In 2007, I had never read or watched any of the books or films.  Yes, shameful, I know! 

Actually, in 6th grade i had picked up a copy of "Sorcerer's" Stone (sorry) from my teacher's bookshelf and tried reading a few pages, but I wasn't into it.  I didn't really like stuff that was super-popular, and this was 1998 so Harry Potter was pretty much like what Beatlemania must have been like, you know? And even at that age I hated society shoving pop culture in my face, so I was not enthusiastic.  I gave up after a couple pages.

Fast forward nine years.  It's summer 2007, and I'm a 20-year-old librarian.  The final Harry Potter book is coming out soon, so of course our patrons are abuzz with excitement.  A few of my coworkers ask me if I'm excited, or something like that.  I tell them, no, I don't read Harry Potter.  These two gals were middle-aged ladies and both favorite coworker friends of mine.  They were like, "Angela! You HAVE to read Harry Potter! Go check out the first one!"  I was like, Eh, I don't read kids books.  They were having none of it.  They insisted that the books were enjoyable for adults; after all, they both loved them.

I am so grateful for those two women, Susie and Jane, because they honestly changed my life.  Harry Potter is truly part of my identity now.  There's a little part of me that regrets not making it a part of my childhood, but mostly I'm just glad it came into my life.

So, I zipped through the series pretty quick, and by the time I was ready for book 7, we were just starting to get our copies in at the library and trying to get them out to patrons who had it on reserve.  One of my coworkers who knew I was waiting for it, had promised to get it catalogued quickly for me, but then she came up and said she had messed up the cataloging (something like it was supposed to be a Young Adult section copy and she accidentally cataloged it as a children's department copy) and she told me to just take the book home and she'd finish working on it when I was done.  I was super grateful, and it's the only time in 10 years of library work that I have ever "cheated" and taking something home before it was ready to go on the shelf, ha ha!