The Experience

It’s been over week since the big Harry Potter excitement. Amazing how long it took the day to get here and how quickly it was gone. I promised that I would fill you in on my experiences and thoughts and haven’t gotten around to doing it until today. So here it is, late, as usual. That’s the story of my life.

I met my mom & dad at the Clackamas Town Center Barnes & Noble about 5:45 on Friday night. The parking lot was already packed. I wasn’t able to find a handicapped parking place near the store, so after circling the lot with a bunch of other people finally had to settle for one waaaaay away from the store. Luckily, my dad saw me pull in to the spot, so he was able to swing his car over and pick me up. Even that early in the evening (the party was scheduled to start at 8 p.m.), I could see through the window that the store was packed. So we went off to Red Robin to have dinner. Then we went back to my parents’ house to count down the time until we could get our books. We should have gone to see the movie, I think.

Finally we left to go wait at the store for our books. We got there about 11:00 or so. The store had lots of events going on that started at 8:00, so the place was totally packed. We stood near the door waiting for my dad who had to park the car out in the back forty, and Channel 6 News came out to film the madness. There was a huge crowd of people around the camera shouting “Har-ry Potter! Har-ry Potter!” at incredibly high volume. If I can find the video clip of it, I’ll attach the link here. You can actually see my mom for just a second in it.

So we hung out at the store for an hour or so. My dad summoned up a chair for me (no, he didn’t say accio chair, he just asked someone if they were using it) and I sat and watched the people while my mom went and got in line. It was very enjoyable. There were a lot of kids there, of course. Most of them were high school age I would say. A few smaller kidlets, a couple in strollers, but the majority were teenagers. There was even the occasional adult with no children attached. Lots of folks were dressed up. There was one family that had two identical twin teenaged red-headed boys with “F” and “G” on their sweaters who were the spitting image of my idea of Fred & George. Their little sister had long red hair and perfectly fit with my mental picture of Ginny before she was old enough to go to Hogwarts. Another lady had a big floppy hat with a stuffed vulture on it. One guy looked like Sirius Black after he got out of Azkabahn, but I don’t think he was actually dressed up. People are so clever. I didn’t think of it until it was too late, but I should have worn my dementor costume. Dang!

About 11:30 the employees shooed everyone out of the store and in to the mall. Earlier in the day they started giving out wrist bands that were color coded and alphabetical to assign places in line. Everyone moved to their assigned letter while I moved to a different chair near the entrance. My dad was taking pictures (which he hasn’t sent to me yet) of the chaos, and said that the line reached halfway down the mall. There were lots of announcements and cheering. There was a couple that came straight from their wedding reception to get their Harry Potter book, and the store gave them first place in line as a wedding present. Isn’t that cute? We asked one of the store employees and he said he estimated there were between two and three thousand people there.

I enjoyed watching all the people come out of the store clutching their brand-spanking new copy of the book. Everyone was so happy and excited. It did my heart good to see so many young people so very excited about reading!

My mom made it to the front of the line about 12:30 and by 12:45 she was out clutching her brand-spanking new copy of the book and mine too. Of course I snatched my copy, sped home and started reading. I got home about 1:30 read until about 3:30, slept until 8:30, and read until I finished it about 3:00. Around 1:30 on Saturday afternoon, just when things were getting really exciting in the book my friend Melanie called. I knew it was her from the caller ID, so I answered the phone, “What?? I’m reading!” knowing perfectly well she was calling to see if I was done yet.

All in all it was an enjoyable evening and something I’ll never get to do again. I’m glad I went.

As for the book…

It was fabulous. Her best ever. I laughed. I cried. I immediately started re-reading it as soon as I read the last word of the epilogue (which was not “scar” as JKR had originally said, but “well”). I’m so sad that she won’t write another one because I love the characters and the world she has created and would love to read more of their adventures. Still, I understand her reasons. I can always hope she decides to write the adventures of the next generation of witches and wizards in the story. But I won’t beg. I’ll just be happy with whatever she comes up with next.

Since some of my blog readers may not have finished the book yet (*cough*Christine*cough*) I won’t tell more of my reactions to what happened to the characters.