The Dementors

I was having a particularly bad day today. I was really sad and heartbroken and I was about to jump into bed and wail away with grief until I fell asleep. So I made myself some hot tea and broke off a huge chunk of some bitter-sweet dark chocolate and was about to curl up in my bed with a book.

And then, I thought …

No wonder the cure for the dementors is a piece of chocolate. No wonder the patronus charm that you need to perform to ward off the dementors is to think about your happiest memory and say ‘Expecto Patronum’.

Yes, I am reading the Harry Potter series now. And you guessed it. 🙂

When I was a kid I resisted reading this series thinking to myself that it is a bunch of books written for children. But when I saw the movies I really enjoyed them. Specially, the scene in the third movie – The Prisoner of Akaban – where Harry himself wards of the dementors that were trying to kill him by performing a patronus charm. Last year when I was going through a particularly difficult phase, I realized that I needed some magic in my life.So on a whim I got the entire series for myself. I also gifted my sister the same so that we both could read it together.

I have been reading the books for sometime, really enjoying them  and I just finished reading the third book. However, until today the analogy for the dementors and the patronus did not occur to me. I realized that what we achieve inwardly will change our outer reality. J.K. Rowling must have realized this before she wrote the book. She was writing this book when she was going through a difficult time herself – her mother’s death, balancing the joy of a newborn and the remorse of a failing marriage, and poverty. She chose to shape her experiences into a charming series of books to enlighten generations of children; she gave us magic to lighten up when down for the rest of our lives.

When I was burdened with the pressure of completing my thesis last year, I remember my old wise friend ask me if I had chocolate. And when I answered in affirmative, he had said “Then what is stopping you?!”

Sometimes as grownups we forget that the cure for a sadness is to take a huge bite from a piece of chocolate and to remember our happiest memories. I wish I can do this more often…

P.S. I will go now and save the bars of dark chocolate for all the rainy days that are yet to come….