This Star Won't Go Out

None of us knew that Fourth of July weekend that something very special was about to happen. That we were one day away from the moment when the love Esther had for the world would become contagious. She was about to inspire a difference in the world.

Just days before the Make-A-Wish weekend began, the HPA entered the Chase Bank Community Giving Challenge. Approximately 10,000 organizations were competing for votes on Facebook. The organization with the most votes would win $250,000. If we could somehow do this seemingly impossible task, it would be the game changer that we had been looking for.

Although we had scores of volunteers throughout the world working day and night for us, trying to get votes, though we had Harry Potter fan sites and Wizard rock bands pushing for us, in order to really come in first place, we would need something truly seismic to happen. During the Make-A-Wish weekend, Esther must have talked with John Green about the campaign, inspiring John to make the Vlogbrothers video, “With Esther.”

All night long I was thinking about how grateful I am to know Esther and trying to figure out a way to, like, give thanks for our weird Internet based cross-generational friendship. And then I remembered that the first amazing night of amazing I spent with Esther was at LeakyCon, a Harry Potter conference. And after all if it weren’t for Harry Potter, I would have no Esther, and also there probably wouldn’t be a nerdfighteria. Then I thought about the fact that Esther is a huge supporter of the Harry Potter Alliance, a charitable organization that nerdfighteria often partners with. Like remember when nerdfighteria and the Harry Potter Alliance raised $123,000 to help Haiti heal and we had the SS DFTBA load up and go over to Haiti. Right, that Harry Potter Alliance.

The HPA is currently in this huge contest to potentially win $250,000 to dramatically improve the amount of worldsuck they can decrease. The HPA is currently in third place but what if we all go and we vote and we tell our friends to vote, and they win the $250,000 which allows them to continue their work, getting books to kids around the world from the Mississippi delta to Rwanda, and allows them to grow the work they do, advocating for human rights around the world. And also it is a small little way of saying to Esther, hi, thank you for being awesome. I’m not going to say that we should win this contest for Esther, because if I say that she will throw up in the back of her mouth and hate me. I think we should win this contest with Esther. So if you wanna give thanks for the existence of nerdfighteria and the existence of Esther and the existence of wonderful boy wizards, please go to the link and vote for the Harry Potter Alliance. So please go vote and thanks again to everyone in Boston. It was so fun to hang out with you guys.



It was now Monday July 5, 2010. I was scanning how many votes the HPA was receiving in the contest. We were doing well, averaging about one vote every couple of minutes. And then suddenly, when I hit refresh, we had fifty more votes. Then one hundred more votes. Soon five hundred. Soon over one thousand more votes.

The video changed everything. Thanks to that video, thanks to John, and thanks to Esther, we won first place in the Chase Bank Community Giving Challenge, nerdfighters all over the world celebrated, tweeting, “We won it WITH Esther.”

As for Esther, she couldn’t believe it. The “With Esther” video had made her something of a star on the Internet. She was getting tons of fan mail over Facebook and e-mail. People were telling her their problems and she was offering a helpful listening ear. Her wish to make a difference was coming true.


One week later there was a big Harry Potter conference in Orlando, Florida, where Chase Bank came to present us with a giant check at a press conference. At the last minute, the HPA tried to bring Esther and her parents to Florida for the event. Unfortunately no commercial airline had the capability of maintaining her oxygen machine at the last minute. So I scrambled to get a video Skype call to take place during the press conference, so Esther could be there the entire time.

At the end of the press conference, we turned on the screen and I said, “We couldn’t bring Esther to the conference so we’re bringing the conference to Esther.” Everyone saw Esther sitting at her home, smiling at them, and the entire room broke out in a standing ovation. Over a hundred people lined up at the computer to say hi to Esther, to thank her for being so awesome, to let her know what an inspiration she was to them.