Today I graduated from college, the only one in my family to achieve this goal despite being the youngest child in a family of six children. My entire family came to see me receive this recognition and we celebrated the day together. Anyone reading this is probably asking, “I though this was a blog post about Star Wars?” Believe me, it is, but I want to explain just why Star Wars is so important to me, why it has become synonymous with some of the happiest moments in my life, and how it helped me out of some of the darkest moments too. THE SAGA BEGINS Every story has a beginning, and likewise, every Star Wars story has a beginning. I wasn’t alive when the original trilogy of Star Wars films began with George Lucas in 1977. I didn’t grow up with Han, Luke, Leia or Chewbacca. For me, there were no princesses, smugglers, or Kowakian Monkey-lizards. Don’t get me wrong, I, like many others, fell in love with the magic and adventure of what would become Episodes IV through VI, but that was long after I was introduced to Star Wars in 1999. At the age of two, I had a crush on Padme Amidala, a Queen undercover desperately trying to save her home planet. I aspired to be like Obi-Wan Kenobi, a fearless Jedi Knight rushing into danger with his master at his side. However, overall, I longed to be like Anakin Skywalker, a child destined for greatness who, by happen-chance, was whisked away into a fantastical life he once could only dream of. The Phantom Menace was my Star Wars. Now sure, it’s probably a little hyperbolic to say that I experienced all these feelings as a toddler, but I watched this film repeatedly for the next few years before Attack of the Clones was released in 2002. (More on that later.) Somewhere between the age of two and five, I also experienced that original trilogy and I distinctly remember walking into a pawn shop with my parents and buying A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi in a VHS combo-pack. I asked my mom and dad, “If this is episode four, five and six, where is two and three?” I don’t know how I was adept enough to notice this discrepancy at the time, nor do I know how my parents were knowledgeable enough about “the Wars” to actually give me an answer, but I was, and they were. That’s the thing that I didn’t realize at the time. My parents were a part of my Star Wars journey from the very beginning. I mean, I’m only just realizing it, but they had to have been the ones to bring Star Wars into our home. For that, I’m grateful. The next Star Wars memory I have is opening weekend for Attack of the Clones. I remember standing in line for the theater, at a time when that was what one did if they wanted to be the first to see a movie. There were people of all ages dressed as Twi’leks and Jawas and Jedi, oh my. I remember sitting in the theater, never getting bored of trade routes, senate discussions, or CGI battle scenes. When Yoda fought Count Dooku at the end, the entire theatre erupted and cheered, and I remember seeing my mother smiling up at the screen. Now, on the 20th anniversary of The Phantom Menace I have nothing but love for my introduction to Star Wars and I am closer than ever to my parents. Though, it wasn’t always this way. THE FORCE IS AWAKE Thanksgiving Day 2014 was complicated. That summer I had gone through a rebellious phase and my teenage life was a mess. Possibly it was because I had no Jedi master to keep me on the right path, or because my life lacked the morality of the Jedi way, but I was lost both emotionally and spiritually. That summer I did drugs, I lost my virginity, I went through juvenile court and maybe most importantly, I told my parents that I was gay. This went as well as one might expect a screaming match in two separate cars in the Taco Bell parking lot could go. My parents were so upset and in disbelief that what I was saying was true. Maybe I could have told them to search their feelings and know it to be true, but at the time, Star Wars was the furthest from my mind. I didn’t go home for two days. I slept around at stranger’s homes while waiting for my parents to cool off. At some point they must have, or at least we didn’t speak about it, because soon I started my senior year of high school and I left my heathen ways behind me. However, holidays with family can be stressful. That year while the turkey was cooking, I hid in my bedroom watching Netflix and trying to disappear. I knew that many of my family members would have heard about “my problems.” They would have heard that the youngest child in a Christian family, me, is breaking the mold and tearing the family apart with Sodom and Gomorrah-style debauchery. I sat on my bed and I watched the finale episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars. For some reason, the episode hit differently for me as I watched Padawan Ahsoka Tano leave the Jedi Order to forge her own path. After the holiday dinner, I sat on the couch in the living room, and then it happened. The first trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens arrived. This was the revival of Star Wars in film. This was where I was going to put all my energy for the next year. I would become obsessed, more-so than I already was, with Star Wars. And then I moved into my first apartment. THE SAGA CONTINUES My parents and I never spoke about my sexuality during the year after I first told them. During this time, I finished my high school career, moved to another state to go to college and decided that now was the time that I could be whoever I wanted to be. I am gay. I am agnostic. I am a Jedi, like my father before me. It almost broke me. My first semester in college was full of growing pain. I had to figure out who I was and looking for acceptance and love was the most important thing to me. I bent over backwards to make relationships work because I felt so alone. On a cold day in November 2015, I was on the phone with my mother and for the first time since Summer 2014, I told her again that I was gay. We argued, we cried, and she hung up the phone without saying, “I love you.” At the time I imagined that she probably did love me, but I had no way of knowing. This felt like the Han in carbonite scene from Empire if Leia had responded to Han’s declaration of love with, “oh, well this is awkward.” Aside from my deteriorating relationship with my parents, I was also going through a bad break-up and that morning, I crashed my car on main street and the police had to give me a ride home because I had no one to call. I had never felt so alone, and that night, despite all of the good things in my life, despite the fact that the return of Star Wars was less than a month away, I decided I was going to end my life. Now, as I sit here and type this, readers can exhale as I obviously didn’t complete the task. I made it out of this dark time in my life. The process of healing was more difficult than I am going to make it sound in this essay, but believe me when I say, Star Wars was the only thing left I had to look forward to. I counted the days to The Force Awakens and when I saw it in the theater, alone, it felt transcendent. I know it was just a normal movie but seeing Rey, a nobody with no parents find her place in the galaxy, resonated deeply with me. I cried while I watched the struggle of the dark and the light in Kylo Ren and when he inevitably killed his father. For me, the story was littered with themes around lineage and personal journey. A little too real for me at the time. At Christmas a week later, I told my parents about the film, we were still talking even though they still didn’t approve of my lifestyle, and to my surprise, we made plans to see the film together on Christmas Eve. When the film was over, I had the best, and longest, discussion with my parents than I had had in recent memory. We bonded over a space opera and for a moment, we forgot about our differences. This started a new tradition with my parents and I where we see every new Star Wars film in theatres together. This tradition has continued, now including my husband too. Life has changed drastically since I was a little boy with a crush on Natalie Portman. Today, I graduated from college cheered on from my parents and my husband standing side by side. My parents and I are counting down the days until this year’s Rise of Skywalker. Who would have known that when my life was the most fragile, during the hardest times, Star Wars would become an anchor that kept me from floating away? The force is with me now, and always. Happy Star Wars Day, my friends. [email protected] @GrahamWoodMedia
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Erick L. Graham Wood
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