Ghosts

[kiricat2001]

No: HPFGUIDX 71592

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Lady Macbeth" 
<LadyMacbeth at S...> wrote:
> imamommy Said:
> 
> >>> IMHO, Nick made it sound like it was a one-time kind of choice, 
at
> least in his case.  He almost sounded like he regretted it, but it
> was to late to change his mind.  I wonder, though if this rules out
> any "guardian angel-ing"  from those who have gone on.  There is one
> instance of this, during the Priori Incantatum, when Harry parents 
et
> al come out of Voldie's wand and tell him what to do.  But I wonder
> about other circumstances.  Any thoughts?<<<
> 
> Lady Macbeth:
> I also believe it's a one-time choice, though whether or not it is 
truly a
> "conscious" choice as Nick seems to have suggested is debatable.  
In a lot
> of ways, the ideas suggested about ghosts in the Harry Potter world 
suggest
> that they are exploring a lot of the same questions about death and 
life
> after death that we explore in the real world.
> 
> Myrtle's testimony in Chamber of Secrets suggests that she 
didn't "choose"
> to stay in this world as a ghost - she just suddenly found herself 
back
> here.  Upon deciding to make the best of the situation by haunting 
Olive
> Hornby, she also found herself ordered back to the toilet where she 
died by
> the Ministry of Magic, thus making an unhappy situation even more 
miserable.

And just how does that work, I wonder?  Who in the Ministry is in 
charge of ghosts?  Probably an Unspeakable. However, the idea that 
living mortals can make decisions regarding an apparition from the 
afterlife seems peculiar to me.  Unless, of course, Myrtle is not 
telling all she knows.

> Nick was certainly afraid to "die" or to "move on", though I'm of 
the
> opinion that there was also more going through his subconcious 
mind - the
> fact that the executioner couldn't seem to fell a clean strike to 
save his
> life, the blade of the axe was too dull...it's possible that he 
didn't even
> feel his execution was justified, and that would have been weighing 
in his
> mind.  Did he leave family, dependent children behind?  Did he leave
> untended affairs of an estate?  Was someone who would commit more 
dangerous
> crimes getting away clean to commit crimes again while he took the
> punishment for one of those crimes?  There's a lot left unsaid 
there that
> could make a person very miserable and very attached to this world.

Nick's biggest reason for why he's a ghost and Sirius wouldn't be one 
centered around fear of death.  I took his words to me that he, Nick, 
had been afraid of death in general, not just at the moment of his 
sloppy execution.  He also implied, almost as if he had received this 
knowledge from somewhere, that Sirius had moved on and had chosen not 
to become a ghost.  Is that because Sirius was not afraid of death, 
in general, although he wore an expression of fear at the time of his 
trip through the veil? 

Nick also tells Harry that he knows nothing of the secrets of death, 
so what happens to the non-ghost souls is not something he can 
comment on. Somehow, I think by the end of the series we will know 
more than Nick does.

<snip>

> In keeping with the statement JK made that "the happiest people do 
not
> become ghosts" and the evidence put forth by the books, the 
only "guardian
> angel-ing" that could seemingly go on would be by ghosts of people 
who died
> tragically or miserably. 

Unless ghosts and what we refer to as guardian angels are two 
different things.  

 This is why I think that Nick may have been off
> the mark, either intentionally or no - there's enough evidence to 
suggest
> that both the Potters and Sirius had enough time before they died 
for their
> minds to switch gears and potentially lock them into this world as 
ghosts.

But, Nick wasn't definitive as to whether the choice to remains as a 
ghost is made at the time of death, when the body is still 
technically alive, or if the choice is allowed to be made once the 
person in question has died.

> Given some of the "lives" that ghosts are shown to live, one might 
hope it
> isn't the case, but I don't think there's definitive proof that ANY 
of them
> absolutely moved on to "the other side of the veil".  Sirius falling
> directly through the veil may have had some impact - but I don't 
know
> exactly what the Ministry was doing with that section of the veil 
or if
> mortals have ever taken their body to the other side before either.
> 
> -Lady Macbeth

It does seem sort of harsh if one has to make a decision right there 
at the very second of dying whether or not to spend eternity as a 
ghost...

Marianne
 
> 
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