The Gospel of Star Wars

I’ve never known or cared to know much about Star Wars. I have nothing against it, mind you, it has just held little interest for me. Here are my past connections:

1. I had R2D2 underoos when I was little. I guess they were meant as some type of under wear, but I vaguely recall running about in them more like a costume. The memory is vague so I must have been small, but I think Shan might have had C3PO?

2. It is one of the first theater movies I remember going to. That and ET, and I don’t remember which of the original three it would have been or anything about what was going on, just that I got taken to an actual movie and maybe was a little in love with Luke Skywalker.

3. When Mike and I first began seeing each other again after our four month break up, I took him to one of the first day showings of The Phantom Menace (I didn’t know what it was called until recently. I used to just call any of the six, “Star Wars”). Anyway, a kid at my work had waited out all night to get tickets and let me buy some off of him. I figured it seemed like something a guy might appreciate a girl taking him to see. It’s probably why he married me, so maybe I should have been giving Star Wars far more respect all along.Anyway, here is the deal. I am pretty wimpy about what I let my kids watch. I know it is all relative because if Abe had older brothers I’m sure there is a lot he would have seen that he hasn’t, and Goldie was watching older stuff at three than my other kids just because Abe and Daisy were ready for it and, well, there Goldie was. But, I am pretty sissy. They have mostly seen PBS cartoons and the really old Disney movies that Mike loves to get for them like Swiss Family Robinson, etc.

But, a strange thing happens when you have a son and he gets in school. He starts hearing about Spider Man and Star Wars and other "cool" shows, and you sense that he would feel so much more a part of things and so cool if he were a little more in the loop. I didn’t let him watch the last Spider Man (well, or any of them for that matter), but I told him all about it and we had long discussions about just what and who the black Spider Man was, why it had such negative power on people, etc. Recently Mike talked me into letting us get the Lego’s Star Wars Wii game (I’m a wimp about games too), because, as he pointed out, when you get the guys with your light saber they only crumble into a pile of Legos and then reassemble themselves. It has made Abe so so happy and he talks about it so much with his friends. He picked up many of the characters names and some of the story line even before seeing any of the shows. Once, after telling me loads about Lego’s Star Wars, he asked me to tell him more about what the Star Wars video games were like back when I was a kid. Were there games when I was a kid?

The other day Mike and I decided to let him watch The Phantom Menace (you know, the first newer one – made after the older ones, but really more of the beginning of the story). We put something innocent on upstairs on our computer for the girls to watch and took Abe downstairs for that. We had to be careful of course and prepare him for KwaiGons death (I know that is not how you spell it, but the fact that I know his name and that he was Obi Wan’s trainer is something amazing).

So, since that night, pretty much all Abe and I talk about is Star Wars. It has kind of been like discussing the gospel in depth only it is the gospel of Star Wars. Now, I wasn’t kidding you when I said I didn’t know a thing. I keep telling Abe answers to his questions like this:

Me: “Well, Obi Wan had to take Luke to find that little green guy . . .”
Abe: “Yoda?”
Me: “Oh yah, Yoda, so he had to take him to Yoda . . .”

But, I have answered so so many questions that I had no idea I knew the answers to. I don’t think we’ll let him watch the next two yet, but he still wants to know the whole story and he is so full of questions!

“Why did Anakin turn bad?”
“Why did they have to hide his kids from him?”
“Why did Obi Wan change his name to Ben?”
“What do those metachlorions in their blood do?”
“Why are they called Siths?”
“Why are there all different looking aliens on the same planet?”
“What did Yoda mean when he said something about, ‘fear makes you angry and anger makes you hate and hate brings you closer to the dark side?'”
“Why aren’t the Jedi’s supposed to marry?”
“What did the dark side do to get rid of the Jedis?”

I am serious, we have the lengthiest discussions about the tragedy of Anakin and what would cause such a thing to happen and how difficult for Obi Wan to have to fight who he’d trained but how redeeming that at least Darth Vader killed the emperor in the end. We discuss the different looking aliens and how many there might be of a particular kind and how the Jedi’s could have gotten started to begin with and how Yoda could fight so well when he walks with a cane. It goes on and on and I don’t know how I’ve been able to hold such discussions on a topic I thought I knew absolutely nothing about. Today I even found myself looking up different synopsis (how do you make that plural?) so I could explain things better to Abe.

I've had no choice but to become informed about Star Wars. It turns out Star Wars is serious and deep business . . . at least it is when you have a very intense thoughtful boy like mine asking questions about it. Abe and I may have made it far more deep than it was ever meant to be.