All About Harry

I wasn't always a Harry Potter fan. I am embarrassed to say I was actually quite anti-Harry Potter for a little while! I remember hearing about a book series that everyone was into when I was in middle school but I probably didn't really know much about Harry Potter until 9th grade or so. I was very hesitant to jump on the bandwagon and be like everyone else. I decided it looked pretty stupid. This probably wasn't helped by my not getting along with a girl at church very much who happened to be completely and utterly obsessed with it, so I had bad connotations with it. My dad, an avid reader, started reading them and wanted to buy the first movie when it came out. I'm pretty sure I told him I'd burn it if I found it! Of course there wouldn't be follow through but how ridiculous!

As time went on and I started to mature more (thank goodness!). The spurt of anti-Harry Potter was followed mostly by indifference for a couple of years until my sister, Lindsay, asked me to watch the first movie with her. I was trying to be more open minded at that point so we watched it. Then we watched the second movie. The rest of the movies hadn't come out yet and I wanted to know what happened! So, I read books three through five (all that were out at the time) and then went back at read one and two. Actually, Lindsay and I read the 4th and 5th books aloud to each other. We cried when Cedric died, we laughed at Ron's funny quips but mostly we just bonded. It really felt magical! Suddenly, I understood why everyone had been jumping on the bandwagon. It wasn't just some bandwagon! It was really good. I could have kicked myself for how immature I'd been (by the way, the girl and I eventually became friendly with each other).

After that I must say that I am the one who became utterly and completely obsessed with Harry Potter. I drew pictures of scenes from the book. I wrote and read fan stories that about Harry Potter (I can't believe I'm blogging that! I used to be so embarrassed about it!). I checked MuggleNet and The Leaky Cauldron on a frequent basis. One time Lindsay and I sent birthday presents to Rupert Grint as part of a MuggleNet package. I went to the midnight release of the Goblet of Fire dressed up like Hermione, who I dressed up as on Halloween more than once... I went to bookstores for the midnight release of both the Half-Blood Prince and the Deathly Hallows.

When the Deathly Hallows was coming out I decided to re-read all the books in preparation for it. I have a rule that I avoid reading the books too close to the movies because I don't want to compare them, even though I still remember pretty much everything (for some reason my brain holds on to all things Harry Potter in finite detail). Anyway, the fifth movie came out two or three weeks before the last book so you can imagine how fast I zipped through the HUGE fifth and 6th books. I left the last chapter of the Half-Blood Prince so that I could read it right before starting the Deathly Hallows and move seamlessly through the books. I cried when people died but I especially sobbed when Dobby died because of how he died, loyal to Harry to the very end.
Though the obsession has died down a lot, I still keep The Harry Potter Lexicon bookmarked as a tab at the top of my screen just for fun. Bryan and I saw the Deathly Hallows:Part I when we were just dating and now we'll see Part II as a married couple! We are so excited for the movie. We've had these puppies:
on our fridge for a week now! We are going to the IMAX theatre! Bryan says I'm going to cry. I don't know if I will... but I he's probably right.

Anyway, Harry Potter has been such a huge part of my life and I'm kind of sad for it to end. At least there is Pottermore. More than that, though, we'll get to read these stories to our kids and get to be there when they are living this story for the first time. I cannot wait for that day. :)