i already wish i had spent the time it took to type this on something else.

[elapses]

Things I should be doing instead of writing up this post:
- finishing my last paper of the semester
- studying for Chem tomorrow
- writing my yuletide
- UM, ANYTHING?

So I kind of want to talk about Harry Potter again (sooooooorry) and how I think the epilogue is so much better when you're not a) reading it for the first time and b) interpreting "all was well" as "happily ever after". Because it isn't happily ever after-- they lost so many. It's about how if the survivors cannot enjoy life, what was the sacrifice of the dead for?

OKAY BUT YOU GUYS! I feel like between this and my drunken confession to reading Next Gen fanfic last weekend I am coming off as some weird psychopath (...because who else reads Next Gen fanfic? I MEAN REALLY? All I wanted was stories about 11-year-olds discovering hoggy warty Hogwarts and having dumb adventures, but all there is is like... a bunch of people who can't let go of their Draco/__________ pairing continuing it on with Draco/[child of __________] porn). I MEAN, I DON'T KNOW, I am having fun with my mini-Harry Potter phase, because like, I haven't felt this way since Deathly Hallows came out and even thaaaaaat was pretty much just excitement stretching from the OotP movie to the discussion superskittles76 and I had over Tex-Mex a couple of days after the book was released. I totally used to write Harry Potter fanfic, and once it was done it actually felt like I was totally over it. Like actually completely forever only passingly interested in Harry Potter. But silly self, you don't get over these things for good.

ANYWAY WHAT THIS POST IS ACTUALLY ABOUT IS THE POTTER FAMILY NAMES-- James Sirius, Albus Severus, and Lily Luna, because I HATE THEM LIKE BURNING. Part of that is maybe me being neurotic, because it actually drives me a little batty that like, every baby ever born in fiction is named after someone. LIFE DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY, friends. And I would like to demonstrate that with a poll!

I know a lot of you actively think about what you would name your kids (captaincatapult and goldenmelisande did their own polling to this effect pretty recently): is that because you think they're beautiful names, or is it because you want to honor someone in your life?


[Poll #1316344]

I... don't mean to belittle anyone that does want to name someone after someone. I think it is a lovely, lovely way to honor someone important to you (I found out recently that my favorite Aunt Monti is named for a Professor Montague that my Nana was especially affected by, which I think is so lovely), what I take issue with is the frequency with which it happens in fiction. It's like anytime anyone pops a kid out it has to be named for someone, they cannot be bothered to come up with their own names. (It is lovely, though, in the West Wing when Toby calls his baby girl Molly after the dead secret service agent.)

I guess the other thing is that they're all Harry's names he wants to give to honor all the dead in his life, and it just... doesn't sound like Ginny had much input at allllll in what to name them. You know? She lost family too, but the scope of people represented in the little Potter's names is all Harry. Something about that really kind of bothers me. (BUT, on the other hand, I think a legitimate argument can be made that Ginny recognizes that having kids and a family means... not necessarily more to Harry than it would to her, but it's special to her, the youngest of seven, in a different way than it would be to little orphan Harry, who has always craved that family connection. It's like Scully and Mulder! And the way poor, emotionally abandoned Mulder really desperately would like a family, but Scully has grown up in a big family with brothers named Bill and Charlie and even if she would like kids, Exceeeeeept it's not like Scully and Mulder at all, because Mulder does not view himself as deserving of that family, and they weren't supposed to have kids. BUT STILL, I think Scully named William for Mulder's William and not her Williams for the exact reason that Ginny might let Harry give all her kids really awful names.)

Hi my name is Alexandra and sometimes I like to write up six long paragraphs about something everybody already agrees with anyway/doesn't even think about anymore and post them on the internet.

P.S. LAST NIGHT'S CHUCK WAS AMAZING.

