man I have to say tho that lrn getting into lotr is the best thing bc while I am always into it it’s not a fandom I talk about a lot because it’s one of my older passions
I started reading lotr when I was nine. my dad’s friend, Rick, was iirc an English professor. we were at his and his wife’s house one day when someone saw me looking at these worn, slightly yellowed paperbacks of lotr on the shelf. not first edition or anything but the ones with Michael herring covers (circa 1988, fifth edition I think).
my dad and Rick talked it over and I wound up borrowing the books.
they were really daunting. some iq person told my parents that I read at a college level but it was my first time encountering books I was mean to read that were not only thick but with tiny print
they sat on the corner of my desk long enough they got a little cobwebby
my dad eventually demanded I start reading them. just start, he said. read just one chapter today, read another chapter tomorrow, just try to read them.
gosh I don’t remember how long it took me to get through them but devoured the books. I remember lying on my pink Minnie mouse comforter, on my stomach, the sunlight streaming through my bedroom window on the old house we had, the seafoam green house with the oak tree in the front.
I remember excitedly looking forward to the passages about legolas and gimli, surreptitiously skipping over the long eleven passages that as a nine year old didn’t hold my attention at all.
for as long as it took me to get started it was over so quickly.
then years later when I was fourteen / fifteen and the film’s came out
I remember talking with a classmate and learning elvish
literally jamming a spade into my own foot as I did yard work because I was privately reenacting the Gandalf and balrog scene
rereading lotr over and over again
teaching myself the calligraphy of the films
screaming shrilly when got the extended edition box set of rotk for Christmas, the lost tales box set and other volumes of the history of middle earth and the silmarillion
moving to a new place and finding out one of my workmates is huge into lotr and workflows by as we grab and then over the years we exchange lotr gifts for holidays (like I got him a hard cover copy of the children of Hurin and he got me the ps2 games for Christmas one year)
to this day I read Lord of the Rings at least once a year, my omnibus version so tattered and dogeared and yellow and I have watched the films so much that my two towers DVD is a little messed up and I’ve memorized all the commentaries and appendices across the films
lotr is responsible for igniting my love of fantasy which triggered my desire to read other fantasy novels which triggered my desire to write and influenced my imagination and honestly that love of fantasy influenced my decision to play Dragon age which is why I game at all in general
it’s just such a huge part of my life and I don’t talk about it nearly enough for the impact it’s had on me
