I saw “Stars Wars, Return of the Jedi” last night, for the first time on the big screen. I remember when it came out. I wasn’t allowed to go see it. My parents didn’t approve all that much of science fiction. Oh, if they were alive, wouldn’t they be appalled at how miserably their efforts to turn me from it have failed. The son of my parents’ friends went to "Star Wars" and even got a Millennium Falcon model with action figures. I was so frustrated because I wanted him to recount the story, and all he wanted to do was play with the toys in a seemingly random fashion. I remember being secretly glad when one of the action figures he’d tied to a makeshift parachute became stuck in a huge fir tree in our yard, as he hadn’t been able to tell me how parachuting related at all to a movie about space, and I thought it served him right. Anyway, it was fantastic to finally see the film played large, in a crowded theater with an audience that cheered when it started and when it ended. To create something that touches so many is precious.

“The Unintended Mongrel” is up to 22,311 words.

A thought on opportunity: Options abound, and the key to distinguishing between options and opportunity is knowing one’s own heart. Sometimes the most important things that present themselves are options that appear to be opportunities but that help you crystallize your thinking and realize they won’t take you in the direction of your true desires.