomb she's about to hurl at someone.

She was created a bit as a joke, for my habit of visiting friends in the Great White North bearing edible gifts. (In fact, creating a new recipe for one friend when he asked for pie and I declined on the basis of transporting pies, unrefrigerated, over a 10-hour car trip, was a Bad Idea. Also, pies are my kryptonite. I suck at them.)

I really wish that I could draw sometimes. Not badly enough to seek a class at a community college, and not enough to try one of those books that purports to teach illustration (yet)... but I have an idea in my head that I find entertaining enough that I'd like to pursue. I suppose I could script it out, and then find an illustrator to partner with me. Or I could practice my drawing until it was better, or keep my idea to a written concept -- but this really begs for a comic book style. And there's lots of indie webcomics out there, why can't I have one?

Women are underrepresented in comics. Their characters are background, secondary, or worse: decorative. The writers, illustrators and editors are overwhelmingly male, too. Publishing an ebook with the option of a print-on-demand copy has become a viable option for many writers, and webcomic artists and writers absolutely have been successful with having their collections printed, too. There's no reason why I, and other women who want to pursue their passions, can't get our stuff out there for people to see. Well... the inability to draw is a pretty good reason... but that's fixable.

So I guess that's my message for today, this International Women's Day: PURSUE YOUR DREAMS, TRAMPLE ANYONE WHO STANDS IN YOUR WAY, AND MAKE IT HAPPEN! OK, maybe you shouldn't trample anyone, assault and battery is never a good idea. But seriously: Go for it! You only get one chance in this life, so why not try? If you fail, at least you tried.