Living, Breathing....and Reading "Harry Potter"

Three years ago I walked around with a raised eyebrow any time the mention of Harry Potter 'the book", or Harry Potter 'the movie" was mentioned. I did not understand the overwhelming media attention. Of course, I never got sucked into the Star Wars, Star Trek, and Lord of the Rings fervor either.  I am a self-declared science fiction hater. Perhaps its just the realist in me, but even as a child, I preferred The Flintstones and The Jetsons to the more 'out there' cartoons like Scooby Doo and Bugs Bunny. Harry Potter did not appeal my sense of style at all.

Publicly declaring my dislike for all things Harry Potter (and science fiction), a friend encouraged me to read the first book. He said that it's not science fiction, but rather, fantasy. Since summer was approaching and I knew I would have the extra time, I decided 'what the heck' and began the series. I had spent a lot of time bashing a series I really knew nothing about, except for the movie promos.

Nearly 4 months and 4,000 pages later, I was a believer. I loved the series. Loved, Loved, Loved.  As a reward for finishing each book, I watched the corresponding movie. During these four months (May to August), my then 8 year old son would ask if he could read the series or watch the movies with me. At 8, I thought he was too young to do either. Other 3rd or 4th graders had seen all the movies, whether age appropriate or not. A few had even tackled the book series. I was skeptical that children of that age could grasp either at all, much less it being appropriate for them.

It was after my husband gave me the series in hardback for Christmas that same year that I reconsidered reading them with Adam.  It was under the condition that we would read them together that I said I would allow him to begin the series after his 9th birthday.

From the earliest days of his life, I had always read with Adam. We tackled the Ready Freddy series in first and second grade and read all the Magic Tree House books by the end of the summer before fourth grade. Reading chapter books together was not a new concept for us. However, tackling a series of this magnitude was definitely new. With the first two books being over 300 pages each, even the shortest of them could not be considered short. "One page at a time. One book at a time" that was my motto. The thought of tackling all 7 books sounded overwhelming by any one's standards.

Initially, Adam would read one or two pages to every 5 or 6 pages that I read. Because, let's face it, if we tried to read page for page together, we would have never have even finished one book, let alone a series. Sometimes I felt like I should have been given a sainthood status. It took an incredible amount of patience to sit through Adam's reading when we first began. Nothing will test your reading ability as reading out loud. That is true for children and adults alike. In fact, I have new found respect for people who make their living narrating books on tape. Over time, Adam has really come a long way with reading to me and he's really grown in that department. Even his teacher noticed a marked improvement in his reading/comprehension scores once we began the HP series. Now for every two pages Adam reads, I read about 4.

Taking into consideration that we, on average, read together about every other day for 30 minutes, it has taken us about 18 months to read through the first five and 1/3 books. Currently, we are two hundred pages into Half-Blood Prince, which is relatively short at 650 pages. Short? Sounds ironic, doesn't it. Yes, compared to book five "Order of the Phoenix",  which is 870 pages, this one feels absolutely breezy in length. Crazy. Anyhoo....

Most of the time when I tell fellow Christians that I read this series with Adam, it is met with a little--and sometimes a lot--of criticism, which is actually the point of this blog, although I took a long time to get here. Are there series that are better suited for us to read together? Most definitely. But the fact that I have a preteen son who still wants to engage with me is more important to me than wanting to be 'politically' correct in our book choices. The simple fact is that while this book is filled with dark versus good, witchcraft and wizardry, it is also filled with friendship and love prevailing over all.  In third grade Adam 'lost' his love of independent reading. If I can find a series where he feels engaged and excited by reading, then I am all for it.

As a mom, much less a devoted follower of Christ, it would be irresponsible of me to allow him to read this series unsupervised. Even if he would be able to understand it without help (which he cannot --even though he is almost 11), we need to discuss what we are reading and what it means. I can bring God and Christ into this book series, even if JK Rowling doesn't.  The fact is that most of the people who feel strongly against  HP have no experience with the series, either book or movie. I don't mind someone having an difference of opinion of it as me if they read it for themselves and deemed it inappropriate. What I don't like is the hypocrisy of judging something by what media, the church, or 'others' have told them rather than experiential knowledge.

In addition to challenging Adam's reading and comprehension levels, I've noticed some other great benefits. We can talk about parseltongue, Erisad, Salazar Slytherin.....anything Harry Potter, and it opens the door to talk about other great topics. Frankly, if my son is talking to me as a pre-teen, maybe I can keep that open line of communication into those rough teen years. Is it guaranteed? Of course not. But at least he is learning that his mom is relevant in his life and is hip to what he likes and doesn't like. After reading all these books together, we are already thinking ahead to what happens when it's over. We are comtemplating our options as our next book series together.  It's nice to know that he appreciates this time with me, too.

No matter what opposition or judgement I face by the masses, I don't now regret, nor ever will I regret, this special time I've had with my son.  I hope it's actually just the start of many more series together.

