You know, I really hope that no fool blurts out the ending of the Harry Potter series before I can read the book. If so, I'll be seriously cranky about it. As it is, I'm taking my speed reading self off to one of those bookstore parties, along with the ever-adventerous Theresa, where we'll be able to buy the book as soon as it goes on sale at 12:01 in the morning.

This is probably the first time in my life when I've actually been a part of some huge popular culture experience. I mean, certainly I was always a Star Wars fan, but living way out in The Land That Time Forgot as a kid there was no way I'd have ever gotten a ride to a theater to see it....

more than once, even if I'd had the money to do so (which I didn't) And even then, I remember the one reasonable neighbor we had confessing to my parents, who had liked the movie rather well, that she didn't like it. "I must be the only person in America who thought it stank." she said.

And I remember thinking, "Well, good for you! At least you're not fake about it."

After that I was out of sinc with my generation. While I was certainly up late enough, I never watched Saturday Night Live since it conflicted with rebroadcasts of OLD radio shows from my grandmother's day. I found Cheers annoying and Sienfeld boring. All the Jason and Freddie and whats-his-name movies I found first too gory and then too stupid, and often too gory and stupid at the same time.I didn't care who shot J.R. as long as he stayed dead so I didn't have to hear about him any more. (Did you know that "Dallas" is a huge hit in Afghanistan? I've heard that the Afghan people feel it's "a classic story of brother against brother") I didn't give a crap who killed Laura Palmer because I was involved with the lives of the folks in Cicely, Alaska throughout almost all the seasons of Northern Exposure. (that was in between long bouts of having given up television all together). I drank tea through the rise and fall and rise again of coffee, listened to folk through the rise and fall and rise again of folk music and am one of two people in America who like bluegrass but hate country.

But, I was an early fan of Harry and the Hogwarts Crowd. Or, more specifically, a fan of Rowlings writing. What I remember thinking when I read the first Harry Potter book was "Man, this woman really remembers what it's like to be young." And when I got the critical passage of the 6th book I was absolutely SHOCKED. I mean, I read all kinds of stuff and I read all the time - I'm sure The Hub will bury me with a book in my hand, but it had been YEARS since I'd read anything that was actually so surprising that I had to go back and read the passage 3 times to make sure I'd read it right. I mean, I wasn't surprised that the character who died died, I was just shocked about who killed him.

And now, late comers are asking me what it's all about. It's a weird feeling.

Of course, it's almost impossible to explain the appeal to folks who haven't read any of the books. But since you're probably not going to read six books in 3 days, I'll give you my spin on it: simply put, Rowling remembers that young people have a LOT on their minds. You don't have to be snatched out of the mundane world of Muggles (non-magical people) plunked down in a magical world to find the new world you experience as you start junior high confusing, enchanting, problematic, and weird. And sure, our hero has a seriously bad-ass enemy who is not well understood by most of the people around him. Who doesn't know what that's like? After all if you have an enemy nobody can know that enemy as well as you do - he's YOUR enemy, not nessasarily everybody else's enemy. Of course, Voldemort is everybody's enemy, except for his followers, the Death Eaters, but he's really got it in for Harry, and Harry has a particular bone to pick with him too, seeing as how Voldemort killed his parents. Sure, Harry has a specific problem by now in that it's up to him to save the world.....

but isn't that the specific problem of all young people? Don't all of us know, somewhere, deep inside, that we have something important to contribute to the world, if only we can figure out how to do it? Well, that's what the Harry Potter books have been about so far. They're a person trying find his particular place in his particular world, making choices about what to keep and what to leave behind, how to tell his true friends from people who just want to hang around him for their own reasons, how to work with and when to work against authority. Thats the magic which has hooked so many people....the Magic is just icing on the cake