THE GEEKY NURSE

Part of what annoys me so much about the fact that Ginny’s trauma was never adequately addressed in the aftermath of the whole Chamber of Secrets ordeal is that it doesn’t feel purposeful. It reads like JKR either didn’t care enough to explore it or straight up forgot. But the fact that Ginny kind of … disappears for a bit and that her experiences in her first year are barely addressed afterwards could totally have served a purpose if JKR had actively made and owned the decision to write her like that and address these things later. Really only takes a bit of re-framing and re-writing later on.

It’d still be sad as shit: It really speaks to the tragedy of Ginny’s whole case that as far as we know, she went through much of the aftermath alone. She pulled herself up from rock bottom and learned to function with this terrible thing having happened to her and on top of it all, had to be the person to remind everyone around her that it happened in the first place.

“Lucky you”, and all that.

(I feel inclined to say it also speaks to her strength that she did do it alone and came out stronger on the other side or whatever, and while I don’t disagree with that, that feels like I’m bordering on glorifying the whole thing, so, hm.)

But it’s not all that unfathomable. Being possessed by a magical diary, that is also a Horcrux, which we don’t even KNOW at that point, can’t be a common occurrence. Ginny isn’t a textbook case. Therapy in whatever shape or form doesn’t really appear to be a thing in the wizarding world. So assume that just like in the book canon we got, the adults do mostly nothing, and all the kids around Ginny eventually just forget all this ever happened because, well, she seems fine, doesn’t she?

Whatever friends she made after that (we’ve not been led to believe she had many in her first year) didn’t know the details of what happened to her, so she would have had to put herself through the task of explaining it, over and over and over again, and risk not being believed or taken seriously because no one we meet ever DOES take this shit seriously. Or she’d have to keep it to herself and live with the fact that no one around her knew what was going on. Either way, she’s on her own.

So all that stays the same: that’s not a writing decision I would have taken issue with, really, if I’d felt like there was a point to it.

We get to the “Lucky you” scene, where Ginny has to remind everyone what happened to her, because even Harry, the person who went down into the Chamber and fought a basilisk to save her, just … forgot. Literally forgot. But this time when she walks out of that room, the people in Ginny’s life who were around for the Chamber of Secrets episode (Hermione is exempt from that - girl was literally petrified) don’t get the luxury of forgetting it again.

Instead they have to actually sit with what they were just told, and slowly it dawns on them that yeah, everyone, everyone in her life, really fucking failed Ginny. For years. Over and over and over again. And they’d have to work really hard to rectify that, because how do they, years after the fact? How do all of Ginny’s relationships heal from the fact that she’s been let down like that? 

It’ll impact her relationship with Harry and her relationship with her siblings (mostly with Ron, I’d argue, because, again, he was there) and her parents and her relationship with Hogwarts, too. Hogwarts as an institution failed her tremendously.

Maybe we come to the conclusion that the wizarding world is terrible at recognising, acknowledging or treating trauma (which … yeah! water is wet) or that you need to pay attention to your fucking friends. There’s a consequence to making her do this alone, and if she has to do it alone, then she deserves for the consequences to be acknowledged and dealt with.

And heck, all this even explains why she’s not particularly present or involved in the main plots for a while there. It’s not that unfathomable that if your baby older brother and his bestie save you from your certain death, but then don’t recognise this will have lasting effects on you, or fail to check up on you, you’ll start to pull away. Develop some complicated feelings towards them. Do things on your own.

Instead, we get my most hated line in all seven Harry Potter books, and yes, that’s including Albus Severus:

“On the other hand, Ginny Weasley was perfectly happy again.” Harry Potter & the Chamber of Secrets, Bloomsbury paperback, page 320

That’s ONE (1) chapter after she NARROWLY ESCAPES DEATH and I’m going to lose my FUCKING SHIT ABOUT IT.

Like, having read the rest of the books, having read the “Lucky you” scene, having thought about the “Lucky you” scene EXCESSIVELY, this feels almost comically naive. Which is, you know, fair, considering we’ve got a literal twelve-year-old narrating, but we know he’s wrong, which leads me right back to the beginning of this monstrosity of a post. And we might hear it from Harry, but he’s no more naive than every. single. adult. involved in this. So, one more time with feeling: blindly assuming that “Ginny Weasley was perfectly happy again” mere pages after the showdown in the Chamber of Secrets was a TERRIBLE MISTAKE. 