Comments

[chibirhm.livejournal.com]

Yeah, echoing the Jewish thing - my hebrew name is the same (but the female version) as my great-grandfather's, and my middle name (Miriam) is exactly the same as my great-grandmother's, and this formula is roughly the same for both of my siblings. I have a lot of names I love picked out, but I don't know what my children's Hebrew names would hypothetically be or who I'm marrying and if THEY are Jewish or have family names or whatever. The only thing I know for sure is that if I have a son, his middle name will be Joseph, because both my grandfathers were named that.

To be fair, though, I don't really have much of an extended family or even like the ones I have, and some of them have weird as hell old-school Hebrew names. So I don't know. MAYBE MY CHILDREN WILL GO FORTH FORGING NEW IDENTITIES. PERHAPS.

[stop-theworld.livejournal.com]

THIS POST IS EPIC. IN A GOOD WAY.

I... always intend to come back to posts like this and then I forget or get overwhelmed, so I figured I would AT LEAST say this much!

ALSO. I NEVER REALIZED THE BILL AND CHARLIE WEASLEY/SCULLY THING BEFORE AND I THINK MY MIND JUST MADE A POOFING NOISE.

[modernthirst.livejournal.com]

My hypothetical Claire wouldn't be named after anyone but the thought that she'd share it with a TTW character does make me feel warm (though it's a different spelling).

Also I think the epilogue names were all in honor of the more major characters who'd passed/faded away and the only one Ginny could have really contributed from her side was Fred, and George gets that one.

[veils.livejournal.com]

I DON'T THINK THIS IS MY FAULT. also gillian DOESN'T EVEN KNOW ME ANYWAY???

lolololol.

[stop-theworld.livejournal.com]

This is the best comment that ever was left anywhere.

[likespring.livejournal.com]

I'm not named for anyone unless you count bands that my parents refuse to directly deny influenced my name.

But! In any case, my dad has been listening to the Harry Potter audiobooks (he wants to re-read all of them before the next movie but doesn't have time to read them, so) and while I'm in the care I listen. And while I don't think I'll like the epilogue any more this time around, the rest of it is JUST AS MAGICAL as the very first time and it's definitely making me want to get back into Harry Potter again. I don't know, I might have to re-read all of them and get back in to the fandom. It was so sad when the series ended so it would be very nice to be able to do that.

Also the names fail. Like other people have said, one or two tributes to a couple different people would be one thing. But making it EVERY SINGLE first and middle name? No one accused Harry of being original I guess.

[goldenmelisande.livejournal.com]

I have my grandmother's middle name, and I actually like it because it was her name. Out of all of my future kid names (and they are totally planned out) only one is for someone special (my mom), but two are ~family names~ that I happened to like. And I am open to whoever I have kids with wanting to name the kids some of their family/special people's names. I just want my kids to have their own names, all of the named after names would be middle names if it's left up to me.

Also Harry's kids' names are fucking retarded, not because they're not original but because jesus christ, Albus Severus? Who DOES that?

[elapses.livejournal.com]

Oh that's kindof interesting-- your dad wanted a Jr? Are you an only child?

I have read that and you pretty much articulated exactly how I feel about it-- although I don't know, the colonization at the end was kind of weirdly handled and kind of put me of it-- I hate it when they get saved because of CSM, and just kind of let the world crumble at their feet without fighting it, however unreasonable fighting it may be? And LOL, THE NURSERY FILES. I have a draft saved in gmail of all the decent to palatable stories I found there (although it was for my personal reference, so it doesn't include the faves that I will not lose/stuff that was already in my del.icio.us). If you get desperate I can send it to you and you will not have to lower yourself to the actually exploring the Nursery Files?

BUT YES, Existence. I think if they had ended it there it would not have been standing on its best foot (the way ending it with Requiem could have? Season 7 isn't greaaat, but Je Souhaite and Requiem are), but it would have been standing, where season 9 and IWTB have really really dragged it down completely. GOD, I JUST WANTED THEM TO BE HAPPY :(

[elapses.livejournal.com]

I HONESTLY DIDN'T KNOW THAT WAS A BIG JEWISH THING. My best friend was jewish and she had a jewish middle name, but only because her mom thought it sounded pretty.

