Walking the Woods of Endor
While catching up with the various social networks this morning I was reminded that today is May 4th – “Star Wars Day” – so thought I might tell you a little story.
When I was very young, my Uncle – my Mum's brother – worked in the merchant navy, serving on a succession of ships, circling the globe many times. On one shore leave in the US he went out for the night, “met a girl”, and missed his ship. She dropped everything and drove him several hundred miles along the coast to catch the ship again. Several months later he flew back to America, and they got engaged – that's how I ended up with a Cousin living in Sebastapol, north of San Francisco.
They didn't always live in Sebastapol though – after working their way across America doing various retail jobs, my extended family settled near Lagunitas, Marin County – my Uncle bought a plot of land, chopped some of the big old redwood trees down, and built the house my cousin would grow up in. You're probably way ahead of me by now.
You see, there was an old farm a little way up the road, set back from the road a bit – essentially his “next door neighbour”. The farm was bought around the same time my Uncle bought his plot of land by a young film maker called George Lucas.
When we were younger, we had a sort of idea that Return of the Jedi was filmed somewhere near my Uncle's house, but until you really visit, you can't really imagine any of it. I wouldn't visit until I was in my early 20s – and by then my Uncle had divorced, and the house had been sold. Luckily my cousin was still on good terms with all the families in the neighbourhood she had grown up, and while taking me for a tour along the valley, dropped in on the old house.
The house was now owned by a successful photographer – I have very little recollection of it, other than a glass wall the height of the house looking out into a vast forest of redwood trees. We spent a few minutes listening to stories of my cousin's childhood in the house, and then wandered into the surrounding forrest – and straight into forest moon of Endor.
You see... George Lucas filmed Return of the Jedi in and around Muir Woods. The speeder bike chases were along tracks through the forest behind his and my Uncle's house. Somewhere I have a few photos of our day wandering in the woods – photos that bring back memories of a time before either myself or my cousin had a family – before obligation and expectation surrounded us.
In many ways those photos are of a long time ago, in a place far, far away.