[Written July 24, 2005 by Delfina]

Being a fan is an admission that someone is so much better than you and has done something so much greater than anything you have ever even thought of, that you have no choice but to give up your silly self-delusions and pretensions — give up yourself, really, and your vainglorious ego — and just slobber all over it in awe.

It’s terribly liberating too, to realize that you have no responsibility in the matter: you don’t have to pass judgment, you don’t have to figure out why you love it so much, you don’t have to compare it to anything else — least of all anything that you thought you might have been capable of doing. You can just love it blissfully with all of your overflowing little heart.

And even though you might be jealous of this great thing that you wish only you knew about and could clutch close to your chest where no one else could see it or tarnish it or take it away, you realize that part of the deal is giving up any stake or ownership at all in this thing that you had no part in creating, in which your only contribution is dazed, slack-jawed fawning. And sharing the love unabashedly with all the other overflowing little hearts, who easily number in the millions, is just more sweetness.

A similar sentiment is expressed here, but I believe with a self-consciousness that has not resigned itself to the crawling-on-your-belly surrender that is fandom.