Humor me...

Let's talk for a minute about what a genius J.K. Rowling is. But before we do that, I should preface our discussion:

I don't like Harry Potter, haven't even read all the books, certainly haven't read any of them multiple times. I also don't have a stuffed-animal monkey named George after George Weasley who travels the world with me. Come on folks, I'm 22; that would just be ridiculous.

Oh wait, I was just talking about some other person. Or alternatively, I was confusing the parts of speech indicating negation and affirmation. For a more accurate representation, please transpose all negative statements to the affirmative. Yes...that's better.

So, about Harry Potter... I don't want you all to worry too much about this situation; the one in which I adore Harry and the rest of the Hogwarts gang. I am not an oppressive Harry Potter fan. I'm not the type to react to the admission that you “didn't like” or “never got into” Harry Potter with the statement, “yeah, well, that's because you're crazy.” While I have no cognitive frame of reference for this point of view, I accept it as absolutely legitimate for those individuals to whom it belongs. It's just like George Lakoff says in his book, Don't Think of an Elephant: it would take years of careful consideration in order for me to develop the pathways in my brain which might allow me intellectual access to this point of view. And like the Republicans in Lakoff's example, I'm quite happy living in ignorance, or at least the familiarity of my own knowing, beating the mental paths of Harry Potter-adoration with which I am so very familiar.

(For those of you tired of hearing Harry Potter praised, now is a good time to tune out and go read about politics or underground music or computers or something...)

So back to H.P. himself. Let's talk about how ingeniously crafted the last Harry Potter book really is. Not that I just re-read it or anything. I didn't just finish it in the Mumbai airport waiting for my plane to Delhi. Nor was I forced to wrap up extra-secretive-like in my shawl in an attempt to conceal the tears evoked by the final chapter of Harry's adventures. Hang on, it's that negative-affirmative thing again. Oh well, figure it out.

So, let's talk about how great all this stuff is. (Also, let's switch from general-unspecific-meaningless-word mode into the mode that's...the opposite of that.) Let's talk about inspiration and artistic beauty, or about how every once in a while you come across something which reminds you what life is all about, and pulls the cord which turns on the bare lightbulb right at the top of the inside of your skull and illuminates all the magnificence in there that you had forgotten about. The lightbulb is old, and a little harsh, and the room it illuminates isn't exactly tidy, but it shows you everything that's up there. A lot of its covered in dust, some of it is broken, but just look at everything you've got stored-up inside you, waiting to be used, shown off, stretched out, unfurled, taped-together and used again, no less brilliant for its scars.

Let's talk about how I should've read the last book this time around with a pencil and pack of stickies to mark all the places articulating lifeandbeyond lessons under the guise of “fiction.” Let's talk about when a certain character says with a smile, “Of course it is happening inside your head...but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

Let's talk about how deeply unfair it is that Harry should have to make the choices he does, that no person of any age should be required to do the same. How, with all the magic and metaphore and beauty of life and living, sometimes it feels like nothing more than stumbling through the semi-darkness and banging your toe, followed by cracking your head so hard that your eyes water, first from pain, then from frustration and anger, finally from some desperate sense that you are irreversibly lost. How, at the end of some days, it all just feels wrong, unfair, blatantly cruel, awkward, unromatic and devoid of anything remotely resembling art or beauty. Sometimes it is just life, the life that involves tripping and snot and using the toilet and people dying much too young or maybe not but in any case you're not ready to let them go. Let's talk about that.

Or maybe we should talk about how Harry finds love in just the right person, so maybe its possible for me too. About how, in all his glory and success and victory, he is still a human, perfect in no light, bodhisattvah but not the kind that's gotten there yet.

Let's talk about how, if Harry, in all his imperfection and humanity, is so very remarkable (and he is, I think), this means that so are we all, that we are there too, being, for that's all we can do, in a place of magnificent incompleteness, complete in that mere fact.

Let's talk about how, in the end, Harry is essentially and fearfully alone.