It all ended. Now what?
This is not a movie review. That will probably have to wait until I'm less emotional about the whole deal.
On thursday or friday, my coworker (who is a year younger than I) somewhat casually mentioned that she'd never read HP and never saw the movies, and had no idea what the plot was about. I was somewhat stunned by this as who the hell doesn't know at this point? She mentioned that she used to read a lot of fantasy literature when she was young, but then HP came out and (I'm almost directly quoting here) "all these adults were reading it and I was like, get a life already!" I'm not sure she realizes how much that hurt, because yes, the books are YA lit, yes, there are issues in the writing and the storytelling, but for me, HP is so much more than a series of books.
I'm horrifically sad right now, but as I've been discussing with fortysixthhour, it's not really about the story, even though Snape's Death, Snape's memories and the scene in the Great Hall where everyone is gathering up the dead hit me like a punch in the gut and left me almost literally struggling to breathe.
I've seen so many posts this weekend where people are mourning the death of their childhood, and I feel the same way. I picked up HP my freshman year of high school, when I was having trouble with friends stabbing me in the back and not really fitting in anywhere. A few years later I stumbled onto online fandom and that was it, my life was changed.
Without fandom, fortysixthhour and I would probably never have talked for more than a few minutes in the newark airport. We certainly would not have ended up as such good friends without spending half of the plane ride to Tel Aviv talking about Snarry fic. I'd have never found the House fandom if people at Queerditch Pub hadn't started watching. Or Doctor Who if my Flist hadn't gone nuts over the fact that Barty Crouch Jr. was about to be the Doctor.
There are too many people in my life that I'd never have met without Harry Potter and the wonderful years I spent in the HP fandom. If I was going to name everyone I'd probably just have to copy/paste my flist, because the HP fandom is the foundation of everything I do these days, pretty much.
So when my coworker says "get a life" in that horrible, dismissive and condescending way, I'm not sure how to tell her that I did get one.
Because of Harry Potter.
***
This entry was originally posted at dreamwidth. Please comment wherever you see fit.
On thursday or friday, my coworker (who is a year younger than I) somewhat casually mentioned that she'd never read HP and never saw the movies, and had no idea what the plot was about. I was somewhat stunned by this as who the hell doesn't know at this point? She mentioned that she used to read a lot of fantasy literature when she was young, but then HP came out and (I'm almost directly quoting here) "all these adults were reading it and I was like, get a life already!" I'm not sure she realizes how much that hurt, because yes, the books are YA lit, yes, there are issues in the writing and the storytelling, but for me, HP is so much more than a series of books.
I'm horrifically sad right now, but as I've been discussing with fortysixthhour, it's not really about the story, even though Snape's Death, Snape's memories and the scene in the Great Hall where everyone is gathering up the dead hit me like a punch in the gut and left me almost literally struggling to breathe.
I've seen so many posts this weekend where people are mourning the death of their childhood, and I feel the same way. I picked up HP my freshman year of high school, when I was having trouble with friends stabbing me in the back and not really fitting in anywhere. A few years later I stumbled onto online fandom and that was it, my life was changed.
Without fandom, fortysixthhour and I would probably never have talked for more than a few minutes in the newark airport. We certainly would not have ended up as such good friends without spending half of the plane ride to Tel Aviv talking about Snarry fic. I'd have never found the House fandom if people at Queerditch Pub hadn't started watching. Or Doctor Who if my Flist hadn't gone nuts over the fact that Barty Crouch Jr. was about to be the Doctor.
There are too many people in my life that I'd never have met without Harry Potter and the wonderful years I spent in the HP fandom. If I was going to name everyone I'd probably just have to copy/paste my flist, because the HP fandom is the foundation of everything I do these days, pretty much.
So when my coworker says "get a life" in that horrible, dismissive and condescending way, I'm not sure how to tell her that I did get one.
Because of Harry Potter.
***
This entry was originally posted at dreamwidth. Please comment wherever you see fit.