Junk or Treasure?

Reproduced from an original posting by me at stlfamilylife.org

As far as winters go in the midwest, it has been a very wet one. Most of the time we see cold temperatures with a strange mix of sleet and ice. We are usually lucky to see any real snow more than once or twice. But this year we were hit with more snow than I've seen in years. So when Punxsutawney Phil declared an early spring, after an array of snow days I thought would never end, it seemed to me he had a sick sense of humor. Not to say it isn't a welcomed prediction;  it seems almost like it is too good to be true.

Supposing that the predicted spring comes sooner rather than later, my thoughts are turning to spring cleaning. It’s not the cleaning that I like per se, it is the organization part that energizes me. I actually enjoy cleaning out closets, drawers and the basement of items that we don’t want or need anymore. And I love it even more when the Salvation Army, Vietnam Vets, or another donation truck carries it all away. But what happens when you have large items that they don’t pick up, or alternately, you have something of value that could earn you money? Below are some great options no matter what your situation.

ebay

Originally named AuctionWeb, ebay was created in 1995 and was renamed after the creator’s consulting firm Echo Bay. It was an instant hit and is still a great way to buy or sell just about anything. In the late 1990s to early 2000′s, my husband and I were regular buyers and sellers on the site. Our surprise sell was a large battery powered Iron Giant figurine. We knew it was a rare find, but were especially pleased to watch a bidding war that resulted in it netting us over $110. They have improved the site over the years and it is easy to navigate whether a buyer or seller. The advantage to selling on ebay is that you have the option to set a reserve price of the minimal you will accept for a sold item, as well as a ‘buy it now’ price. The downside is that most auctions last 5 to 7 days, and in the end, may not even sell at all. It can also get pricey when you have multiple pictures and various listing fees.

Craigslist

Craig Newmark founded the service in 1995 as an email distribution list of friends, featuring local events in the San Francisco area, before expanding as a web-based business in 1999. In many respects, Craigslist is a simplified ebay, although it has classified ads, personal ads and even discussion forums. When we wanted to sell our son’s loft bed, Craigslist was the perfect choice. We wanted to list it locally and knew it needed to be picked up since shipping it was not an option. Generally speaking, we’ve had no trouble selling the items we put on there, but have had limited success in finding specific items we’re hoping to buy at a discounted price. Ebay has much better selection in that respect.

Freecycle

Although founded in 2003, Freecycle is a relatively unknown web-based service. Freecycle is the perfect place to offer large donatable items to fellow St. Louisans for free. Over the Christmas holiday, we were able to find permanent homes for a large sleeper sofa, 100 paver bricks, old cookbooks, my in-laws NordicTrack and a rug anti-slip backer. The sofa had been an eye sore in our basement for several years. I had exhausted all efforts to find a new home for it and was delighted to hear about Freecycle. We found a new home for every item we listed that week within 24 hours. Of course, the catch is that you are giving them away free to whomever is willing to come get them first. You cannot come back and ask for money. We also found that on several occasions we had no-shows and had to contact alternate takers. Could some of those items have earned us money? Most certainly. But, honestly, we were glad to be rid of them and the delight of having them gone outweighed the desire to make a few extra dollars or to lose out on the tax break that you would earn if donated to a charity. Another downside is that as a seller it’s not a particularly easy site to navigate, whether creating your initial account, or posting pictures to go with your ad. As a buyer, it’s simple and easy to use. It was my favorite new find of 2010.


So, as you clean out those closets and storage units this spring, think about the different options you have to rid your house of unwanted clothes, books, household items or tools. After all, what you consider junk may just be another man’s treasure.

To Facebook and Beyond

Hi, my name is Bonnie and I was a Facebook addict.

While it's embarrassing to actually type those words, it's true. It took me awhile to catch on to the whole FB phenomenon, but once I figured it all out, I was hooked. Initially, it was the rush of finding friends, former classmates and former co-workers and sending or accepting friend requests. Then I loved the quizzes like "What is your Harry Potter patronus?" or "Which Disney princess are you?" Eventually the new-ness of FB wore off and I felt like I had caught up on the lives of the roughly 200 friends I had. That's when I turned to games like Farkle, Wheel of Fortune, Family Feud, Bejeweled-and my favorite, Zuma Blitz. The fact was that no matter what I was doing on FB, it was too much. Too much lost time on something that had little value.

Over the three years I was a registered user, my husband and I argued about it off and on.  He did not understand why I wasted so much time on it and I found myself defending my position. In the last year, I definitely limited my time on it, although in hindsight, it was still excessive.

Over the same three years, I thought about privacy and security issues. Honestly, there was a little nudge in my heart and mind that made me wonder if this was really a secure thing to do. Posting pictures of my family and statuses that revealed personal information was probably questionable. Once I put things out there, they were out there forever. And I worried about it more and more. So when my husband approached me earlier this month and urged me to reconsider FB altogether for security reasons, I had to agree. At his work, my husband had been approached by some pretty high officials urging him and others in his work group (and their family members) to get off social networking sites. Seemed to me it was confirmation of something I had considered myself but did not have the courage to do.