I LIKE YOUR JOSEPH PLAN, THOUGH.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

HI MY NAME IS ALEX AND I TYPE A LOT FOR NO REASON.

Bill and Charlie crack me up but no one ever finds it as funny as I do. I'M GLAD YOU DO.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

I think honoring Sirius and Dumbledore and even Snape was really important, but I also think that James and Lily were... a little much. I don't know, I do agree that it was important to honor those who had passed, it was just too much all at once.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

I'm not named for anyone unless you count bands that my parents refuse to directly deny influenced my name.
LOLING SO HARD.

Rereading is what I've been doing, I don't know what it is but all the sudden I MISS IT ALL. Too bad I can't find my Chamber of Secrets!

AND YES, exactly.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

I definitely agree that named after names are better for middle names.

Albus Severus totally gets the sticky end of the popsicle stick, James and Lily, separately, are not so bad?

[cambridge.livejournal.com]

If I ever get a kid (which I reallyreally do not want but who knows), they will hate me because I plan on naming them Pancakes. Yes, if I do not get a pet named Pancakes, I'm probably naming my kid Pancakes. I AM SET ON THAT NAME. I am only half-kidding. Or maybe something different like Alabee, which is what Kevin Barnes from of Montreal named his kid. I think it's pretty? Although I have no clue where he got that from. OKAY I HAVE ISSUES.

Anyway, I totally agree with you on the Harry Potter thing although I actually forgot the epilogue ever existed.

[ofadoration.livejournal.com]

If I'd been a boy I was either going to be named George (for my paternal grandfather) or Jack, apparently. And yeah, I'm an only child.

I agree about the colonization at the end! I loved most of the fic SO MUCH, though, and it involving colonization kind of hurt a little because the rest of the fic was so great. I might try to re-read it and just scroll past the allusions to colonization and see if I can somehow stop reading it before colonization is really brought up. I might take you up on that offer -- I think I've read all of the relatively decent babyfic people bookmarked on del.icio.us, so. I think I may have even attempted to find some decent post-Existence fic on Gossamer, too. Ew.

I totally would have no problem overlooking my issues with S8 if it HAD ended with Existence, but we're not allowed to have nice things. :( I know it wasn't entirely CC's fault since the show got renewed and whatnot, but that still didn't mean he had to write more emotional Scully torture and give away William. (What gets me so much about giving away William is that it was TOTALLY because he would ~interfere~ with a film franchise, and, uh, what film franchise? Stupid CC's ego.) While I'm pretty enamoured of the idea that just Mulder and Scully are enough for each other, I just hate that they got to have a baby and didn't get to keep him. And even the happiness they got in IWTB is tainted by Scully being not really Scully in it. Hahaha, funny story -- when I began watching the show this year it was in complete ignorance of how the show ended, so I assumed it had ended relatively happily, in the movie Mulder and Scully would be in an established relationship, there would be no relationship drama, and it would just be a fun, creepy MotW along the lines of Squeeze or something. I was pretty shocked when I found out how the show actually ended. SO NAIVE.

. . . um, long comment of babble is long, so I'm just going to stop now.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

YEAH, I was really enjoying it? AND THEN COLONIZATION. Ugh, my life: so hard. But it's okay, I still have Milk & Cake and the Ghosts series.

But we pretty much share a brain on the whole baby issue. I love the idea of them being enough for each other too, but... like, you can't give them that and then take it away and expect them to ever really be happy again. WHICH UPSETS ME SO MUCH! I feel like I am so completely overinvested in William compared to... sane people in this fandom, but it's like... I wouldn't've wanted him at all if it were my decision, but once he's there, it makes me miserable that he doesn't stay.

