For as long as I can remember, I have been a Star Wars fan. Every birthday I’d get pissed because I’d tear open my gifts and instead of an At-Tat or the Millennium Falcon, I’d get a freakin’ Monchichi or Strawberry Shortcake’s latest sidekick. Some solace was taken in the fact that I was the only girl that ever got to play Leia at recess. Part of that was probably the fact that I was the only one that could do the buns, but I didn’t care. I remember tearing ass down the isle to front row center when we went to see Return of the Jedi. While I may have lost my Star Wars sheet set along the way, I still have some of my trading cards left and my trusty rusty Return of the Jedi lunch box still faithfully holds some of my art supplies. And of course I own the DVD box sets.

One cold, rainy Saturday morning a couple of months after she turned 3, my eldest monkey figured out how to open the secret door of the entertainment stand and handed me “Phantom Menace.” “Mommy, this is my movie choice. I wanna watch this one.” The pride, oh the pride. I patted her head, told her it would be too scary and too hard for her to understand and insisted she pick a new one. Bless her gorgeously geek heart, she stood firm on her choice. Her arguments in the end were simple. “If I don’t understand something, I’ll ask you mommy and if it gets too scary, we can turn it off.” Hells bells, you can’t really argue with logic like that.

Ten minutes later, another fan was born. Two more actually, lilest monkey sat in wide-eyed wonderment cheering and booing right along with her. But, eldest took it to a whole new level. The rest of that weekend was spent watching all six in order up to her new beloved Anakin was “saved.” It floored me how little I needed to explain to her. There are so many favorite moments from that weekend. I think my favorite was when Luke made it out with Vader and she looked at me and said “Wow, he actually managed to pull it off.” Not remembering I was talking to my 3 year old and being mother of the year- my response? “Right? He’s kind of a wuss.” Sorry folks, I was a Han Solo girl all the way.

Most of my friends weren’t entirely surprised at my “how I spent my weekend.” I swear everyone we encountered over the next few months heard her tales of the battle of dark and light, the path of a Jedi, the power of the force, the wisdom of Obi Wan and Yoda, her undying love for Anakin and the importance of having really good friends be they human, wookie or robot. Then one of my friends sent me a now rather famous YouTube clip of a 3 year old explaining Star Wars. I watched it and giggled. It didn’t really occur to me the vast differences between that 3 year old and mine. VAST. Thinking she’d be happy to find a kindred spirit, I showed her this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBM854BTGL0

I expected a giggle. I did not expect her to lose her lil mind. She seriously damn near cussed that lil girl out. It went like this:

(Bear in mind, I did warn her it was only about New Hope, aka “When they save Leia” – oops I forgot to mention she renamed them all. I’ll footnote the rest.)

“What? The ‘sand people’ are Jawas and they aren’t that important.”

“ ‘Shiny one?’ ‘Shiny one?’ It’s C3PO. Duh.”

(At this point I’m staring blankly at my irate lil monkey.)

*HUGE GASP* “NO ONE MISPRONOUNCES OBI WAN KANOBI’S NAME!! NO ONE MOMMY!!!”

“Huh? That ‘light up sword’ is a light saber! Light SABER!”

“Leia wasn’t in jail. She was being held captive by Imperial Forces.”

“That’s it?? That’s it?? What about the subplot??!” (WTF!? Did my 3 year old really just say subplot!?!?!) “No Han? No Chew? MMMMOOOOOMMMM!!!!”

“Yeah, Darth will getchya because you, you are NO JEDI!!” (Yes, she was totally pointing her lil finger at her too.)

“Mommy, don’t EVER show me that girl again.”

That’s when it became clear to me that she wasn’t your average 3 1/2 year old. It also became clear I was raising a lil ÜberGeekGirlie in training. In my book, that’s just awesomsauce.

Yes, she still plans on marrying Anakin and is desperately pleading her case to her sister for decorating their new bathroom all Star Wars. My money is on her. Lil geek girls FTW!

***As promised- she renamed them all right away to remember them better. Never mind the fact she could tell you who Qui Gon Jinn was. So, in order:

“When Anakin was little”

“When Anakin became a Jedi”

“When Anakin caught on fire”

“When they save Leisa”

“When Luke becomes a Jedi”

“When Luke saves Anakin”