From the Diaries of Minerva McGonagall: October 12, 1954

Dear Diary,

Having to go to work every day seems like a great unfairness. How do so many adults manage it? I suppose I am also an adult now, although I do not feel like it—and I do not think the other adults feel like it either.

I can tell by the way my coworkers look at me that they think I am young and foolish and inexperienced. They ask me to do the most mind-numbing tasks, and when I suggested I could use an accio spell to retrieve files from the enormous halls of cabinets instead of running up and down the halls myself, they said no. Turning down a perfectly good idea just because I am a member of the junior staff! 

(Someone told me later that the files might get damaged as they flew through the air, and that I needed to carry them by hand to ensure their security. I wanted to argue that I could get it to work, maybe by adding a modifier to the spell, but they’re not interested in my thoughts. They’re only interested in my ability to fetch and carry.)

When I took the job at the Ministry I thought I would be able to help make the wizarding world a better place for its inhabitants. I thought I would be taking on challenging tasks and working side-by-side with the brightest witches and wizards in London. Instead I spend my days walking from room to room handing out files and collecting documents, or sitting quietly in meetings making note of who said what. Sometimes they even ask me to run out and come back with tea and scones, because they know I can pretend to be a Muggle—and because I always carry Muggle money, which means I am literally paying to do my own job. They pay me back, of course, though not always in a timely fashion, and not at what I would consider the correct exchange rate.

Not everybody at the Ministry likes Muggles, which I find disappointing. Many of the senior staff are openly prejudiced against Muggles, and I feel like they are constantly watching me for mistakes, so they can blame it on the half of me that is not like them. Some of the senior officers are kind and wise, but others rose to power years ago and still support out-of-date ideas. The world would be so much better if young people were allowed to be in charge!

I still think of Dougal every day. Some days I think of him every minute. I have so little else to think about, as I walk up and down the file cabinets or sort letters for the Ministry’s owl post. (Their owlery is twice as large as the one at Hogwarts.) I wonder how often he thinks of me. If the Ministry did not hate Muggles so much, if just one person changed just one law, I could write a letter to Dougal and an owl would fly to his farm and land on his front porch, right where we stood the last time we were together. 

It is unfair—and I am still too young to do anything about it.

Yours faithfully, 

Minerva