#animal affinity

[lets-go-every-witchway]

Roots of Your Craft - Day 27

Do you have an affinity with an animal or type of animal? What does it mean to you? If you don’t, but had to have one, what do you think it would be?

I really, really, want to say cats here. Sadly, I think I’ve lost what affinity I had with them since I’ve grown older. I still have more of an affinity with my family cat than anyone else in the family, and when I go back to the family home he’s sort of my anchoring point and a huge source of comfort. He’s old, a bit smelly at times, and definitely going senile, but I adore him and we both help to de-stress each other. He’s definitely a lot calmer and quieter when I’m there, and even a bit more obedient (if such a thing can be said of cats)!

[My grumpy old man meowing for no discernible reason <3]

However, I no longer feel a connection to cats in general as I once did. I mean, I still love them, but I don’t think the cat population are as interested in me as I am in them! If that affinity was to come back I would be very happy. I think it probably would still be to cats - my boyfriend often says I’m like a cat - and I can’t imagine sharing that kind of connection with any other animal. 

[darkshrimpemotions]

So tonight my wife and I were thinking of other ways to talk about having an affinity/love for or relating to an animal, since this is something most people seem to do and since neither of us really want to use patronus anymore and using spirit animal is appropriative. A few we came up with:

Familiar - this one may be iffy for some, because it's usually associated with witchcraft. But as a witch myself I personally feel like the concept of a familiar is broad enough that it's not really appropriating any specific religion or culture to use it to talk about such an affinity (though anyone feel free to contradict me if you think I'm wrong here).

Wesen form - this one is from the NBC series Grimm, where Wesen are people who have an outer human face and an inner face that reflects an animal or creature from folklore. These inner faces can reflect some aspects of their nature, but are not necessarily indicative of the whole personality.

Daemon - this one is from His Dark Materials and refers to the soul which is in the form of an animal and exists alongside each human character.

Zord - this one is from Power Rangers and refers to the ancient massive machines used by the rangers to fight evil. Each Zord has a corresponding color and reflects some aspect of the ranger who pilots it.

Were form - this one is from Teen Wolf. The lore is shaky here but basically not all weres are wolves. Sometimes they take other forms which reflect who they are inside in some way, IIRC.

Anyway that's several ways you can talk about having an affinity for a particular animal without being appropriative and without falling back on using patronus if that is spoiled for you.

The cool thing is, these all have slightly different connotations so they could all be slightly different! For instance I'd say my familiar or my daemon are probably pigs, and my Wesen form would be a bauerschwein (pig wesen), but my Zord is definitely a bear.