Princess Leia is no good AT ALL, or, My father's driving need to tuck people in

My father likes tucking people in very thoroughly. Sometimes if anyone in my family is sick or sad and my father notices that she is sitting on the couch or on a chair with a blanket, he will come over and pull the blanket all the way up to her chin and then tuck it in carefully around all the edges. Preferably tucking the blanket into the sides of the chair, so the ailing one can't just wiggle free. He does this and then stands back to admire his handiwork, and if it looks like something that Houdini might be able to squirm out of, he quickly swoops back in for another round of tucking. To make sure the ailing one is the max-amount comforted.

Anyway, we were watching Star Wars last night, me and my father and Robyn, and you know right after Obi-Wan Kenobi dies and Luke is all sitting at the table in the Millennium Falcon looking pathetic and dejected? And Leia comes to sit by him to comfort him?

Well, I don't know if you remember, but part of her comforting process is to put a blanket around him. If you can call what she does putting a blanket around him, because honestly, I don't think it even deserves to be called that. I know how blankets are supposed to be put around people, from long experience, and Leia doesn't even come close to following the international standard blanket-wrapping procedure. She sort of puts it on his shoulders. Like that's going to help him in his hour of grief.

You know, I don't want to say she doesn't care about him, but let's look at the facts: He's grieving, and she's employing the tested and tried technique of blanket therapy (fair enough), but when there's an emergency, he leaps right up totally unrestricted and scrambles rapidly down to the gun area to shoot Empire fighter planes. If she really loved him, he'd have had to struggle for much longer and flop all over the ship like a dying fish and eventually cut himself loose with his lightsaber. Frankly, the signs indicate to me that she's telling him to GET OVER IT ALREADY, rather than demonstrating compassion. And I think that's hard-hearted. And that's why Princess Leia is no good.

Happy Thanksgiving!