Pen in Motion

I had a recent experience with a former suitor (not quite a boyfriend, but almost 2 months of dating) that has left me annoyed and a little hurt. And also contemplative.

Said person re-entered my life after about 7 months of silence. He supposedly just wanted to be friends because he was still wounded from his divorce. He wasn’t ready for a relationship, but he missed talking to and hanging out with me. And then an ex-girlfriend called, and suddenly his status changed. And we also couldn’t be friends anymore. Awesome.

I won’t go into the a lot of details of the first go-round with the suitor, but our relationship/thing ended because he was abducted by aliens and forced to give up his cell phone and laptop and not allowed to responded to any messages. That sounds more fun than the truth. And yet, I forgave him and agreed to be friends. I was okay with him not wanting to date because I didn’t trust him that much yet. But he flirted and it was nice. And then came 4 days of silence, and then I was done. Again.

There was also the sense of rejection that has left me smarting somewhat. I didn’t want to date him again, but it still stung that he didn’t want to date me. He was open to being in a relationship, but not with me.

And once again, I was disposable. That’s the part that bugs me the most – I was kept around until he didn’t want to deal with me anymore, and then I was discarded.

So – jerk, right? Yeah. Completely. But not just him. Me too.

It took most of the day of wallowing and ranting before I began to see the hypocrisy of my actions. Had I stopped looking/talking/etc to other guys while the suitor and I were being friends? Of course not. Why would I? He and I were only platonic friends. It’s not like I had a string of potential dates lined up at my door, but still – I wasn’t limiting myself because of him. And he was equally free to pursue someone.

So what’s the big deal? A man I didn’t have any romantic interest in didn’t want me. That’s it.

Now I did find out about him lying to me about something fairly significant during our relationship, but there’s nothing I can really do about it now.  I suppose I could “confront” him via text, but how would that help? Plus, I’m old enough to think before I act.

As I calmed down, I found myself remembering times when I had treated someone with the same “disposable” action. I didn’t do it to be malicious, but the action was still the same. We have all been this way, as much as we don’t want to admit it. We have all been the jerk suitor at some point in our life. We’ve all been hypocrites.

What now? I shake the dust from my feet and move on. I will remember two things from this experience: not to allow anyone to treat me as a disposable bottle, and also not to treat others as though they are discard-able. I have more value than that, and so does everyone else.

I saw the road you took –

just a simple, black asphalt path

with the old wooden rails

that looked like they could barely

hold their own weight,

let alone everything that was between us.

Nothing grand about that road

except it’s where we stood at that moment.

But then you left –

left me, left what used to be us.

We could have been great.

Or not.

Either way, now we’ll never know.

Leaves crunched

under your boots as you walked,

never looking back.

And then I lost sight of you

because I was staring at the trees –

lining the road like sentries,

green gems shining under the sun.

No wonder you chose

to go this way. Maybe I should too.

I’ve had this sort of rant for a while regarding Star Wars and Han Solo. I rarely get to expound on it because I rarely meet people who (1) dig Star Wars as much I do and are willing to listen (2) care about the actual story and characters like I do. But then I remembered this here blog – hooray for making your own platform. So, here it goes.

Han shot first. Those of us who remember the original movies before George Lucas jazzed them up for the DVD version already know this. There isn’t a debate at all – he shot before Greedo before Greedo could shoot him.

So what’s the big deal about it? Well apparently something for Lucas to change the scene so it looked like Han fired his weapon in self-defense. Perhaps he didn’t want Solo to look like such a bad guy in the beginning. Maybe outside pressure forced the director to soften Han’s rougher edges and make him less like a villain and more like an okay guy who just happens to be a smuggler for a mobster. Not so bad, right?

But softening the edges actually does the character more harm than good. Han Solo is a scoundrel – he says so himself in “Empire Strikes Back.” He’s not a good guy at all, and in the beginning, is only out for himself. He agrees to take Obi-Wan and Luke to Alderaan for two reasons: (1) money and (2) to skip out on the boss who just tried to kill him.

The boss, of course, is Jabba the Hutt. Think of Jabba as the Godfather – how many guys worked for Corleone and never killed anyone? It’s probable that Greedo wasn’t the first guy/being killed by Han. Highly likely.

Han Solo is a scoundrel who thinks of himself first and foremost. He is, without a doubt, flawed. And unlike Luke and Leia, who were already focused on helping others before themselves, Han’s character was in need of redemption. His journey actually began in the final scenes of “A New Hope” when he decided not to abandon his new friend Luke and run off with his reward money.

One of the best stories told throughout Star Wars is that of a man who went from caring about no one but himself to caring about everyone else first before considering himself. And not only does Han end up fighting with the rebels, but he is willing to step aside when he thinks the love of his life is in love with his best friend – that is not the Han Solo that we meet at the beginning of the story. And the depth of his story is shortened (and we are robbed) when you/society tries to make his edges less rough, less unpleasant and “bad.”

Even at his worse, Han is still a relatable, very human character. How? Because he is flawed and in need of redemption. We all are. For those who don’t like the religious undertones of that word, let’s say amends/atonement/rescue – from behaviors or decisions or points in our life that weigh us down and make us scoundrels. We have all been a scoundrel at some point in our life, and few of us probably wanted to remain as such. Han found a way to a new life and a better version of himself – another something that most of us can relate to and desire.

So why make him less scandalous in the beginning? Changing the timing of his trigger pull not only lessens his character’s transformation, but it lessens us a little too. It’s okay that Han shot first. We want him to. We might even need him to – for the story, and for us too.