Exactly eleven years ago, my childhood was turned completely around by my desire to receive a letter. I'm sure you very well know what kind of letter I'm talking about. That which is contained in an envelope where an address is written in slanting, tiny letters. That which would take you to a place filled with everything you could only dream of.
I hoped, just like every child my age, that one day I would wake up to an owl post.
And in most ways, when I look back from where I am now, I guess I got that dream.
I was one of the lucky children in the world to be given the chance to join a world that is filled with magic, goodness, friendship, family, and love. I became, in the tiniest of circumstances, a part of something that defined magic anew.
Along with more than half of the world, I got to enter the world of Harry Potter. From the day he was delivered to the Dursleys with nothing but a lightning scar on his forehead and a marked life ahead, I watched him grow and discover who he really was, fight for his friends, and save the only home he's known from being corrupted by the evil.
Year after year, we waited for his new adventure. We anticipated, knowing he could probably get past anything (heck, he got to "unofficially" battle a troll at the age of 11, didn't he?). With every bit of himself that he shared with us, we developed a kind of friendship that crossed the line between fantasy and reality.
But now, we got to see him end everything. We got to say goodbye, knowing "all is well" now. We got to witness the finale of something we've known since childhood.
We all have to grow up, eventually. Maybe this is one of those times. Must I say, it really is hard to grow up. Especially when one of the things you gotta do is let go and just commit to memory your happy times as a child. And Harry-time was, is and will always be, a happy one for me.
This is a difficult post to complete, I should admit. I ought to be saying goodbye, that's why. I logged in thinking about bidding farewell, acknowledging an end, and accepting he fact that I gotta let go now. But like everybody else, I find it difficult to the point of being heartbreaking.
What do you say after eleven years of emotionally and psychologically investing into something like Harry Potter? Nothing, I guess. This is a wordless stint, something you cannot easily describe. And perhaps, it will always be like this.
And I would always be back. To the place I call home, to the walls of pure magic, to the world where everyone gets accepted.
I would always be back, at night when I have a hard time sleeping. In any time of the day when I have nothing to do. At any moment when I just want to feel warm.
Because the child in me would always be there. No matter how much I've grown, matured, or learned. That child who waited for an owl by her window would always be within me.
Until the very end.
