- English translation
If you don't care about it, leave it in your stepfather's hands.
- Literal wording
The thing that does not concern you, entrust it to your mother's husband.
- Meaning and lesson
When a matter means nothing to you, you may as well hand it to someone who cares little about your interests. Your mother's husband, here a stepfather, is traditionally assumed to lack devotion to his wife's children; the saying uses that stereotype without proving it true.
The point is delegation, not that the stepfather is wicked: he is a fitting keeper only for things nobody minds losing. The saying can mock careless delegation, implying the thing was never valued, or shrug off a trivial concern that needs no trustworthy keeper.
- When it is used
Fits wry remarks about someone handing off a task to a careless or uninvested person, or about one's own indifference to how an unimportant matter turns out. It is a teasing, colloquial jab rather than formal advice, and should not be used as a slight against stepparents.
- Register
- colloquial
Cite or copy proverb
How this record reached us: Editorially sourced.
Report an issue with this meaning: If you don't care about it, leave it in your stepfather's hands.