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| Seal or Selkie? (Photo by Chillum) |
In a strange case of real-life Jeopardy, the answer to a New
Zealander’s urgent query might have been: What is Selkie?
The New York Daily News reports that, while upstairs in her home one day, Annette Swoffer heard a clatter down below. She hightailed it down to the kitchen to investigate, and there was a baby seal. It had let itself in through the cat door, and was well on its way to the living room couch. Once there, it cuddled down for a nap.
Just how did this cute-as-could-be pinniped manage to drag its aquatically-adapted body all the way from the deep blue to the grassy green? Wikipedia reports that, albeit clumsily, pinnipeds (we call them seals) can move on land by “wriggling their front flippers and abdominal muscles.” This produced the “waddling” effect that Swoffer noted as her new pinniped “roomie” helped itself to her couch.
Sounds plausible - but not nearly as interesting as other possibilities. For instance, what if this “seal” were actually a Selkie?
Selkies look just like seals to the uninitiated. However, the Faroe Islanders, Icelanders, Irish and Scots have discovered that “seals” are sometimes only skin deep. In other words, mythological Selkies (aka “silkies” or “selchies” from the Old English seolh and the earlier Scots selich) can shed their seal-skin to become humans (which could be why some humans are still so fatally attracted to the skin of seals).
In the Faroe Islands, they tell tales of a farmer who hung out on the beach to watch the Selkies dance. These sleek females would slip out of their skins as the night progressed. The farmer was so overcome with passion that he stole one Selkie’s skin in order to force her to remain human and marry him. He then locked her skin in a chest and kept the key with him day and night. Years later, he left the house and forgot the key. His Selkie wife was able to reclaim her skin and escape back to sea (leaving their children behind). She then reunited with her Selkie husband and their two sons.
Perhaps this baby seal is actually one of those Selkie sons. Who really knows the answer to that one…
Resources
http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/baby-seal-sneaks-woman-home-cat-door-curls-couch-a-nap-article-1.991767
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinniped
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selkie
Copyright December 16, 2011 by Linda Van Slyke All Rights Reserved
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