VI- When your thing becomes everyone’s thing and you aren’t sure how to feel about it

Sorry, that was a mouthful.

We went to Disneyworld this last week to celebrate both my husband’s birthday and our son graduating high school. (No more getting up at 0h: stupid-thirty! No more constantly driving back and forth! YAY.) It was fun, and it was exhausting. Have you ever heard someone complain that they need a vacation after getting home from a vacation? The hubby and I came up with an explanation: you can leave home to go on a vacation, and you can leave home to go on an adventure, and those are two very different experiences.

Adventures involve doing things. Vacations are a break from doing things. If you are tired when you get home, chances are you went on an adventure, not a vacation.

Going to a theme park? That is a whole-ass adventure. You cannot just show up and expect to do all the things. You have to book your days, hotels, restaurants, rides, all in advance. It involves getting up at 7am and competing with thousands of other people to secure spots on the attractions you want, or else there’s no way in heck you are getting on them. You compete with thousands of other people just to walk around the park. It’s hot, humid, and there’s a lot of walking. Park water fountains taste gross. Bottled water sells for a premium. You have to pay additional money for fast lanes, or you’ll end up spending 2 hours in each line and get to ride like 3 things.

We opted to spend the money. We had a good time. Our son got to ride most of the iconic stuff and a few new things. He enjoyed Thunder Mountain. Tron was neat. He did not like Tower of Terror (me neither! not a fan of getting dropped!) We got to watch the firework show.

Of course, we spent some time in Galaxy’s Edge. A year ago, we did a weekend at the Star Wars-themed hotel before it shut down, so this was our second collective time visiting that park. We all have lightsabers (we didn’t bring them). We’re Star Wars nerds in this house…but. My husband grew up more on Star Trek. My son isn’t a hundred percent sure he’s seen the original movies; he likes the Clone Wars and Bad Batch.

Me, though?

This was my thing.

And it struck me, wandering around Disney, that it feels like everyone is a Star Wars fan, nowadays. It’s everywhere. How many new shows have they made now? I mean, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Kid me would have loved for a place like Galaxy’s Edge to have existed.

It’s just…

I remember when all we had were three movies and a bunch of novels that were maybe, sort of, probably not canon. I remember when the only cute green alien with bat ears was an old muppet who spoke in riddles. The Clone Wars was an obscure bit of lore mentioned offhand by Obi-Wan, who was definitely not played by a handsome Ewan McGregor. If you saw a dude in a helmet, that was Boba Fett, and you were a nerd if you knew his name. We didn’t have prequels, sequels, TV shows. spinoffs and characters and ideas and alphabets and this vast avalanche of LORE.

We had this.

Remember this scene? Remember the melancholy music, the lightning, the expression on Luke’s face as he stares off in the distance?

Luke Skywalker was my first movie crush, at the tender age of…7?…8 maybe? Because that look? That wanting to go, to be something more than what you are, to leave behind all adults in your life saying things like “stop daydreaming?” I understood him perfectly. I wanted to go on his journey. I wanted the Force to be real because I wanted magic to be real.

I was never one of those lore junkies who knew the name and specifications of every ship, but I was one of those annoying kids who could, if asked, recite every line of all three movies. Casual viewers knew about Aldaraan: I knew about Bespin, Yavin, Coruscant. I knew what a bantha was. I knew who Anakin Skywalker was…and I also knew about Anakin Solo and the twins, long before Disney created Ben. My nickname in high school was Mara Jade. (If you know, you know).

There weren’t many Star Wars nerds, but we did exist.

Now Luke’s universe is packed with kids carrying Grogu plushies, dudes wearing Mandalorian helmets, women sporting Twi’lek lekku, people who have never even seen the original movies and are still fans because there’s so much else. You could cross the entirety of Galaxy’s Edge and find no sign of the original Skywalker who stood on a Tatooine hillside and gazed at the double sunset.

I’m glad Galaxy’s Edge exists. That feels like a triumph for the nerdy, high school me who loved this franchise long before it was cool. But Star Wars, like the Disney parks themselves, have gotten awfully crowded.

How do you keep loving your thing when it’s everyone else’s thing, too?