Diary: Harry Potter & Sea Creatures

I have had some good walks lately, and eaten some tasty fruity things, and yesterday I spent a high percentage of my time thinking about Harry Potter. I wrote this small analysis shortly after waking up:

I'm super sleepy and I just ate an 'oats and honey' bar and I'm thinking about all the characters I've ever read in books and all the characters that made me love them, and all the characters that were like empty shells I could fit myself inside to feel the narrative happening like it was happening to me.

And for some reason now I'm thinking about Harry Potter, the boy himself who I liked for being sarcastic and stubborn and gently rule-breaking and silly but also Worried About Things like me. The boy who is still all those things but now in retrospect also naive and irritatingly sure of himself when he shouldn't be sometimes, just like me too.

But he was both, he made sense as an outsider who was siding at this moment with Ron and at this other moment with Hermione, but he also made sense as me. I love Harry. I always identified with Luna a huge amount for her place as wide-eyed and creative weird girl, but it was Harry we saw into most of all, and he was me too.

Nice, huh? That's why I think it's important to write nonsense into drafts when you are barely awake or coherent. That's why I try to write notes and get my splintered thoughts down somewhere as much as possible, even when I don't feel like I have anything in my head, let alone anything to say. Because unthinking little notes on Harry Potter can turn into something that means something to you later on.

I've been really into reading, and after I finish Ender's Game this week I'm going to start reading some recent releases and hopefully some 2016 releases, because I really want to feel like I'm getting a sense for the scope of things that are being released now, as current in literature as it's possible to be. I also really like reading the popular books of the moment and being part of a wide-scale reading 'moment'. I want to read Room by Emma Donoghue, so that may well be next on my list (even though it's a 2010 release).

I also ended up idly watching a nature documentary on Saturday night about sea creatures and goings-on, and it reminded me how much I used to love watching them as a kid. They still retain that sense of awe that I had when I was young. It's a really nice thing to watch, quite relaxing and soothing despite the serious matter of, well, life.