Today is Star Wars Day. I guess the date originates from how “may the force be with you” sounds like “may the 4th be with you.” I really love that there is an entire day devoted to geekdom. It’s awesome. I watched my VHS-converted DVD of Star Wars today for extra analog nostalgia. Sometimes there’s nothing better than shitty picture quality. Sometimes movies are supposed to look old (Mr. Lucas, please stop messing with them).
I can’t remember the first time I saw Star Wars. I’m very lucky to have never had to be without it (I do remember the first time I saw Alien 3. I was in the basement eating Gardetto’s and as soon as I saw the eggs opening and heard goo gurgling I wanted to vomit). Star Wars has just always existed; a blur in the background of my life. In 3rd grade, I do remember coming home and watching Return of the Jedi in the basement. I was upset about bullies or something and imagined that they were all Jabba the Hut (who I thought should have gone on to become the spokesperson for Pizza Hut, but I guess they don’t want people thinking that their pizza is fattening). We had a cool basement. I used to watch movies down there ALL. THE. TIME. It was the hangout and our own little movie theater - full of my parent’s discarded furniture and wallpapered with movie posters (trophies from my siblings’ movie theater jobs). It was the coolest (for a long time I thought all kids had basements like this, but then realized that ours was truly one of a kind).
For me, Star Wars is more than just a movie or some crazy cultural phenomenon (I think I’m being bold by claiming it’s more than a phenomenon). It was the trilogy I often turned to for comfort and direction. I knew that it would always be there, and if I got bored with one of them there were 2 more movies! My older brother and I would watch Star Wars and Indiana Jones ad infinitum. As a family, we all agreed on Indiana Jones, but Star Wars somewhat divided the siblings. My other brother was all right with it, but not bonkers like me and bro #1. And my sister will never watch them. I think she went to see one of the prequels at the drive-in (which is always a double feature, so she probs went for the other movie) or something, but that doesn’t really help our case much. I think some people just have the force and others don’t.
(I may or may not have cut school when the original trilogy was re-released in theaters. My brother(s) may or may not have been party to this. We may or may not have smuggled an entire bag of Wendy’s into The Empire Strikes Back when it was released on my twelfth birthday.)
I’m glad the force is strong with me. I am a Jedi. I grew up idolizing Princess Leia (um, who didn’t?). I was pretty upset/intrigued when I realized that Star Wars was not a magic historical record of actual events; it was a movie. From that moment on, I knew I wanted to be a part of the magic of making movies. That sounds pretty idyllic, huh? Yeah, I was pretty awesome. I used to hide my mom’s knick-knacks (usually brass or shiny) and draw maps to them in my Minnie Mouse address book. I often referred to it as my “grail diary” and kept a rubber band around it, just like Indy. Sometimes I would take rocks from my mom’s flowerbed, put scratches on them (Sankara stones!), hide them, and do it all over again. This was way more fun when my parents were having construction done to the house and our entire backyard was dug up – lots of “I can reach it” stuff, etc. I remember my mom being mad that I had managed to cake a solid two inches on mud on the bottom of my pink “My Little Pony” sneakers (Velcro-closure because I hated tying shoelaces at this point). I used to take broken tree branches and they would be my lightsaber as I fought Darth Vader all over my back yard. Because I was the youngest, I was usually playing by myself (this makes me sound a bit crazy), so often I would be lightsabering against trees that I would call “Darth Maple,” “Darth Evergreen,” or “Darth Tree” (I never remembered the kind of tree that was directly behind my parents’ house). This seems a bit sad, but also hilarious (imagine little me reenacting movies in my backyard where all of the characters are pretty much played my me- and I’m like, a 6-year-old girl). I was never sad; sometimes the neighborhood kids and my sister would leave me out on purpose and I would cry to my mom, but that didn’t really do anything. So, I just played how I wanted to play. My fucking huge imagination never let me feel lonely. I think being introduced to Star Wars so young (thanks, bro) helped shape me into the well-adjusted, imaginative, creative, rebellious, blonde Jedi that I am today.
(Is Luke Skywalker considered a blonde? I think I’m going to go with sandy blonde. So, a blonde helped the Rebel Alliance defeat the Galactic Empire. Boom.)
Also, this is pretty awesome: #replaceawordinastarwarslinewithpants
Today gets 5 Barbie Warhols: 
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