Star Wars

When I was almost four years old my family started taking care of foster children. Our first foster children were Leti, who was about 11 or 12 and Michael, who was 4, just like me. Michael spoke very little English, so my mom made it my “job” to talk to him constantly so he would learn English. At the same time my Dad purchased his first beta video player and a copy of Star Wars, A New Hope, episode 4. Michael and I sat together to watch that movie and repeat the lines so that he could learn to talk with me. Through the years Star Wars has been a uniting factor in my life. Tonight, during my last night in France, I used Star Wars to accomplish the same thematic designs.
I was left to babysit the 5 kids, 3 speak French and 2 English (Luc says I speak American, not English). Through direct instruction from their parents, the French kids were told to set the dinner table for me, watch TV and promptly go to bed. They obliged with all those directives and I used a little bribe called Kinder chocolates to encourage good behavior during the movie. Kinder chocolates are the cheap chocolates that I love in Europe. The Buenos are alright, but the Happy Hippos rock my world. The Happy Hippos are only in Italy though, so far I haven’t seen any here, and the bottom of my bag is full of the Kinders I purchased to take back to the states. The kids were thoroughly enticed by the small token of chocolate during the thrilling scenes of Star Wars. I chose Star Wars to be our uniting movie since the Force crosses all language boundaries.
The language issue hasn’t been huge, since I get the most important things translated for me. The striking difference has been my ability to turn off my brain and ignore the happenings around me. I can read my book and disregard the conversations of others, when usually my brain hears and analyzes all those people on the train, in the living room, on the TV or all around me. It has been nice to escape from the world in that way. However, there has to be a replacement for all the energy in my brain. I have chosen to use my book and my camera as my comfortable constants in my life. My book is a world within my own world that is intriguing and available exactly when I need it. My camera is a way to show my interpretation of the world that does not need words. The kids like to use my camera as well, which makes it another uniting factor. Rosie, my three year old niece also needs a language diversion. She doesn’t understand what is going on around her and so she takes her Teddy with her everywhere she is taken. She is prone to whining and making up her own language at the moment as well. Rosie is a lot like me. People in our family have said that our personalities are similar since Rosie was about 4 months old and her obstanance started showing through. Marc, her father, just said today, “When we can’t handle her anymore we will send her to you because she is just like you. Right now she always needs her Auntie Jamie.” I think I’ve needed Rosie holding my hand just as much as she needed me to speak to her only in English and comfort her when everyone else is playing and pushing too rough for her. Familiarity and control (our personality strengths) make us both want to keep one thing from our lives near us at all times. We can’t understand what is going on around us so we retreat into what we do know. Mine is the book and camera and Rosies is her Teddy and dresses. Oh, Rosie loves her dresses and anything pink, which is great since her name in French means pink.
Life continues to be amazing. Traveling with families has many benefits, cost and fun with people you know being the best two benefits. I’ll need a vacation from my vacation though. What I really need is a kitten.
During the depression people used movies to escape their hard knock lives. Star Wars was exactly an escapist movie tonight for the six of us who have been thrown together and forced to find ways to communicate and live. The kids were better behaved for me than they’ve been for their parents. They were all asleep when the parents returned and the kitten and I were snuggled in the upstairs hallway. Sometimes, when we are put with other people for a short or long amount of time, like the foster kids at my house, we use objects and familiar territory to find a way to exist together. Star Wars, chocolate, kittens and toys from home are my suggested therapeutic items.
Ps. We had the backyard chicken for lunch today with a cous cous salad.