[Fic] "Going Inside" -- Harry Potter
Mar. 22nd, 2004 06:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
edenfallingThis week: Luna Lovegood. What makes her tick? I don't know, really, but here's my current guess. Ask me next week and we'll see if I still think so.
[ETA: The AO3 crosspost is now up!]
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Going Inside
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There's a certain art to being oblivious, a certain amount of effort needed to let yourself be free of others' opinions. Luna began cultivating herself years ago, having decided that the real world -- as the Prophet described it, anyhow -- was full of sharp edges and blankness and not at all where she wanted to live. So she turned inward to her own version of reality.
It's simply more interesting to believe in Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, after all. Who cares if they probably arent' real outside her mind? They're real enough on her inside, and that's good enough for Luna. Reality is relative, after all -- for Muggles, any magical creature is as ridiculous as a Crumple-Horned Snorkack, yet what wizard would deny the existance of House Elves?
The trick is to remember what's real inside and what's real outside, and to not mind the way other people don't bother to separate her perceptions. The trick is to not mind the names they call her, to calmly track down her stolen things instead of pitching fits or bursting into tears, to see thestrals and not think of her mother. It's not that hard once you learn the way of it -- simply label that part of the world a different level of reality, and ignore it.
It's a little lonely, shifting between her inside, her outside, and the way-beyond places she's labeled "Here There be Dragons," but Luna's learned that trick too. She has her father, she has the animals that don't care what level of reality she's in today, she has the portraits who are as mad as everyone else thinks she is, and now she even has friends of sorts.
She could do without Voldemort, but friends? Friends might be worth the risk of death and destruction smashing through her shifting definitions. She's not strong enough to keep all the nasty things in the way-beyond, keep them from her outside, but she'll fight as long as she can, and if she has to run, they'll never reach all the way inside. Luna can keep going in forever.
And when the outside calms, and she ventures forward again, maybe her new friends will be there to meet her.
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Inspired by the 3/21/04![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
15minuteficlets word #47: quirky
Am now off to dinner, and then more windowframe painting. Ick blech paint-smell.
[ETA: The AO3 crosspost is now up!]
--------------------------------------
Going Inside
--------------------------------------
There's a certain art to being oblivious, a certain amount of effort needed to let yourself be free of others' opinions. Luna began cultivating herself years ago, having decided that the real world -- as the Prophet described it, anyhow -- was full of sharp edges and blankness and not at all where she wanted to live. So she turned inward to her own version of reality.
It's simply more interesting to believe in Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, after all. Who cares if they probably arent' real outside her mind? They're real enough on her inside, and that's good enough for Luna. Reality is relative, after all -- for Muggles, any magical creature is as ridiculous as a Crumple-Horned Snorkack, yet what wizard would deny the existance of House Elves?
The trick is to remember what's real inside and what's real outside, and to not mind the way other people don't bother to separate her perceptions. The trick is to not mind the names they call her, to calmly track down her stolen things instead of pitching fits or bursting into tears, to see thestrals and not think of her mother. It's not that hard once you learn the way of it -- simply label that part of the world a different level of reality, and ignore it.
It's a little lonely, shifting between her inside, her outside, and the way-beyond places she's labeled "Here There be Dragons," but Luna's learned that trick too. She has her father, she has the animals that don't care what level of reality she's in today, she has the portraits who are as mad as everyone else thinks she is, and now she even has friends of sorts.
She could do without Voldemort, but friends? Friends might be worth the risk of death and destruction smashing through her shifting definitions. She's not strong enough to keep all the nasty things in the way-beyond, keep them from her outside, but she'll fight as long as she can, and if she has to run, they'll never reach all the way inside. Luna can keep going in forever.
And when the outside calms, and she ventures forward again, maybe her new friends will be there to meet her.
--------------------------------------
Inspired by the 3/21/04
15minuteficlets word #47: quirkyAm now off to dinner, and then more windowframe painting. Ick blech paint-smell.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 01:56 am (UTC)Friends might be worth the risk of death and destruction smashing through her shifting definitions.
Yay, friends! I love her as an addition to their group.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 08:25 pm (UTC)I like Luna too; I think she's a particularly good addition to the group because she isn't in Gryffindor. And Harry has always been far too willing to ignore anyone who isn't in his own house.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 02:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 08:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 03:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 08:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-24 01:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 11:35 am (UTC)Am in *AWE* ... especially as I love the way you've characterized Luna, and woven in such profound thoughts.
"Friends might be worth the risk of death and destruction smashing through her shifting definitions. She's not strong enough to keep all the nasty things in the way-beyond, keep them from her outside, but she'll fight as long as she can, and if she has to run, they'll never reach all the way inside. "
And the ending ... makes me ...
smile. :)
Thank you.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-23 08:44 pm (UTC)Glad you liked it!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-24 05:43 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-03-25 01:24 am (UTC)