Part of me was sad when I deleted my account but another part of me was relieved. In the short 10 days that I've been a recovered FB'er I have learned a lot about myself and have found this to be a mostly positive experience. Maybe what I discovered about myself is not typical. I suppose a more secure person with a more balanced approach would not relate. Still, I imagine I am not alone.

Insecurity

The biggest thing I learned is that all the insecurities I had as a child, teenager and young adult are still with me today. In fact, I think FB surfaced a lot of those insecurities that I did not realize I still harboured . Nothing like a social networking site to highlight your popularity factor. Not to say I did not have friends--I actually had 250 at one point. Of course, define 'friend'. Three quarters of my friends probably wouldn't cross a street to greet me so do they really count? There is something rather depressing about posting a status you think is funny, entertaining, poignant or profound and get almost zero response. And how many pictures do people really want to see of me or my kids? The fact remains that whether or not I am on FB, true friends will keep in touch and are genuinely interested in my life and seeing pictures of my family. The fact also remains that my self worth is based on my life itself and should never be based on a shallow Internet experience like Facebook. No longer am I rushing to check my notifications to see how well liked I am. Relief.

Voyeurism

My husband would tease me that FB was nothing more than socially acceptable voyeurism and I agreed. In hindsight, it seems kind of creepy to me that to expose so much of our lives to a number of people we barely know. No offense, but do I really care how wonderful your elementary school is where you teach or that you are working as a fitness trainer and have to be awake at 4 a.m. Or that you audition regularly for bit parts in television commercials.  Probably no more than you caring about my day to day life. It seems to me FB is just a way to toot our own horns and scream out in a silent way "Look at ME, Look at ME".

Contentment

Each person fights personal demons and silent battles. Struggling with depression, I am no stranger to the ups and downs in my own life. But I noticed that almost instantly after disconnecting from FB, I became much more content with my own life. Maybe this falls in-between voyeurism and insecurity, but how easy is it to get caught up in comparing your life to others based on what they post as statuses or in picture or video form? Don't we all paint our lives in the best tone possible for our social networking followers to see?  No one is happy ALL the time with the lives they lead. I had to tell myself to stop comparing my marriage to that of my newlywed friends or with the overachieving friends across town, I know everyone has struggles in their lives but living in the FB bubble, it was easy to fall into the trap that every one's lives were better than mine. And I do have a pretty sweet life.

Time

One of the positives I've witnessed in my own life in the last 10 days is in regards to time. The first thing I would do in the morning was grab my first cup of java and sit down in front of the computer and lose at least an hour on FB. Easily, I would find myself spending 15 or 30 minutes playing the various games and checking out the statuses on the scrolling home page, several times a day. Shameful as it was, I could conservatively estimate I lost 3 or more hours a day to the networking site. Certainly I had better things to do. Still, in my addictive personality way, I would keep coming back to the computer several times a day. In my defense I still accomplished a lot and never neglected my children or my responsibilities at home. But, I can say that I often felt overwhelmed at how rushed I always felt to complete everything I wanted to in one day. Having the extra hours in my day not sucked away by the computer is making me feel more at ease and much more even-tempered emotionally.  When I think of the hours lost, I am almost sick at how much I could have otherwise accomplished. What about my down time? I still have it. I spend some time watching TV shows I don't otherwise make the time to watch, or reading a novel I've been wanting to read. And writing for fun.

Personal Connection

Hands down, the best part of giving up FB is reconnecting with my family. No longer is my attention and loyalties divided. Even though my husband did not notice I was off FB until I actually told him yesterday, he did notice a change in our intimacy. And the kids are getting a lot more of my time. We read together and spend a lot of time just engaging one another. And they don't feel second best anymore. While I would never have considered myself neglectful in any form of the word, I also put my focus on the computer more than them at times. Maybe it's my imagination, but it seems to me that the kids are arguing less and seem happier. There just might be direct connection. Either way, home life has improved.

For all the arguments on why getting off FB has been a great thing, it doesn't mean I don't miss it. Sometimes I do. But rather than missing the abstract reasons of games and quizzes,  I miss the ease of communicating with my friends. And the general curiosity of what is going on their lives, whether that is voyeuristic or not. Yet, all I need to do is remind myself that my true friends will still keep in touch and our relationship will be better for it.  It's even a great excuse to go to Happy Hour together, or grab some dinner.

The bottom line is that FB was great for a season but it's time to move on.  It was a very fun way to reconnect with people from my past and create new relationships for the present. Facebook account or not, my true friends will still want to be my friend. It may take more effort and the communication be more limited. But honest-to-goodness relationships beat Facebook any day of the week.