Petunia not a squib but...

[Maria Ribera]

No: HPFGUIDX 110460

With all these very interesting theories about Petunia floating around, 
i started thinking about what JK may have tried to say when she stated 
that Petunia is not a squib, "but that is a good guess".

I have been reading around a bit trying to figure out what people 
understand as Squib, and was glad to see that i am not the only one who 
thinks that Squibs, who are people with some magical trace but not 
strong enough to perform magic, can be born both of wizarding and 
muggle families. People like Filch or  Mrs. Figg are born in the middle 
of the magic world, know it well (even better than the muggle world in 
most cases, i dare say) and stay in it without the capacity to perform 
magic. We have seen two so far, and they are oldish, but i guess a 
young squib would continue to live with his/her magic family without 
problems. For instance, if Neville hadn't turned out magical enough, he 
would probably continue to live with his grandmother, although maybe 
would attend the local muggle school to get some education. In the same 
line, those muggle-born people who have a bit of magic but not enough 
to be fully magical are somehow squibs. Most of those in this second 
category might not even notice. Harry had no idea of the magical world 
before his 11th birthday, and while he was aware that strange things 
happened to him, he couldn't relate them to magic and didn't change his 
life in the muggle world at all. So if a "muggle-squib" has even less 
magic than a full wizard like Harry, there might be even less chances 
for him/her to notice.

Now, on the issue of bitterness. We only know two official Squibs, so 
we can't really tell much. But we can easily see that Filch is a very 
bitter man. He seems to be angry at the whole world for his lack of 
magic and tries hard to exploit the little he has (Quickspell). Mrs. 
Figg we can't tell if she is bitter or not, but i don't think she is. 
She seems to have found her place in life and still be useful in the 
wizarding world without enough magic. On the other hand we have 
Petunia, who is very bitter at her sister for the reasons we all know.

So here is my Theory:

Part 1 - Squibs that are born of Muggle parents are not called Squibs, 
but something else. Let us called them Mibs for now. We can change that 
later. They are a closer to muggles than to Squibs. They might never 
know they have a bit of magical blood, but could be aware of strange 
things happening to them "as if by magic". However, if in contact with 
a magical person, they might reach some understanding of what the 
strange things happening are and realize their condition of Mibs. Like 
Squibs, they might be able to interact with Kneazles, do some very 
simple magic (Quickspell) or see Dementors. However, most of them do 
not know what these are, unless they are aware of the wizarding world.

Part 2 - Petunia is a Mib. This might explain why JK Rowling said that 
Petunia is not a Squib but... If Squibs are rare, Mibs are even rarer. 
They are basically Muggles. She would have lived completely unaware of 
magic if it wasn't because her sister was fully magical. It gives her a 
big reason to be bitter at Lily. Also explains why she knows about 
Dementors... she could have seen them, not only heard about them.

Now, anyone ones to give their point of view on this pet theory of mine?

Maria




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