And she deserved to have that acknowledged somehow.

To top it all of, my very favourite play weirdly and clumsily backtracks on the whole disaster:

“After I came out of hospital - everyone ignored me, shut me out - other than, that is, the boy who had everything - who came across the Gryffindor common room and challenged me to a game of Exploding Snap. People think they know all there is to know about you, but the best bits of you are - have always been - heroic in really quiet ways. My point is - after this is over, just remember if you could that sometimes people - but particularly children - just want someone to play Exploding Snap with.”

Harry Potter & the Cursed Child, page 368 of the PDF I just pirated, because, as you can imagine, I don’t own a copy of Cursed Child.

Which is very nice, and never happened.

You know, given that Harry was a) TWELVE YEARS OLD and b) canonically has a “if it didn’t literally kill you it can’t have been that bad” mentality (reread his fight with Ron in Deathly Hallows and tell me I’m wrong, that’s EXACTLY how that thing started, and that was ABOUT GINNY, TOO!), it’s perfectly reasonable and in character that that didn’t happen.

Which is not a good. But it makes sense. And it was worth exploring. At the very least, it was worth acknowledging.

J, you’re welcome to disagree with me completely and I’ll hold you in high regard (well, I already do but that’s beside the point!) but I’ve always taken this as a metaphor on how trauma victims are perceived, especially by someone who treats trauma as “if it didn’t kill you it must not have been that bad” mindset and how, if there isn’t performative aspects of post-trauma actions (including one I read from a court case last week where a guy had 7 SA cases against him and the defense attorney mentioned that she was out getting her nails done 2 days after she was assaulted and he blamed her for “not being traumatized enough” so she must be lying.

Harry, bless his broken 12 year old self (and up to and including 17) really was a bit of a knobhead (and kinda self-centered too which is how kids are at that age) in that he’s the unreliable narrator and to him, her appearing “perfectly happy” means it must not have been that bad when it really was that bad and worse.

People die. He gets bent. People are traumatized and it’s a *shrug* (which is a symptom of PTSD/C-PTSD) so for him being the unreliable narrator to see “it wasn’t that bad since she didn’t die” and “she was perfectly happy” when she really wasn’t in the least - demonstrates his myopic viewpoint and a metaphor on how people view others who have been traumatized.

Everything else is on point - the siblings failed her; the adults really failed her; the institution as a whole failed her; society failed her so the only way she was going to overcome it was by herself which seems to be normalcy rather than an aberration, especially for juvenile girls.

Did Jo write it ham-handed? Oh yeah and then some. I have horror stories to curl most talons and make granite weep for what I keep locked away in sharing burdens with others. But to tell someone who was possessed for almost an entire year and it nearly kills her that “she was perfectly happy” seems performative ignorance.

Like a Depressed person can have a good day and look happy and then cease to exist the next - the trauma victim can appear “happy” and be completely broken inside.

It’s a tremendous failing on most people in not seeing the need to help, even if it’s only to make a phone call to get someone the professional help they do need.

Am I giving the Author too much credit? Possibly. But that’s how I always read it from day one - that while she’s learning a new normal and pulling away from those she’s closest to and has complicated feelings towards the same ones who failed to protect her, everyone else thinks it’s NBD since she’s not locked away in the Janus Thickey ward at St. Mungo’s or kept hidden at home or hiding under her covers in her bedroom for good.

“It must not have been that bad if she’s happy right now.”

From the little information we get from the books (up until the “Lucky You”), we would get the impression that the kids are alright. But in Ginny’s experience, she has nothing to do but carry on, plaster on the smile because everyone else has. That is why I consider her one of the strongest and bravest of the Gryffindor because she had to do this all alone. Harry is surrounded by people who care for him and support him. He shares with Ron and Hermione. But with Ginny it is unclear who she has as a true confidante. It seems like she has many people who like her in the following books, but does she have any one with whom she can trust with her fears (which would be even more difficult after the last person she confided in used her secrets against her in horrible ways?). I head cannon that Luna plays a significant role here, but I agree that JKR dropped the ball in exploring Ginny further and providing an example of someone who was failed by so many people, but still managed to make it through. That is the main reason I hate how she is portrayed in the movies— as a mere plot device or prop for Harry. She was so much more than that!

