It's kind of a well kept secret of mine that there was once a time in my life when I was even dorkier than I am now. Like a lot dorkier. Which is nothing to be ashamed of - I'm still a dork 100% - this week particularly. Y'all this is Hogwarts week 1!
(Which just makes me wonder - how is Hogwarts dealing with COVID-19? According to this post by I'm not sure who the author is, wizards can get muggle diseases, but they just cure them quickly. Is the entire wizarding community hiding a treatment from us and just straight up letting people die? Surely, there's a way to transmit a potion long-distance through a Thunderbird, like in the first (and should be only, in my opinion) Fantastic Beasts. But for a moment, imagine that they can't magically cure it. Is Hogwarts sending out confusing tests weeks in advance via owl? What if an owl goes missing? Does Platform 9 3/4 take your temperature as you pass through and turn solid for anyone with a high grade fever so they just get a concussion but at least the school is safe? Is Madame Pomfrey preparing at all? It seems like the lady just has pumpkin juice and Skele-Gro, which I'm not sure that will do much. Is the Sorting Hat safe since the virus can stay in your hair? Are house elves being freed with face masks rather than socks? Are evil purebloods protesting masks? Are the house points hourglasses being used to track COVID-19 cases instead? Are students getting house points taken away if they meet up in big groups? Can they even offer online classes? Has Professor Trelawney figured out how to share a screen yet or is she just shouting that this is a result of "THE GRIM"? A lot of questions)
No matter how old I am, I don't think I'll ever get over the magic that is Harry Potter. My parents read the books to me when I was really young until I was able to read them for myself, I was a beta tester for Pottermore, I dressed up as Hermione Granger twice for Halloween, and I even went to Harry Potter summer camp (which is a story for another time.)
But honestly, Harry Potter was one of the biggest parts of my life for a good while. (This is embarrassing for me to discuss, but I don't really think anyone reads this, so I'm not feeling like this is particularly a risk. It's all for that good daily #content.) Throughout middle school and for part of high school, I wasn't just a Harry Potter fan, I was a Harry Potter... influencer. Back when influencers weren't really things. I don't keep up with the scene at all now, but back in the day, Harry Potter fan pages on Facebook were HUGE. They were managed by admins who posted memes, interview screenshots, trivia contests, etc for thousands of fans. Like this one down below. This was "Comparing Your Friends to Harry Potter Characters" which back in my time, had around 30,000 followers. Oh and yeah - that's me.
Every admin had a little secret nickname that they went by. Mine was "Nimbus: the Girl with Wifi," which I thought was the perfect blend between Harry Potter and my other love at the time, The Hunger Games. I even had a little fan page/blog that - get this - had upwards of 600 followers. That may not seem like much, but that's literally more followers than I have on Instagram NOW. (I, of course, have taken the page off of the internet, but just so you believe me. And if you look closely, you'll notice that I called my followers/fans 'Nimbytes.' Literally, who did I think I was? Lady Gaga?)
I worked on a bunch of different pages and for the most part, it was a straight forward job (I call it a job only because it basically was. You would have to APPLY to work on pages, interview, and you would be kept on a strict schedule of creating content, promoting other pages, etc.) I kept folders and folders of material, and I would come home from school at the end of the day and just post as much as I could for this lovely weird little community we had created. I mean, let's be honest, it's all a little obsessive and weird, but nothing was weirder than what I did for The Hogwarts Experience. There, I was Professor Nimbus, and I taught Defense Against the Dark Arts Year 4 and Alchemy Years 6 and 7. That's right. I taught. A fictional freaking class. I literally spent time making lesson plans on grindlows, hinkypunks, kappas, etc. and it's like MATE THOSE AREN'T THINGS. I assigned HOMEWORK. FOR A CLASS THAT NO ONE WAS GRADED ON. I had OFFICE HOURS. FOR WHAT? I DIDN'T HAVE AN OFFICE? I'll stop myself there.
So why do it? Why did I do this insane thing that was really freaking weird in hindsight and took up almost all of my time?
Because I loved it. I loved the rush of posting something and sharing something I was interested in. Besides, the community on these pages was amazing. In middle school and high school, some of my best friends were people I had never met, which seems scary and stranger danger-y but it really wasn't. We all spoke this one weirdo language and I think we were all looking for a place that we felt like we belonged. We were looking for magic. I would come home from school, excited to talk to my British friend, Ed (Pumpkin Pasty) who I would discuss school drama with and we realized that our lives were pretty similar, even if we were a whole country and hell, a whole rebellion away from each other. I would hang out with my fellow American friend, Marisa (Madgy) and we would hack into each other's admin pages and I would turn her page into just one big Nicolas Cage appreciation page. And then there was my best best friend, Hannah (Annabeth Mockingjay Weasley) who lived in Canada, and we talked every goddamn day from morning till very late at night for me, due to the time change. We were both going through pretty hard times in our lives and we were each other's outlets, and I like to think she saved me. I think I saved her too. Even now, we will comment on each other's Facebook posts or message each other, saying how proud we are of each other since we know how far we've come from crying into lined pink pages of middle school diaries and writing headcanons we both would prefer to forget.
There were even groups of admins across pages and we would all come together to share our interests, our sorrows, our fears, and I think we were all just kids looking for an outlet, which we found in each other. To this day, I am still friends on Facebook with at least a hundred people I have never met, from all across the globe. Recently, someone revived one of the admin groups and everyone posted little updates about what was going on. It seemed like all these kids and teenagers lost in the world had turned into adults over night. People posted about college, finding jobs they loved, and finding significant others they loved more. And Reader, I cannot tell you how happy I was to scroll through posts of people I knew so well finally in a place in their lives where they felt comfortable being the version of themselves out in the real world that they found in a comfortable little haven of a silly admin group.
Don't get me wrong: I'm a little (a lot) embarrassed just writing this all down and remembering all the weird things I used to do, but honestly, I wouldn't change a thing. In many ways, it made me the person I am today and it made me feel heard at a time when I felt alone. While I cringe a bit about all the Drarry shippers I had to entertain, I gotta admit - it was totally awesome while it lasted.
It feels a bit like the end of a circle (especially since I'm writing this while wearing my glasses, signaling that time has, indeed, passed) but you know I gotta do it.
~Nimbus: the Girl with Wifi
P.S. That really got away from me. Go take my quiz "Which Harry Potter Bootleg Patronus Are You?" before I get weirdly sentimental again.
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