SHIP: Harry, Ron and Hermione - "It's a family affair!"

[naama_gat at hotmail.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 11976

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Neil Ward" <neilward at d...> wrote:
> STOP PRESS: FFA attempts a serious shipping post - no poems, no 
parodies - everyone chokes back the boredom as he enters 'Binns' 
mode.
> 
> ***
> 
> [DISCLAIMER – I haven't read every single shipping post - I need to 
see the world outside - so I apologise if the following thoughts have 
been proposed before.  I also pity you if you think like I do]
> 
> Not wishing to suggest that there are only two male archetypes 
[waves at Dave Hardenbrook and all the women on this list], but 
during the various discussions about Ron and Harry in canon and 
fanon, I've become increasingly sure that I'm like Ron, and not, as 
I'd hoped, like Harry.  I don't share Ron's passion for sport, but I 
am sarcastic and insecure and I was inclined, when younger, to be 
very jealous and indulge in blanking people with fuming silences.  I 
am also freckly and have a touch of redhead in me (in fact, I've 
found a picture of me aged 11 that looks uncannily like Rupert Grint 
in 'Joe 90' glasses).  I'm stretching it, I know.  Indulge me, 
please
.
> 
> My reason for mentioning all that is that I've been told that, in 
relationships, I'm inclined to fall into the parent-child model, 
where I'm the parent, and that set me thinking of Ron as a `parent' 
in our triumvirate
.
> 
> In my view, Harry is the `child' to Ron & Hermione's `parents' in 
many respects.  Harry came to the magical world like a newborn baby, 
ignorant of its wonders, while, by birth and book, respectively; Ron 
and Hermione became his `elders', teachers and advisors.  Harry is 
the risk-taking teen swimming in newfound popularity, while Ron is 
the exasperated guide and Hermione the admonishing rulekeeper.  In 
Harry's shadow, Ron could be compared with the father who lives 
through his son.  He watches his Quidditch matches and encourages 
him, despite his own lack of involvement; he experiences poverty, 
while Harry enjoys a wizard fortune (isn't it often the case that 
parents wish better for their children than they had?).  Hermione, on 
the other hand, is the perfect, finger wagging, nagging mother, who 
does everything but wipe Harry's face with a spittled hankie. 
> 
> I could equally make a case for Hermione and Harry as the parents 
and Ron as the child, if I shift the emphasis to the Muggle world, 
but my point (I did get there eventually) is that this is a three-way 
relationship that engenders familial love and bonding.  My original 
model isn't all-encompassing and doesn't preclude romantic links 
within the `family,' but it is, perhaps, the foundation of the 
lasting, platonic friendship between these three.  Alternatively, it 
could also be that Harry `grows up' and moves on, as many children 
do, and that Ron and Hermione are left to enjoy their fractious 
`marriage,' or that we'll witness an eye-popping `incestuous' 
relationship between Harry and one of the other two.  
> 
> Okay, now pull me to pieces!
> 

Very, very cool!! I really think you've got something there. In fact, 
I think you've hit on one of the main (subconscious) reasons that R/H 
always seems so right to me and H/H doesn't. 
Of course, the parents-child aspect of the three-cornered 
relationship is only one of its aspects (or else Ron's jealousy of 
Harry would be completely out of place), and I think its mostly the 
result of the external circumstances. I mean that its not that Harry 
is by nature more childish or dependent than either Ron or Hermione. 
Its just that he's the one that is constantly in danger (being 
Voldemort's favorite shooting target) and so he needs more help and 
guidance. 

Thanks Neil! That was a really interesting post.

Naama