darcy doesn’t sing a single note even during conversations where everyone else is singing at him that is until the argument following his first attempt at proposing to lizzy where you can see his restraint fall away

his first big solo is the letter he writes her

gelsey bell is mary and the unofficial narrator and she sits down at her piano to describe whats going on but before she can ever reveal her feelings on the matter, starting with that gelsey bell scream, mr bennet comes over and does the whole ‘that’s nice dear but give someone else a turn’

mr wickham has this huge ballad about how darcy ruined his life and its super melodramatic and touching

mr collins proposal to lizzy is an absolute bop that he gets so into he forgets for a moment what he’s doing he’s just owning the stage

wickham has a song where he’s trying to seduce lydia but she’s not even listening she’s just monologuing about how excited she is to get laid

during darcy’s second proposal he keeps hesitating waiting for lizzy to interrupt him like she has done every time before but she doesn’t say anything until he’s finished

at the end mary sits down at the piano and right where she’d usually be interrupted, kitty joins her and harmonises

 jane and bingley have the adorable upbeat romantic duet which is just them being super polite like ‘oh so nice to have you here’ ‘so nice to be here’ interspersed with their inner monologue which is just them being like fucking jesus I’m so in love

the bingley sisters probably have a really cool mean solo

lady catherine has this terrifying disney villain song in the garden

I was a little nervous. I'd loved Gaiman's work for a long time, and had dithered over which books I wanted him to sign as the limit was two. Eventually, I settled on Stardust and Fragile Things - as it was the Fragile Things tour (if I remember correctly), and Stardust had a special place in my heart.

As soon as I stepped inside, I realised there was absolutely no reason to be nervous. There was this chilled out, completely at ease guy with a leather jacket and curly hair. He smiled at his fans. He actually talked to them, and was actually interested in what they had to say, not wanting to hurry them along. I took a (very bad) picture while he signed someone else's book.

Then came my turn, and my nerves completely vanished. He asked for my name, and I spelled it for him as Richelle is quite unusual.

"That's a really cool name," he said, "Where did your parents get that from?" I explained it was my aunt's middle name. "What does it mean?" He asked. I told him I didnt know, but that it was the French feminine of Richard, after my great grandad.

"Ah, that makes sense, with the Ri..."

He signed both books, and drew me some lovely little doodles. ("I drew a cracked heart for you.")

(I don't have a good enough memory to remember this so clearly by the way, but I blogged about it immediately when I left the shop, and I've been able to refer back to it)

What a lovely man, I thought.

A few months later, I went to a Terry Pratchett book signing during his tour for Making Money. Again in Forbidden Planet, there was a two book limit, and as I'd already promised a friend in the USA a signed copy of Making Money, that meant I had one book for myself. Then I remembered Good Omens, and kicked myself for not thinking of bringing it to the Gaiman tour a few months before. Oh well, I thought, there's always next time.

The first thing I saw of Terry was his hat. Then I noticed his laugh, which was very infectious. He signed Making Money, dedicated to my friend, and then he spied my copy of Good Omens. "Ah, this old thing." He grinned and signed away. I saw the dedication and laughed, and stepped away, feeling like he knew something I didn't.

That's that, I thought, I'll wait for another Gaiman signing.

I had to wait a little while, as it turns out, until his signing for The Ocean at the End of the Lane in Ely cathedral in 2013. This time, I wasn't so lucky. My friend and I drove from London to Cambridge, and there was an accident on the way. By the time we got there, there were hundreds upon hundreds of people in front of us.

This signing also included a talk, and Gaiman spoke about his childhood, his experiences as an author and answered lots of questions. He also read a passage of his book, Fortunately, the Milk, and the audience were in hysterics. Seriously, no matter how old you are, you'll love that book.

We queued up to sign in the order we arrived, and we queued for a long time. The girl standing in front of my friend and I was obviously very excited, and she struck up conversation with us. She told us she was heavily dyslexic, but she'd read every single Neil Gaiman book. She enjoyed his work so much, that even though reading was difficult for her, she devoured his books and they made her love to read.

