Yesterday I finished Sigrid Nunez's The Vulnerables in which after joking about how there are no ugly flower names people can name their kids, the protagonist nicknames a pandemic roommate with whom she is saddled "Vetch" (as in the weed).
Later in the day, trans friends talked another friend out of cosplaying a Harry Potter character. The friend said she wanted to "signal to people that I love the character, but reject JKR." And trans friends online said that every bit of visibility adds to JKR's support and coffers and that anyone engaging with the Harry Potter universe is tone deaf and ignorant at best and violently transphobic at worst. And asked how love of a fictional character could matter more than the real people she loved being harmed by JKR. Fair point. (This in addition to the racism, fatphobia, slavery, and other bigotry rampant in the HP books, of course.)
Because she seemed so crestfallen, I suggested Ursula K. Le Guin... she is genuinely wise, wrote tons, has several universes, is a gender visionary (The Left Hand of Darkness!), and the Earthsea Series is great for young readers. Then I reread the first book in the series--A Wizard of Earthsea--and was amused to be reminded that Ged has a friend called "Vetch."
WHAT are the odds of two Vetches in one day?!
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