This is a photo of me stagediving at LeakyCon. It was taken by the lovely and charming Evanna Lynch. Life is weird/beautiful. Anyway, while I was crowdsurfing—I was out there for quite a while—I had time to think about some things: 1. The Harry Potter fandom is uniquely wonderful, and the greatest luck of my professional life is probably that so many HP fans became early nerdfighters, because the whole culture of nerdfighteria came not primarily from us but from those early nerdfighters. 2. Although it is hard for me to express it in a meaningful, individual way, I am really grateful to everyone who identifies as a nerdfighter. We’ve done so much amazing stuff together that none of us could ever have done alone. 3. I love being a nerdfighter, and I love being a nerd, and I seeing people be so honestly themselves is such an inspiration to me. 4. How are all these people—many of whom are very small—holding me aloft? 5. The metaphor here is too obvious. 6. There’s probably a better, more interesting metaphor that I’m not thinking of. 7. I guess the real metaphor is not you-can-only-make-stuff-if-people-hold-you-up; the real metaphor here is that together-things-happen-that-can-never-happen-alone, which is a very important thing for an introverted and socially anxious person like me to realize. I guess these days this is a politically charged statement, but it seems to me manifestly true: You make nothing alone. Human beings are not mere competitors, and human life is not merely competition. We are collaborators. To be human is to catch the falling person.
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This is a photo of me stagediving at LeakyCon. It was taken by the lovely and charming Evanna Lynch. Life is weird/beautiful.

Anyway, while I was crowdsurfing—I was out there for quite a while—I had time to think about some things:

1. The Harry Potter fandom is uniquely wonderful, and the greatest luck of my professional life is probably that so many HP fans became early nerdfighters, because the whole culture of nerdfighteria came not primarily from us but from those early nerdfighters.

2. Although it is hard for me to express it in a meaningful, individual way, I am really grateful to everyone who identifies as a nerdfighter. We’ve done so much amazing stuff together that none of us could ever have done alone.

3. I love being a nerdfighter, and I love being a nerd, and I seeing people be so honestly themselves is such an inspiration to me.

4. How are all these people—many of whom are very small—holding me aloft?

5. The metaphor here is too obvious.

6. There’s probably a better, more interesting metaphor that I’m not thinking of.

7. I guess the real metaphor is not you-can-only-make-stuff-if-people-hold-you-up; the real metaphor here is that together-things-happen-that-can-never-happen-alone, which is a very important thing for an introverted and socially anxious person like me to realize. I guess these days this is a politically charged statement, but it seems to me manifestly true: You make nothing alone. Human beings are not mere competitors, and human life is not merely competition. We are collaborators. To be human is to catch the falling person.

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