I Open at the Close

So, today it was announced where the split will be in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 and Part 2. And I just can't help but feel a little bit sad with all of this, well, that and one of my older friends posted a picture of us on the night of the Deathly Hallows release.
At 98 Days to go, it kind of seems like the end's coming a little too quickly for me. But really I think I have to go back to the beginning.
Christmas 2001 was my first introduction to Harry Potter. I was in grade one, six years old and pretty much just learning to read. I had decided to try to read 100 books by Christmas, (and if anyone cares that's a little more than 1/school day) My parents are really big readers, and by the time I got to Christmas I was reading novel sized books. My actual reading career started in Kindergarten when I would read books to the class. They were only the kind of picture books that the teacher would read, but I was still 5 and reading aloud.
The Harry Potter books made their way into our household because my father, who is always more up on what's happening, even now, knew that there was a movie coming out and wanted to read the books first. The books were apparently very popular even then. I got him (with my mom's help) a three book set and then fourth book, the only books available at the time. But, then I thought that they looked really interesting, and I read them too. According to my mother, I only caught the main story line, but I was only six. I read them over the next few years again and again, and they just sort of migrated to my bedroom eventually.
Fast forward to 2005, when I turned 11. This is the time that a lot of Harry Potter fans say that they cried when their Hogwarts Letter didn't arrive. Me? I was more interested in why I was now having these little blank-out things. As it turned out, I was having seizures and was diagnosed with Epilepsy later that month. It severely put dent in my life, and it became really important for me to get the medication correct so I could be seizure free. That took most of the summer. And then I went into Grade 6. That August, my dad was diagnosed with an Acoustic Neroma, a type of brain tumor, and though we didn't know it, he would die if he didn't have the surgery in the next 2 months. So, in September 2006, while I'm battling with Epilepsy, my father has a brain tumor removed. It takes until March for us to figure out that my brother, who is in grade 2 at the time, isn't well. He is diagnosed with ADHD, Anxiety, and a few LDs. He is moved into a special class (called the ECO room) the next year. While all this is going on I'm trying to figure out how to look like a normal kid, while still dealing with all of this at home, and having this sleeping thing that makes me sleep for ages...
So anyway, I get to Grade 7 March Break starts up, and my parents think 'Oh, let's go skiing in the Rocky Mountains to get every bodies mind off things" and I bring along a few books. One of those books just happens to be Twilight. Now, this was the Twilight Saga before anyone caught wind of the movie, before we knew when Breaking Dawn was coming out, before Twilight got popular. I have an irrational dislike of really popular things, Harry Potter notwithstanding.
So Twilight becomes the very first thing that I obsess about. I had the soundtrack the first day it came out. I got posters, I got (and made) T-Shirts, but most of all, I found Fanfiction.
Now, when Twilight got popular, I started looking for ways out. It became something I didn't want to take part in, if everyone else could, sort of. In a way, I didn't want Twilight to be my life anymore. I wanted to be different, again. So, having moved from Twilight exclusively fanfic sites to FF .net I switched to Harry Potter. And suddenly, everything that I had had in the Twilight world before it became a 'huge phenomenon' was there, except everyone was way more mature. And then, I took the quizzes, I reread the books, I reread the books again, I made t-shirts, I found Wizard Rock, I went to a Wizard Rock concert, I found A Very Potter Musical, I found Average Wizard, I dressed up as Draco Malfoy for Halloween, I had a party for A Very Potter Sequel.
In the end, the total amount of time spent on Twilight 11 months and 21 days. Total amount of time spent, and continuing to spend on Harry Potter: Years. So Twilight will always remain as a thing I will remember as being my first obsession, but Harry Potter is a thing of the books. From 6 years old, to 15 years, to the end of this, it will probably be the longest thing I have ever enjoyed.
Song: The End of an Era by Oliver Boyd and the Rememberalls and A Phoenix Lament by Ministry of Magic.
Book: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling, and Harry, A History by Melissa Annelli.
Quotes: One shivering second of silence, the shock of the moment suspended: and then the tumult broke around Harry as the screams and the cheers and the roars of the watchers rent the air. The fierce new sun dazzled the windows as they thundered towards him, and the first to reach him were Ron and Hermione, and it was their arms that were wrapped around him, their incomprehensible shouts that deafened him. Then Ginny, Neville and Luna were there, and then all the Weasleys and Hagrid, and Kingsley and McGonagall and Flitwick and Sprout, and Harry could not hear a word that anyone was shouting, nor tell whose hands were seizing him, pulling him, trying to hug some part of him, hundreds of them pressing in, all of them determined to touch the Boy Who Lived, the reason it was over at last –" Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows "Dumbledore will never truly leave, just as long as those who remain loyal to him stay!" Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets