Word of the Day - Storge

And an example from the news hole


ˈstɔːɡiː 

noun

archaic

natural or instinctual affection, as of a parent for a child

In C.S. Lewis’s The Four Loves, he talks through the four classical types of love: storge, philia, eros, and caritas, and storge was the one I’d never really seen discussed (let alone praised) before. You could translate it as fondness, and it’s easy for that to sound trivial or sentimental.

One way I think about storge if that it’s the kind of love you have for that one particular tree that sits three blocks from your house and marks the turn onto your street. It’s not that that tree is the tallest or most beautiful—it might not even be your favorite kind of tree in general—but it is your tree in a way no other tree is.

| Leah Libresco Sargeant, Festivals of Particularity