No, no, this isn't a post about Harry the dog. Rather, I have noticed lately that most of the blogs I read [ed. note: Google Reader is the most wonderful thing since mood/status RSS feeds on Myspace] are all talking about the newest Harry Potter book.
This is an issue for me, because I don't read Harry Potter and never have. There are several reasons for this:

1. I don't enjoy the sci-fi/fantasy genre. Fiction is a big enough stretch for me without talking snakes and flying goblins.
2. I hate bandwagons (case in point: ACL Fest-although I would love to see The Killers show, Lord of the Rings, Titanic, Amy Winehouse).

Seeing as HP falls into both of those categories, I have managed to avoid reading any of them. I think I saw part of the first movie when I was in San Diego and I watched it with the girl I lived with. But other than that, I just don't have a taste for the phenom. As my Great Aunt Sylvia would say, in her New Zealand accent, "not my culture."

When my sister and I were young -- probably younger than the demographic they were aimed at -- we read Baby Sitter's Club books at the same rate with which we ate ice cream sandwiches. I only started reading them because my sister did. Those of you who never read them need to know the set up -- a gaggle of eighth-grade girls started a "club" of baby sitters, where they would hold meetings (way too organized meetings) and deal with their dramas at home and at school. Every chapter surrounded one of the girls, whether it was Claudia the Asian dyslexic who loved junk food and played the role of the treasurer, or Kristy, the type-A sporty overachiever who was the president and started the club to begin with. Each chapter was precluded by a little three-paragraph introduction written by the girl who the chapter was about -- the genius of the book was that they used a different handwriting for each blurb, defining the girl with the hearts hovering over every "i" or the large loopy script that mimicked the girl's space-cadet attitude.

I was so young when I started reading those books that I distinctly remember having to skip over Kristy's, Mary Anne's and I believe it was Stacey's introductions, for one very simple reason: they were written in cursive instead of print and I couldn't read (or write) cursive.

My mom hated the BSC books because of the candy-popcorn style in which they were written. I don't know why she was always shoving Robert Frost in front of us as eight year olds, but for whatever reason, she thought we should read more appropriate literature. I do remember the large influence the descriptive style of each girl's outfits and hairstyles had on my sister and me. My sister, always the artist, would draw intricate family portraits of girls and boys wearing the same outfits outlined in the books: yellow and purple polka-dotted sweaters, over purple leggings, finished off with gold bangles and hoop earrings (uncanny how the styles have come back around, it seems). I preferred to mimic the author's writing style and remember penning a 90-notebook-page epic about a family of eight who goes on a cruise to Hawaii and all of the daughters get ponies when they arrive at their new home. Even under the cloud of BSC, I was still horsecrazy.

But back to Harry Potter. It seems too easy to blame my mom for tainting me on bandwagons for life or becoming a snob when it comes to reading lists. But I do think that my desire to read fun fiction -- like the ever popular, SATC-influenced books out there right now that stemmed from The Devil Wears Prada bandwagon -- was snubbed out at an early age. I remember it took me my entire fourth grade year to read Watership Down. What an incredibly strange child I had to have appeared to be, cross-legged in the corner of the darkened room next to the window on the last day of school, my peers watching The Lion King while I followed a different sort of animal story.

Tonight, after reading another blog talking about the newest HP release, I was on the phone with my mom and asked her if she'd ever read Harry Potter. Her answer was unsurprising: she'd read the first one to see what all the fuss was about, deemed them poorly-written and unimpressive, and moved along to some other Booker prize winner. "It appears to me," she said, "that anyone who reads them isn't very well-read and reads them because they're easy to read and they make easy cultural references that anyone can understand." I rebutted with evidence that many well-read people on my blog roll were also reading the Harry Potter books. She dismissed this. From well-read to spell-read, perhaps? "Had they read The Gammage Cup, they wouldn't be reading them. They're like when you read the Baby Sitter's Club books. The same things."

For the rest of my life, my mom will reference The Gammage Cup. I picked it up at Half Price Books when I was in fifth grade. I vaguely remember reading it and remember the general theme of the storyline. It was the closest I ever came to fantasy fiction. I loved it. Afterward, I guess my mom must have read it to see what I was gushing on and on about. My mom also was enamored with it -- there were certain descriptions of events in the book that were so beautiful and poignant. I remember specifically a description of a babbling brook, which managed to change the way I have looked at creeks ever since.

I found an article from 2001 surrounding The Gammage Cup talks about a character, Muggles, who also makes an appearance in the HP books:

A rising tide lifts all boats, they say. The rising tide caused by the phenomenal success of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter books has indeed lifted the boats of many writers of children's fantasy. One of the oddest cases is perhaps Carol Kendall, and her book The Gammage Cup. This is hardly an unsuccessful book: it was first published in 1959, and it was a Newbery Honor Book. It was reprinted at least as recently as 1990. But when a writer sued J. K. Rowling over supposed similarities between her obscure 1980s books and the Harry Potter books, notably including the use of the word "muggles", some unexpected attention was paid to The Gammage Cup. For it turns out that long before either J. K. Rowling or her suer, Carol Kendall used "Muggles" in this book. To be sure, Muggles in The Gammage Cup is a character name, but nonetheless, Kendall's book is certainly proof enough that the word has a long history in children's fantasy.

My mom uses The Gammage Cup the same way she uses the BSC books: as leverage of what I have read in my life that was noteworthy versus what I have read in my life that was not. Perhaps she's right -- I guess when I'm on my death bed, I won't look back and say "I wish I'd read those Harry Potter books." I hope I don't regret the bandwagons I've never climbed aboard.

When all is said and done, I don't plan on reading any Harry Potter anytime soon. Unless I happen across a copy and I have a chunk of time that I feel like dedicating to witches and ghouls.

Or whatever it is that those books are about.