Happy Star Wars Day!

As coincidence would have it, if I believed in coincidences that is, I have the day off. I did not intentionally take a vacation day to celebrate Star Wars Day, but the synchronicity is not lost on me. Now I get to enjoy the day however I want (while maintaining social distancing and with most things still closed). But at least I’m not working!

A few weeks ago, I had a remarkable discussion with my wife. It was one that we’d had in the past, but I never truly took it seriously. Then, the pandemic arrived and all bets were off. If memory serves, we were out for one of our daily walks when my darling wife uttered the words below.

I’d be open to watching the Star Wars and Marvel movies.

My wife

If this wasn’t proof that the self-confinement had been going on too long, I don’t know what is! In all seriousness though, we had discussed watching the Star Wars saga together in preparation for our 10th anniversary trip to Walt Disney World in 2021 (I’m still holding hope that we’ll be able to go). With the newly opened Galaxy’s Edge at Hollywood Studios, it made sense for my wife to familiarize herself with the world of Star Wars.

You see, my wife has never seen Star Wars, or maybe one of the movies years ago in a previous life, but it’s not really her thing. So for her to say she wanted to watch them, I was all in! Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve watched the first two movies of the original trilogy. Tonight, we watch Return of the Jedi.

My love of Star Wars has been life long. As a child, I preferred Star Wars over Star Trek, though this would change as I got into my teenage years. But no matter what, I remained a fan.

When George Lucas announced he was making a new prequel trilogy, I was ecstatic. I would finally be able to experience Star Wars in a movie theatre, just like the generation before me. A friend of mine added to the excitement when he suggested that we go camp out to buy movie tickets. (You see, kids, back in the day, you had to actually go buy movie tickets at the theatre. You couldn’t just book your tickets online using your phone.). So that’s precisely what we did. A couple of days before the tickets were to go on sale, we went and became the first two people in line in town for tickets. People had in fact been lining up in bigger cities for days by this point, but we were the first here in Moncton. No sooner had we gotten ourselves set up that a few others joined the line saying that they were just waiting for someone else to get things started. By the next evening, we had a good 40-50 people waiting in line.

While people will forever debate the value and necessity of the prequel trilogy, I will always have a soft spot for Episode 1: The Phantom Menace. It was the first Star Wars movie that I was able to experience in a theatre. I got to camp out and have fun with friends to create an experience. I even made the front page of the newspaper a couple of times over those few weeks. First, we were interviewed about camping out for tickets, and then I was photographed on opening night when I dressed up to attend the premiere with another friend. Yes, I was that guy.

And yes, my wife knew all of this before we got married. She still said yes. That’s true love.

So I now wish all of you a happy Star Wars Day.

And May the fourth be with you. Always.