The thing that aggravates me most about Existence, though, is that absolutely every other XF season finale ends in mayhem (either Mulder in peril or "oh, crap, the closed the X-Files!"). Existence reads like a series finale because it's an ending-- slightly open ended, but mostly closed. I'm not a huge Doggett and Reyes fan, but I do like the way they're portrayed in the end of Existence, and I would be okay with that Doggett and Reyes pursuing social justice and continuing the X-Files while Mulder and Scully... get to just be them for awhile. BLERG, IT'S SO UPSETTING.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

Your taste in names really really reminds me of my sister. BUT I AGREE, I doubt I want kids either.

[dictatorcari]

I swear you have the best journal on the entire internet. I am now a fangirl of you.

/creepy

THE NAME THING BOTHERS ME SO MUCH, OMG

[elapses.livejournal.com]

SO FAR THERE ARE ONLY TWO ICONS IN THE elapses FANDOM, BUT NOW THIS COMMENT THREAD INCLUDES THEM BOTH!

No but really, that's such a nice thing to say, THANK YOU.

BUT YES, IT'S HORRIBLE.

[http://users.livejournal.com/spyglass_/]

So I generally choose to forget that the epilogue for Harry Potter even exists because I am not a fan of OBHWF and/or ZOMG with the cliche already, but I think another one of the things that really bothered me about it was the names. I mean COME ON and get a life.

I HAD TROUBLE answering your poll though. Because I am kind of named after people, but kind of not. See, my family is Catholic and it's Catholic tradition that your children are all named after saints in some way. I'm the oldest, and my mom wanted to name me after the Virgin Mary but Mary/Maria were out because my dad has a cousin Maria who's a bitch (his exact words) and his sister is Maryann. So they decided to name me Grace after Our Lady of Grace. My middle name is Elizabeth after Lizzy from Pride & Prejudice. BUT EVERYONE IN THE WORLD'S MIDDLE NAME IS ELIZABETH, so I have added my Confirmation name into my legal name (unofficially, I suppose) because I find it lame when everyone can guess my middle name right away :-P

I have a good idea of what I might name my (VERY HYPOTHETICAL) future children and I could see myself maybe using my grandmother's name in some way because growing up, I was closer to my grandmother than I am to my mother... But probably only as a middle name.


Anyway, that is my story. Your posts = win. :D

[http://users.livejournal.com/spyglass_/]

Your icon? Is possibly the greatest thing ever.


That is all.

[anniemoon.livejournal.com]

When I was 20 one of my BFFs died of leukemia at 17. I've always said that if I ever have a son I'm going to name him after my friend (Nathaniel) to honor him, but since I will not be having children it's kind of a moot point. :|

[aliice.livejournal.com]

i almost barfed when i read the "epilogue" of HP.

[elapses.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's right! You were Harry/Hermione, weren't you? I was always Ron/Hermione but I, TOO, think OBHWF was much too much. And I think there's kind of a pattern of people who love Mulder/Scully and people who love Harry/Hermione...? I don't know why, but I think it's there.

That's actually really cool that you were named for Lizzy Bennett, though, I think.

[silverstars.livejournal.com]

I was going to be named Katherine Anne (my grandmothers are Catherine and Anna) until about 3 weeks before I was born. Then my mom decided she didn't like that anymore so the switched it to a name which honors no one. I thought it was a little strange how they went from one extreme to the other.

I'd like my kids to have middle names after family members or really close friends. My first daughter's middle name will definitely be Catherine after my grandmother. I was super close with her and she meant a lot to me. I'm really glad she had a nice name that sounds good with all of the first names I like. But seriously, even if her name was like, Hildegarde I'd use it-- that's how important she was to me. I don't know who else I'd honor though. There are a few people I'd consider, but I don't know.

AND NO I CANNOT EVEN TALK ABOUT THE HARRY POTTER CHILDREN. THOSE NAMES ARE ONE OF THE MANY, MANY REASONS I PRETEND THAT EPILOGUE DOES NOT EXIST.