Ten Years

Ten years ago, the word “forum” was completely foreign to me. I had no idea what being a part of an online community was like. I had always been taught that it was dangerous to chat with “strangers from the internet.” (You can tell how well I took that particular lesson to heart as a youngster, haha!!) Ten years ago I wrote just for fun. I never would have imagined sharing any of my work with other people. My writing was for my-eyes ONLY!! Ten years ago, the idea of sharing my writing with those strangers on the internet scared the hell out of me...

I don’t even recall the exact detail of events that lead me to HPFF. I just remember that I was researching something for a scene that I wanted to write for my own Harry Potter story. So I was Yahoo-searching something (because in those days, yahoo’s search engine was all the rage, lol!!) and a story that another fanfic author had written on HPFF popped up in the search results. Curious, I clicked on it to see what it was, and thus I discovered the world of Harry Potter Fanfiction. I was amazed!! There was an actual term for what I was doing, and thousands of other people were doing it too!! Who knew?

But of course, in my own self-critical opinion, MY story was not nearly good enough to be posted online for all the world to see. It was very much a part of me back in those days, and I simply was not ready to let other people to read it. I was far too happy to just continue keeping it all to myself. Little did I know the levels of growth and feelings of accomplishment that awaited me through the experience of writing fanfiction with others... Sure, I had read the announcements on the HPFF homepage about checking out their forums before, and even clicked over there a few times during my anonymous guest reading visits. But it all just looked so confusing, and a little bit intimidating, so I admit that I was hesitant to join. I believe that it was the “Title Help” section that finally drew me in. I remember thinking: "These people are going to help me come up with chapter titles and summaries? They talk about stuff like that there? How cool is that!?"   

So, on March 28th, 2008, I signed up for my first ever online forum account; and I haven’t looked back since!! I have met so many wonderful and supportive people in this community, all of which have helped me to grow and develop my own personal writing style. I eventually came out of my scared little writing shell of shyness; and on December 9th, 2008, I FINALLY posted the first chapter of my Novel to the HPFF archives!! (Back in those days, the story was called “All is NOT Fair in Love & War” and it was going in a totally different direction that what “Love, Not War” is traveling in now though). But I honestly wouldn’t have it any other way!! I can’t even believe how hesitant I was in the beginning. It’s so silly to even think about how irrational my reasoning was back in those days...

But looking back on my early days now, I am simply stunned by HOW MUCH I’ve grown since I first started writing. And when I think about that fact that it has now been TEN YEARS to the day, I am left breathless in awe and wonder. My writing is certainly not what it was ten years ago, that’s for sure, and I own the majority of that to THIS community!! Had I never clicked “join” on this very day ten years ago, I don’t even know if I would have stuck with writing after college. Who knows?? I mean, I barely have time for it as it is right now, but it's still one of my dearest passions. My loves. My favorite methods of escape. When real life gets to be too complicated, when work gets too stressful, when the business becomes too much... I sit down and I write. I immerse myself in the fantastic world of HP; and I write about Draco, and Roxi, and Lucius, and Saleena, all of their complex relationships and problems. Because sometimes, I confess, it is far easier to deal with their issues than it is to focus on whatever else is going on in RL at that moment.  (But aren't we all a little guilty of that on occasion though?)

Don’t get me wrong, I'm not one of those people who run away from their problems. Not in the slightest. It's just that I am happy to have writing - and writing Harry Potter Fanfiction in particular - as a means of a temporary break/escape from it all from time to time. And had I not met all of you lovelies here, I honestly don’t know if I would still have stuck with it after all of these years... As some of you may know or remember, I did take a two-year hiatus from 2012 to 2014 while I was in college, and I almost didn’t return after that. When I did, I wrote a few new chapters back in 2014, but that was when I realized that the story wasn’t going in the direction that I wanted it to anymore. So, in January of 2015, I decided to scrap everything and start all over with my Novel!  I have been in the re-writing process with LNW for three years now. The only reason I did not delete the whole thing and start all over, was because I did not wish to lose all of my old reviews/feedback on the story. I was editing the chapters as I went before the HPFF forums closed in the spring of 2016. After that incident, I sort of just abandoned everything over there and I took a break for a while. (9 months, to be exact.) With the opening of HPFT’s archives, I was excited to have a real fresh start with my Novel. I finally started posting the newly re-written chapters on January 2017, and to-date our archive is THE ONLY place on the internet that hosts all of my stories in their most updated form.

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...When I started writing this blog last week, this was originally going to be the part where I write the conclusion, and wrap up my bittersweet feelings of how it’s been an incredible ten years, and how I cannot wait to see where the next ten will take us!! And while that is still true; as most of you all have seen/heard by now, the announcement came on Monday that the HPFF Story Archives will be closing next month, on April 28th. The fact that this announcement came in three days before what would have been my ten-year forumversarry has, admittedly, thrown me into several emotional tangents off-and-on all week that I was not quite prepared for. Just when I thought that I had buried all of my feelings about that place and finally moved on with my life... BAM! Here we go again... I guess a part of me has known all along that the site was running on borrowed time anyway. But that still didn’t make the official announcement any less shocking, or any easier to digest. The more naive part of my brain had convinced me that the old version of LNW would always be around on HPFF for me to refer back to and reference when needed throughout my rewriting process. After all, feedback has always been SO important to me; which is why I have been using all of my old reviews from there as I go through the editing process with my Novel. But now, in a month’s time, all of that will be deleted. Permanently. Nearly 20 years of history, just gone. And I’d be lying if I said that I did not have some very mixed feelings about that... 

