Dear Luna Lovegood,
When thinking about characters to write to for this project, the first person I thought of was Voldemort. While I will get to him later, I feel like it’s important to write to you first. I wanted to write to you because you are my mom’s favorite character, besides Harry. While I was never particularly fond of you in the movies, as I’ve gotten older i’ve realized why my Mom loved you so much. If you’ve met my Mom you’ll know that she has one of the biggest hearts out of anyone you will ever meet but also one of the most fragile ones. One of the problems about wearing your heart on your sleeve is that people take advantage of that way to often, and while I don’t want to talk about that with myself just yet, I do want to talk about why it is important with my mother. Your mysterious and flamboyant personality could be as far from my Mom’s as possible, but the way in which you show how much you care and love others is the same. My Mom always gets made fun of when she talks about how much she loves Harry Potter. If you sit down to watch a movie with her she will say the lines before they come on screen. Though she’s seen each movie over 50 times (approx 41 days of watching Harry Potter), but that is a part of my Mom’s identity. She was more excited than me when I got the letter from Dr.Cermele back in Summer when I was informed I would be taking this class. While I could write about how much I love my mother and all that she does for me, I’m proud to be her son because she isn’t ashamed to be herself and wear her heart on her sleeve, much like her favorite character.While I won’t be talking about my time in class, I wanted to talk about how some Harry Potter characters helped me become the person I am today.
Dear Severus Snape,
Thank you for showing me what it means to show true bravery and courage. I know if you are reading this that you would ask what’s the difference between the two, but we both know you know the difference. If you know me you know that Voldemort is my favorite character, but for all the wrong reasons. I don’t idolize Voldemort, and I certainly don’t want to be like him when I am older. While some parts of your life, I would not like to be repeated in mine, if I were to share the same fate, I will have lived a happy and fulfilling life. Your bravery comes from the courage to still respect others even though you have gone through hell in your life. You watched the one that you loved most die, and you made sure to always take care of her son whenever he came into trouble. While I fortunately have had to suffer the same traumatic experiences as you, I can however model the compassion you show to others in my life. While you may not have outright show your love, you always had it ad you always had what was best for others in mind. You made the most selfless act of sacrificing your life so that others may live, and if that what my life comes down to, well the much like yours, I believe it would be a life well lived.
Dear Neville Longbottom,
Thank you for showing me that it is okay to not know your place in the world when everyone else seems to have theirs figured out. When I was little I didn’t really see you other than the comic relief character in the Harry Potter series. Now as I grow older and I look back on my childhood, which is scary to say over, I realize that you are the one I relate with the most. I saw your insecurities when I was little and I laughed with everyone else, now all I can do is to express my sympathy and empathy for a boy I was too scared to accept that I was you. I saw the anxieties you dealt with, how everyone told you what you should be. We succumbed to others in order to make the effort to fit in. Showing emotion when others thought that showing emotion makes you somehow less than others who don’t. The ones who are unable to show emotion are the ones who live in fear of being accepted for who they are. A line that has always stuck with me is, “For what is a man, what has he got. If not himself, then he has naught. To say the things he truly feels, and not the words of one who kneels.” – Frank Sinatra. The reason I bring this up is not only because of how I like Sinatra but because of how much the words stuck with me. For someone who was raised in the age of men have to work and women stay in the kitchen, Frank helped break down those barriers. Before I go off to much, that’s why I relate to you so much. We both wear our hearts on our sleeves and are sometimes made fun of for it. We are scared o say who we really belong with and we struggle to find happiness once we discover who we are. We are not ashamed our who we really are, we are only feel ashamed because others have not had the benefit of knowing who they are and accepting it. We learned to be ourselves, we learned to stand up to others, we learned how to stand up for ourselves. Thank you for showing me what it means to be myself, but I still have a lot to do and a lot more to learn about myself.
Dear Voldemort,
Did you guys really think I’d do a series of postcards without writing to my favorite? You may be thinking to yourself, how the hell is Neville not his favorite after writing that? Well it’s simple. Voldemort, I’d like to thank you for showing me what it means to show kindness. Through your racism, homophobia, sexism, you showed me how to treat others. Now, you may be thinking, “uh, oh, where’s he going with this”, and to that I say, through all of those things he’s shown me what not to do. I never understood as to why we should only have positive influences as role models. None of us are perfect, and believe me when I say Voldemort is as far from perfect as you can get. I think that we should all bad influences, why should we only look up to be good. If we can’t stand up to evil, then there will never be any chance for change. People like Voldemort, are people we need to look at and learn how to teach others to not. Voldemort treated others like crap, he made sure everyone knew where they stood with him. The only person he respected was someone who showed the most courage and bravery out of anyone in the Harry Potter series. While yes, Voldemort is my favorite, now you all know why.
