The squonk is a fearsome critter from American folklore. The earliest written account of the squonk is from William T. Cox's Fearsome Creatures of the Lumberwoods--a book from which I take a lot of monsters. The squonk lives in the forests of northern Pennsylvania, and it's one of the many creatures that arise out of lumberjack tall tales. Lumberjacks' jobs were grueling and dangerous, and they were isolated out in the forests. Out in the wilderness with physically taxing jobs and no women-folk around, they did a lot of manly man activities like cutting down trees and wrestling and spitting. And since they were such manly men, their story telling had a competitive edge where they would constantly one-up each other.
Paul Bunyun was so big--How big was he?--He was so big that it took four storks to deliver him when he was born!
Paul Bunyun was so big that when he was three weeks old, he rolled around too much and knocked down five acres of timber!
They told stories to entertain on nights they were too exhausted to arm wrestle, but also to give some explanation to the mysterious tragedies that took place around them. Jeff wandered off into the woods and never came back? Eaten by a monster.
The squonk fits in this first category of tall tale. It doesn't kill or maim or lure people into the woods. It's just weird and maybe funny if you think about it in a certain light.
The squonk was so ugly--How ugly was it?--It looked like a pot-bellied pig, but with ill-fitting skin that wrinkled and bunched like a rhino. It was covered in warts and blemishes and clumpy patches of wiry hair. It was so ugly that it hid so no one could see it its ugliness. It was so ugly that it spent all its time crying.
The squonk can avoid capture by crying so hard that it turns into a puddle of tears. In almost every description of the squonk, it's mentioned that one time some guy caught a squonk in a bag, but by the time he brought it home/back to camp/to is competitor naturalist to prove the squonk's existence, the squonk had turned to liquid.
Even though it arises out of such a manly man tradition, and the squonk's ugliness and its over-exuberant emotions about being so ugly is meant to be a joke, you can guess that I latched onto something else in this story. People--especially women and especially young women--spend so much emotional labor on worrying about how ugly they are. Feeling so ugly that you just want to hide and cry constantly? I've been there. Feeling like you'll cry so hard, so focused on one single flaw that you might as well just turn into a puddle of tears? Yeah, I remember junior high.
There's a lesson in there, which is basically "don't be a squonk." Don't let your vanity get the best of you. Don't be so consumed with your perceived ugliness that it's the only thing the "More about the Squonk" post talks about. But then there's also a lesson in there about not focusing on other people's looks until they feel they have to hide away and lose themselves.
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