So yes, I went through the whole process of backing everything I had left over there up on Monday night - something that I probably should have done two years ago, but I was clearly being lazy, lol! But it was SUCH a humbling experience, let me tell you. Seeing some of the old reviews that I had gotten - reviews that are now almost ten years old - it really reminded me of how far I’ve come as a writer, and just exactly how much I have improved and grown over the last decade. I confess that I had not logged into my HPFF account since last year’s CTF event, so it felt a bit strange to be back there again. But I’m glad I spent the time that I did on Monday night (staying up til nearly 5am, lol), saying goodbye to the place that first gave me the confidence to share my stories with the world. It was a very bittersweet process, to say the very least.   Overall though, I’ve dealt with my feelings on HPFF for the most part. That’s why I was not around for the first 10 months of this forum being open. That’s why it took me so long to jump back in and finally get involved here. I was scared. I was hurt. I was sad. I was emotional. And I felt lost. But once I was ready; once I finally put those hurt feeling aside and moved on, I came back here and I immediately jumped into the CTF reviewing event that was going on last spring. And everyone was so welcoming, and so friendly and inviting. It just made me feel as though no time had passed at all!! I was able to just pick right back up where I had left off at and start again. Not all the old faces were here, but there were many familiar ones, and several amazing new ones!! And I instantly fell in love with the feeling of community again.  

I cannot even begin to tell you guys how important, how special, how meaningful, how absolutely AMAZING if feels to know that no matter what happens, no matter how much time passes, no matter what crazy circumstances that RL may throw my way; YOU GUYS - my HPFT Family - will ALWAYS be there for me. This place really is like Hogwarts; always there to welcome you back home, lol!  And I really do mean that, genuinely, from the bottom of my heart!!! HPFT is not JUST a website, just a forum, or just an archive. Sure, it is comprised of all of those things, but for me; HPFT is and always will be its MEMBERS. You guys are what keep me going, and y’all are why I do what I do. We are all connected through our love of writing and HP/other fandoms alike. Nothing can tear us apart, and just knowing that simple fact alone fills me with so much joy and hope for the future!! 

Ten years it’s been. I’ve made so many friends from so many different part of the world. I’ve pulled so many all-nighters in so many different HC competitions. I posted my first ever Novel and received over 500 reviews for it. This year I won my first site-wide award! I even learned how to make graphics over the years too!! It has been one hell of a ride, that’s for sure! And yes, absolutely, I cannot WAIT to see where the next ten years take me!! Because, for as long as I live, I cannot see myself outgrowing Harry Potter, lol. And, at the rate I’m going, (as @Rumpelstiltskin often likes to joke) I’ll be 80 years old by the time I finish LNW, lmao!!!  That is TOTALLY a joke though, haha!! I really am hoping to have it close to being finished here within the next few years.  ...In all seriousness though; it’s not often I feel compelled to Blog about things. It’s not often I bare my soul, or make myself vulnerable in such a way as this. But today was a big day. And,in light of recent events, I could not allow it to go by and NOT say anything. I’ve told people in private before my feelings about the site and the community before, but I felt that it just needed to be said publically. Because I know a lot of people are hurting right now. A lot of people out there feel lost, sad, and emotional over Monday’s announcement. And that’s okay. I was there too. But then I realized something…  The community is still here. It’s not lost. There is still a place for us. We still have our little corner of the internet to call home. And after ten years, and am beyond grateful for that!! I will probably carry several of the friendships that I have made here with me for the rest of my life.

If you’re new here and you’ve just read this entire rambling novel of a blog post - welcome!! I probly haven’t ‘met’ you yet, but I love you just for being here!!   And everyone else, because let’s face it, y’all know I’ve talk to like practically everybody now pretty much at one point or another (like, seriously, what’s a stranger? haha!!) I love you ALL so much!!!   This community means the absolute world to me. Y’all are my family, and I would do anything for any one of you, be it within my power/capability to do so. This community of wonderful, supportive, encouraging, uplifting, amazing, funny, talented, accepting, inclusive, loving, kind, helpful, and just overall amazing people have done so much for me over the past decade. So it is my honor, my privilege, to be able to give back and do for you all now as a staffer. Being on the staff team for the past 8 months has probably been THE BEST experience in the whole entire Ten Years I’ve been around here, lol! I just love being a part of something so great, and being able to help my online family out here fills my heart with so much joy!! ?

So happy ten years of writing Harry Potter fanfiction to me.  Even though it hasn’t been ten years here at HPFT, specifically, I know that there are some of you here in the community who I have known for the vast majority of the last decade. I love you; all of you, old and new, or not, lol!!  Thank you for simply being here, for contributing to the community. Big or small, your contributions and your presence here matters. No matter how small/insignificant/unimportant you may feel, I am here to tell you that YOU ARE IMPORTANT, and you DO matter!!! Just look at me, I was a notorious background lurker for six years. So I know all about hiding out in the shadows, lol!! But even our fabulous lurkers are ever so lovely, and I just adore you ALL to pieces!!!  Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU!!! Thank you; all of you, for making this place what it is. To anyone who has ever read my story; and especially all of those who have left me Reviews over the years, THANK YOU!! Anyone with whom I have ever held a conversation with; be it here on the forums or on social media, Thank You!!  

Your love and support mean more to me than words can describe!! I truly am beyond excited for the future of this Community, and I cannot wait to see what the next ten years will bring us!!   

Love, Deana ?