brightberries

Written by Hortense

I’ve already made a short comic about my experiences, but I thought it’d be good to put it into words too.

When the internet started blowing up about Ethiopian wolves being pollinators and photos of them licking at red hot poker flowers were everywhere I suddenly had an awakening.

I wish I had some profound message or experience to make this story sound impressive. But the comic sums it up pretty good - I started looking at photos and suddenly my identity shifted and I am a wolf.

Here’s the comic pages for reference:

 

Like the final panel off-handedly mentions, I did have an intense fascination with wolves as a kid. A wolf kid you could say. My fursona was a wolf for the longest time. I had dreams as wolves, daydreamed myself as one, played any game I could with wolves in them, etc.
 

So, I guess my point is, this isn’t completely out of the blue.

There’s been a build up towards this moment. But, it’s still odd. When I was younger, I always drew my ‘sona and daydreamed about myself as a large white werewolf. Not some twig-looking orange normal wolf. They don’t even have ice powers or heterochromia!

I kid! But there’s a grain of truth in the silly.
Why this specific wolf? Why do I now see myself as this creature and a wolf more like my fursona of years past? Why am I a wolf?

Beats me.

It’s been roughly six months now, but since my awakening I have persistently seen myself as an Ethiopian wolf.
I am often one in the headspace. I have phantom limb shifts of an Ethiopian wolf’s tall ears, canine paws, tail and body map. I experience envisage shifts often too. I continue to look at photos of this species and see myself. I’ve begun having dreams as a wolf again too after a few years hiatus.

I think it’s fitting that I’ve become the only species of wolf I know of that spends its time hunting alone. Don’t get me wrong, packs are still central to the Ethiopian wolf’s life, but they spend a lot of their time off on their own and meet up at set intervals. It speaks to me, as someone who prefers to break off from others to get my work done. I love sharing what I’ve done with others, but I need my alone time to recharge.

There’s some other behaviors/instincts I could point to that connect me to this species such as being territorial over my space and preferring interacting with a small tight-knit pack vs just anybody. However, I feel like my biggest connection to being this species is feeling like their body is mine. I feel this so obviously, while on the other paw I feel like I have to dig around to line up examples of instincts to potentially write here.

So, as per usual, I tossed this species into my beloved term othervague.
When I first joined the alterhuman community, I identified as a therian and I did so for about two years before othervague was coined and I moved to that term.

Per the original coining post of the term.

Othervague
Defined as an other- (-kin, -link, -kith, -hearted, etc.) identity that either:

1. features confusion between which derivation of identity it is (I, personally, plan on using it because I am unsure whether my -types are voluntarily or not)
2. whose user has a disdain for the boundaries between each term (a sentiment expressed as early as Tirl & Flip Windtree's 2002 article Just Be on otherkin.net)

Originally, I identified this way because I didn’t like the in-fighting in the community over what it meant to be a “real” therian. My identity felt fluid. I just wanted to enjoy myself in my own sandbox in the corner where I could simply enjoy being as I was, no matter what that meant at the moment, and scratch around in the sand freely. No one was going to fakeclaim me when I was the sole othervague user (now there’s like 3 of us!).

Nowadays, I like the term othervague for its other definition - outside of describing an identity that cannot be easily fit inside a single box - it also is for identities you don’t wish to label further. I want to spend time experiencing Ethiopian wolf as it comes without worrying which tidy label it should fall under. The broadness of this label isn’t for everyone, but it suits me just fine. No one has ever given me shit about it either, nor implied my identity was less than for choosing this term to describe myself.

I do still have a soft spot for the term therian, because it’s how I originally came to the community. But, I feel a disconnect with the “feeling like an animal” part. Maybe one day I’ll return to it.