The Doldrums

Mom.

(Source: )

What they did not want you to ever find out is that your generation, the generation born between 1980-1995, actually outnumbers the Baby Boomers. They knew that if you ever turned your eye towards political reform, you could change the world. They tried to keep you sated on vapid television shows and vapid music. They cut off your education and fed you brain candy. They took away your music and gave you Top Ten pop stations. They cut off your art and replaced it with endless reality shows for you to plug into, hoping you would sit quietly by as they ran the world. We as a society are only as strong as our weakest link. Give them hell.

—Unknown.

What does it mean to be part of the ‘Harry Potter generation’? Surely it’s something unique to each of us. Harry is more than just a character in a book or film. The Harry Potter Generation know the intense, clenching excitement of waiting for the next book to be released. We know what it feels like to keep reading through the night because we just can’t put it down until it’s finished. We scorn the failures of the films (but secretly go to the cinema to re-watch them three times). We know the power of friendship with people we’ve never met, but spend hours talking to online. Yes, we read fan fiction, not because there was anything missing from the series, but because the thought of letting it all go is just too painful.

As a child, I read all of the books my mother read when she was a child, passed down to her from her own mother’s childhood collection. I can’t help but feel sorry for my children, because Harry Potter won’t be the same for them. When they finish one book, the next will already be on the shelf, waiting for them. It’s that which separates us, which makes us unique.

The Harry Potter Generation, if nothing else, learned to be patient.