When it came to our turn, Neil had been signing for hours, it was late. He must have been tired. But he was still genial and pleasant to the people in front of us. The girl in front of us stepped up, and she was so overwhelmed, she couldn't speak properly as he signed her books. She was almost panicking, but she still managed to tell him about her dyslexia and despite it, her love of his books. Neil put down his pen, and spoke softly, kindly. "Would you like a hug?" She nodded, and laughed and cried and hugged him so tightly.

When it came to my turn, I said he was very kind, and he smiled. He quickly signed my copy of The Ocean at the End of the Lane, and then spied the next book I'd set on the table, open to the page where Terry had signed. His smile widened. "Ah," he said, dipping his pen in his ink, "I almost never get to finish this joke any more, as Terry no longer does signings."

He drew an asterisk next to where Terry had signed, drew an arrow to the bottom, and then finished the joke.

PORTALS CAN’T MOVE.

If you place a portal on a surface, and then that surface moves, the portal immediately closes. A good example of this is one of the last test chambers in the first game. There is a surface that, upon a button press, is tilted upwards at an angle. If you place a portal there and THEN hit the button, the portal disappears.

The ONE, SINGULAR EXCEPTION to this has been in Portal 2 when you are deactivating the neurotoxin generator. But it is fair to assume in all other cases a portal would not be allowed to move.

Harry’s losses are so hard. His parents. Sirius. Dumbledore. When Ron is gone, Harry mourns him as dead; he’s gone, he’s lost forever, Harry will never see him again.

And then Ron comes back. Ron coming back to him is a miracle.

I have a theory that the valued quality of each of the four Houses isn’t really about the personality of its students.

The valued quality of each of the four Houses has to do with how they perceive magic.

Stick with me a second: Hogwarts is a school to study magic. Magic as Hogwarts teaches it can be seen as many things: a natural talent, a gift, a weapon, etc.

So how you believe magic should be used will both reflect your personality and change how you handle that power.

“Their daring, nerve, and chivalry set Gryffindors apart,” Gryffindors perceive magic as a weapon. Gryffindors tend to excel in aggressive forms of magic, like offensive and defensive spells, and they are good at dueling. But a true Gryffindor knows that the power is a responsibility, and so they must always use their powers to stand up for what’s right. They are the sword of the righteous, which makes them as good at Defense Against the Dark Arts as they are at combat magic.

Hufflepuffs believe that magic is a gift and that the best gifts are to be given away. Hufflepuffs, “loyal and just,” would naturally abhor the idea of jealously guarding magic or using it to hurt someone else. So Hufflepuffs share their magic to benefit of Muggles, like the Fat Friar, to protect the overlooked, like Newt Scamander with his creatures, or to oppose those who would use magic to torment and bully, like the Hufflepuffs who stood with the DA and the battle of Hogwarts.

Slytherins are the opposite: they believe their magic is a treasure that they have been entrusted to protect. The Slytherin fascination with purity, with advantage, with cunning and secrecy–all of which were perverted by the Death Eaters–comes from the idea that people with magic in their veins have been given something special that it is their duty to protect at all costs. And perhaps they aren’t entirely wrong: power in the wrong hands can be dangerous. And power interfering at will with Muggle affairs is a gross presumption that could turn the course of history. Though the series shows some of the worst that Slytherin can be, “evil,” is not a natural Slytherin tendency. “Cautious,” is.

Ravenclaws believe that magic is an art form, one that is beautiful and should be appreciated and studied for its own sake. If “wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure,” then asking what magic is for is useless. It’s more important to immerse oneself in magic for its own sake. Ravenclaws push the boundaries of magic to see if they can, hence Hermione’s spell experiment on the DA coins being dubbed a Ravenclaw quality, but like Luna Lovegood in the pursuit of extraordinary creatures: they can also be content to plumb the depths of what already exists.

And this explains why all the Weasley children were sorted into Gryffindor. Family forms our values— and we are more likely to retain those values when our family is close knit. The Weasleys believe that they have a responsibility to use their magic to care for and defend those who can’t protect themselves because they are pure bloods. Whereas the Malfoys believe that their magic is a their birth right to be hoarded and protected because they are pure bloods. Same reasons but different values or motivations.