2005-05-26 - 9:27 p.m.
When the new Star Wars movies came out (actually, I think it was for �Attack of the Clones�), I decided I wanted to see them with the same people I had seen the original movies with. I had found a picture of my kindergarten class online (it was actually originally a site that�s now gone, with the photo in color). I started trying to recontact my classmates.
Googling produced several candidates for my best friend from then David. I figured he probably wasn�t the cage fighter in LA, and emailed the grad student at Stanford. He wrote back and told me he�d gotten married and had kids. Man. Last I remember, we were playing with Lego in my backyard. Twenty-ish years will do a lot.
Several of the friends I contacted had gotten married. I guess that�ll happen. Who had become a lawyer, a teacher, a programmer. Five of the six of us I originally emailed had had radio shows in college � talk, comedy, reggae, punk. I met Peter and Russ for �Attack of the Clones� and then also Devan when we decided to see �Return of the King� (since most of us read it around third grade).
On Monday, Russ, Peter, Devan, Rajiv, and I got together to go see �Revenge of the Sith�. David is sadly in California. Robyn E. has also reconnected with some of us (via Friendster of course), but unfortunately she couldn�t make it either. She was the head of the Kissing Bandits back in the day, girls who would chase boys around and try to kiss them, anathema in second grade. I wish they�d come around more these days. I wanted to see how she was after all these years.
We met at a kosher Indian restaurant, cause Rajiv is pretty observant. I should note that this confused me about religion for some time. Rajiv is a Cochin Jew with parents from Bombay. Until I got older and went to school with WASPs, I had the idea that religion came in two flavors. Either you were Catholic (which meant the same as Christian) like Puerto Rican David or Irish Jennifer, or you were Jewish like Peter or Rajiv.
Indian food was good cause it tends to be mushy and I still had a sore throat from choking (the restaurant is all vegetarian to avoid milk/meat issues). I�d gotten there early and sat down at a table first, so the moment of truth came when I got up to hobble to the bathroom. I�d given everyone a heads up that I was visibly disabled now (actually, I referred them here cause I�m still kind of a coward about initially broaching the topic of MS out loud), but I was still pretty nervous.
Everyone totally rolled with it. I�m not sure what I feared � people recoiling in horror? All of them at some point let me use their shoulder for balance (it�s generally a lot easier for me to walk with the cane in my right hand and my left on someone�s shoulder, not for support but to steady myself). It occurs to me that I am indeed pretty much the same yutz I was at age 8, disability or no, and it was good to feel that I�m still me to friends who haven�t seen me in decades.
If you haven�t seen it, the movie is the best of the prequels by far. I realize this isn�t saying much, so I�ll go out on a limb and say it was better than �Return of the Jedi� (which was marred by those damn Ewoks) and maybe on par with the original film. Whew. There, I said it. Bring on the dissenting opinions, fanboys.
People have told me there was just too much corniness. But I think part of this is a function of age. Star Wars is aimed at awkward teens, for whom overblown drama is par for the course. I bet if you watched the original films for the first time now as an adult, they would seem just as hackneyed. I mean, �I love you / I know� is imprinted on my mind as classic, but lets be honest that it�s not exactly Shakespeare.
I was quite amused to learn that playwright Tom Stoppard was brought in for an uncredited rewrite of the dialogue. I don�t envy him the original dreck he had to work with. I sort of wish it had been rewritten by a Glengary Glen Ross-era David Mamet. �Mace: Fuck! You�re a fucking Sith Lord, Palpatine! Anakin: I�m turning to the dark side. Fuck!�
Yeah, I could go on and on about my feelings towards the movie. But that�s not the point. I saw the new Star Wars film with the people I saw the old ones with, just like I wanted. I confirmed to myself that I�m still the same guy to them as a gimp. And it was insanely great to see my friends as adults. We�re going to see each other again in December to go to �The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe�.
� 2005 Geoff Gladstone
Sign My Guestbook!
powered by SignMyGuestbook.com
�
