I hope you find a new roommate. I recently had to move back home because my old roommate had to go and get married instead of signing another year on our lease

Aw, dang! What’s up with that? Just another reason why relationships are dumb.

Or…wait. Waaaiiit. Marriage = roommate for life and not having to find strangers on the holonet to live with every year. Hm. Hmmmm.

Hey, anyone wanna marry me for tax benefits and affordable housing? I’ll even do the cooking, but it’ll just be plum-tomato and sardine sandwiches every night. I’m also great at arguing and getting on your nerves!

Got up at 6am this morning. Ordered a latte on my commute even though I have caf at home and free caf at the office. Showed up to work at 7am. Retrieved yesterday’s notes from Sweeper’s vacuum chamber. Got the Modal Nodes’ Greatest Hits in my earbuds. Ready to bang out a week’s worth of work in one day, since the spirit of the college kid who wrote all his essays 24 hours before they were due still lives in me apparently. That and the post-procrastination adrenaline and three shots of caffeine. Let’s get this bread. Rey says no one says that anymore. I can’t believe I’m so old I say stuff that no one says anymore. Did I mention I’m super caffeinated? Anyway. It’s Friday and I’m gonna kill work today and so are you LET’S GOOO

Ben. I had a vision of you, dressed not unlike Darth Vader, killing your father. What could it mean?

You know, I had the same nightmare once. Are we linked through the Force, anon?

It was really scary. I woke up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. And then I realized it was just a dream and I cried (in a manly way) and hugged my stuffed bantha Ren and went back to bed.

The next morning my dad called me and asked why I had messaged him at 3am saying “I love you Dad” with tons of hearts and crying emojis.

Ugh, I’m so bummed! Treeso told me he’s not staying on the lease next fall, because he’s moving back to Otoh Gunga to take care of his grandma. Oh well, at least he’ll be close enough that we can still hang out sometimes…

He said he’d help find someone to take over his lease, which is good, because, uh…I can’t afford a one-bedroom apartment in Theed on my own. And I’m not interested in moving back in with my parents. But most people will have signed leases already by this time in the year, so it’ll be tricky to find someone.

Anyone know someone in Theed looking for a place? (Guys preferred. I don’t want cooties.)

Hey, Benny! What's ur favorite season of the year? (Ur planet does have seasons, right?)

I’m lucky that most of the planets I’ve lived on have had seasonal rotation! I like when the seasons change. Reminds me that life is always moving on and there’s always something new coming.

Winter used to be my favorite when I was younger, because of Life Day and my birthday and hot tea and sweaters (though let’s be real, all seasons were sweater season for me back then).

Now, summer has kinda grown on me! I like getting to wear tank tops and showing off the gainz and taking selfies to make my dad jealous (he gets back at me by sending me selfies of his beard, which isn’t great by any standard, but better than when I try). Since there are so many universities in Theed, the city’s population drops drastically during summer vacation, and it’s so peaceful compared to the rest of the year.

There’s still a couple of months left till summer, but it’s started getting warmer already, and I’m hyped.

Holos from when I graduated from University of Naboo last year! (Class of 28 ABY; Journalism major; Galactic Policy and Nonhuman Studies double minor.)

Rey made fun of me for wearing “a dress.” So I made fun of her for actually wearing a dress (Mom made her wear it).

Heh. Good times, good times.

#Justice4Sweeper

Contemplating whether I should rant about droids’ rights and risk getting cancelled—okay I don’t care let’s gooo cancel me baby. It’s my college experience all over again!

So. I don’t believe in droids’ rights because I think the concept of “rights” applies to organic beings (with another split between organic sentient beings, aka “persons,” and organic non-sentient beings, aka “animals”—but for the sake of this argument I’m using the word “organic” to talk about persons here, so you can put your “but banthas are organic so why don’t you give them rights” strawman away).

Somehow, we sentients wound up in this galaxy—whether through some lucky cosmic accident and subsequent evolution or being born through the Force or whatever—who cares, somehow we got here, and we are what we call “alive.” That mysterious aliveness is unique to organic beings. We live, we die, we breathe, we reproduce, our cells replicate and regenerate—we’re alive. Nobody has to assemble us or program us. Two gamete cells come together (in most species, anyway) and automatically a new being begins to form according to the laws of nature.

Droids are not alive. We created them. True, we created them to mimic aliveness, we gave them the ability to use language in a way that mimics ours, we even gave them a capacity for data storage that we interpret as “memory” and programmed them to display certain behaviors that we interpret as “personalities.” But a droid does not come into existence without someone else manufacturing it and programming it and putting it together. It does not possess the aliveness that organic beings have by nature. Droids mimic life, but they do not possess it, and therefore they are inherently different from us and not entitled to the natural rights that organic sentients have.

Okay. So that’s my stance on droids’ rights. Now, when I tell people that, they assume I must, like, super hate droids and go around kicking every droid I see. No. Nooo. I may have a special hatred in my heart for Sweeper, but that’s just because he’s utterly incompetent. I go to a cafe and the waitress is a droid? Cool. I’m not going to leave her a tip, because droids don’t need money, but I’ll smile at her and say please and thank you, ‘cause my mama raised me right. When I visit home and see my mom’s protocol droid See-Threepio, I say hi and ask him how he’s doing and tease him and yeah, interact with him as if he’s a person. (I know some of the based red-pilled types will go so far as to refuse to use gendered pronouns for droids, but I do call droids “he” or “she.” I just do so without actually believing they’re people, like how we call spaceships “she” and stuff).

I’m nice to droids. Most of ‘em, anyway. I’m willing to suspend reality and entertain the fantasy that these machines, that we created to mimic us, think and feel like we do. But at the end of the day, I know that Threepio’s “personhood” is just a projection of my mind and my own sentient experience, not something innate to him.

Take Ren the Bantha of Indeterminate Gender or Origin for example. The stuffed bantha that Luke gave me for my sixteenth birthday. I love Ren. I used to talk to Ren. I used to imagine Ren talking back to me. I dressed Ren up and brought Ren everywhere and wrote fanfiction about me and Ren having adventures. I projected life and personhood onto my stuffed animal, but no one in their right mind would seriously argue that a stuffed animal has rights. It’s the same thing with droids—the only difference is that while I’m the only one pretending my stuffed animal is alive, we intentionally programmed droids to contribute toward their own illusion of life.

Despite not believing in droids’ rights, I do actually think droid abuse is bad. Being cruel to droids for the fun of cruelty is messed up. Not because droids are people, but because the love of cruelty is evil. And I think “abuse” is an accurate term that doesn’t necessarily denote personhood—like how we talk about abuse of power, etc. Droid abuse is kind of a separate conversation though, even though people like to conflate the two.

Anyway—I think one thing that pisses me off the most about the droids’ rights issue is that people take it and run with it in ways that don’t make sense. Like…okay, I may not agree that protocol droids or other advanced processing droids are sentients, but I can see why you would feel that way and how you might come to that conclusion, especially when it comes to droids that haven’t had their databanks routinely wiped. I don’t think it’s insane to believe in advanced droid sentience—it’s incorrect, but not insane.

But…mouse droids? Gonk droids? Repair droids? Sweeper? My guy…my brother in the Force…no. That’s not a person. That’s a glorified toaster on wheels.

Do you still talk to Fannie and Amalia? If so, how are they doing?

I still talk to Amalia, yeah! We don’t talk that often, but we send each other memes and stuff. She lives on Coruscant now, which is where she came from before Luke found her. This is gonna sound weird, but she like, switched religions, kind of. Apparently there’s a religion of non-Force sensitives and semi-Force sensitives who revere the Force, despite not being able to feel it or use it to make things float and all that.

I don’t really get it. I asked her what the difference was, between that and being a Jedi. Or why you’d devote your life to the Force if you weren’t gonna get a lightsaber and mind powers out of it. Or why she’d join a community of non-Force sensitives, when she used to be such a powerful Jedi-in-training.

Amalia said that as a Jedi, she was always focused on how to use the Force, but now, she thinks more about how the Force uses her. The Force, to her, is less of an energy and more of a divine being with its own will, whose will we ought to discern and follow. And then there was some other stuff about how she thinks the light side/dark side balance thing isn’t actually true, that what we call the light side of the Force is really just the Force itself, and…well, it’s way over my head, so don’t ask me.

I don’t know, I guess it’s kinda interesting. But I’m a little more interested in paying my bills and hitting work deadlines right now.

One thing’s clear to me, though. Amalia is way happier than she used to be. More chill. And nicer. Doesn’t stop her from roasting me all the time though—which is good, because I’d hate to lose such an integral part of our friendship.

As for Fannie…well, she and I aren’t really in contact anymore. She went to Ryloth to work with a Twi’lek anti-trafficking organization around the time that I left for college, and things haven’t really been the same between us after that.

Fannie and I used to be real buds. She always saw the best in me (even when I was being a jerk), and showed a lot of care for me that I hadn’t really experienced before. We became even closer after she broke up with her boyfriend Deirak because of their differing plans for the future (she was set on returning to Ryloth, and he wanted to stay with Luke and be a Jedi teacher).

Even though Fannie was the one who ended things with him, it still made her really sad, so after the breakup I spent a lot of time with her and listened to her cry and invited her to hang out with my family and took her on walks a lot. (Looking back, I can see why Deirak stopped being nice to me around then. Whoops. Sorry bro.)

Anyway…after I went to Naboo and she went to Ryloth, being in such different worlds—I mean our lifestyles, not the planets—put kind of a strain on our friendship. I was complaining about writing essays, and cramming for finals, and enduring my stupid stupid stupid Nonhuman Studies courses where everyone was like “Ben is a human so his opinion on Hutt crime lords is invalid”—and Fannie was like, “Oh yeah, I helped deliver a baby today. I went on an undercover mission to help a woman escape her slaver.”

Awkward.

It’s not like we fought over it or anything. But…there was just this…disconnect, and we both were really busy, and eventually we kind of just…stopped talking.

Well…okay, maybe I was the one who stopped replying as much. And then I got anxiety whenever I opened our messages and remembered I hadn’t replied in over a month.

She did reach out to me last summer to ask if I graduated. I was like, “Haha, yeah!” and she was like “Congratulations!” and I was like, “Thanks!” and that was that.

I do think about her a lot though. I think I could have been a better friend to her. I wish that I had supported her more, instead of focusing on myself and feeling self-conscious. Sometimes I think about reaching out again, but…I don’t know. It’s been a long time. I’m still busy, and I’m sure she is too. Maybe that friendship just ran its course…

Someone in my department keeps anonymously reporting me to Sentient Resources for verbally abusive behavior. Toward whom, you may ask? Toward the stupid cleaning droid that makes it his personal mission to sterilize my desk every morning. I’m an ancient fossil that still likes using paper notes to organize my thoughts, and that kriffing droid throws my notes away half the time.

Let me say it again but slower: Sentient Resources. I’m getting reported to SR. For cussing out the cleaning droid. Even if we did nickname the cleaning droid “Sweeper,” Sweeper’s about as sentient as the caf machine in the break room. About as old and busted, too.

I think SR knows the reports are bantha crap, but they just honor them anyway because obviously someone here really cares about Sweeper and then they can say “well we talked to him what else do you want us to do”. It’s almost part of my routine now. Once a week I get the comm requesting me to report to the SR office, I show up, Kerdie glances at the file and says “Uh, hi Ben, I guess it’s the Sweeper thing again, I’m sending you another copy of our policy on droids’ rights, try to be nice to Sweeper, get out of here” and then I’m on my way.

I mean, I’m still on the clock so it’s like a free stroll around the building for me. Wonder who the big Sweeper stan around here is, though.

Wow, that haircut!! I didn't think I could imagine you without long hair, Ben, but it looks pretty nice! I haven't been around much because of work and school, but it's nice to see that you seem outwardly alright, at least. Have you been eating well? Getting enough sleep? Socializing as much as you personally need? (And how is Ren the Bantha, by the way?)

Yo, sorry for answering this ask…five years later. My bad bro, my bad. (I had short hair like five years ago for anyone who doesn’t know—you can still see it in my profile holo ‘cause I haven’t updated it hahaha)

Thanks! The short hair look actually turned out not that bad on me, once it grew out a little. But it wasn’t pissing off my parents enough, so my luscious locks are back and longer than ever. Then my parents got used to that, too, so I had to get my ears pierced. I’m thinking maybe a tattoo next…except I don’t actually want to get a tattoo, so maybe I’ll just tell them I got one, and refuse to say where. Heh heh heh.

I’m doing good! I started meal prepping (ronto roast + rice + veg is my winning combo), and as I mentioned before, I’m a 10pm bedtime guy now. As for socializing, I feel like it’s hard to have deep/intimate friendships in your twenties (especially as a guy for some reason), but me and my roommate have a bunch of fellas from the gym that we hang out with sometimes.

And Ren! Ren the Bantha of Indeterminate Gender or Origin! The stuffed bantha…the myth…the legend. Y’know, Ren’s super old now. Super well-loved. Lookin’ a little crusty. I should really wash Ren sometime. But Ren is still Ren: sage and mysterious as ever…if a little smelly.

OH MY GOD YOURE STILL ALIVE. I followed this blog when I was in high-school YEARS AGO. I'm glad ur still around!!!! hope ur doing well <3

Hey anon! Great to see you again—the Ben fan club seems to be way smaller now (eh, that’s fair, I got old and boring) but it’s so exciting to catch up with my OG pals and hear that you’re still out there too! Glad to hear that you (like me) made it to your twenties!

Oh my Force, total flashback. Remember when I started The Knights? The Knights of Ben or Ren or whatever? The “I hate puberty” club? We can bring it back and make it the “I go to bed at 10pm now and live for the weekly free item at the grocery store” gang.

How strict are your parents?

My parents weren’t that strict with me growing up. I was allowed to go on the HoloNet and stuff. And I didn’t have a curfew or any rules about going out—but then again, all I ever did was stay in my room. Heh.

I guess they were pretty hands-off with me, especially once I became a teenager. I ate whatever I wanted from the kitchen and went to bed however late I happened to stay up. That sounds like a teenager’s dream, but honestly, now that I’m older, I’m a firm believer that teenagers need to be taught how to take care of themselves. Like, seriously. I wonder how my quality of life as a teen could have been improved if I knew that exercising and eating healthy and sleeping well aren’t just things to brag about not doing.

Anyway—after the whole Snoke thing, my mom got a whole lot more protective over me. I don’t know if “strict” is the right word anymore, since I’m an adult now, but I feel this constant low-level pressure from her and it’s annoying because I’m supposed to be a grownup. There was one condition to me moving out—if I ever hear from Snoke again, I’m coming right back home. I told her that wasn’t fair because why should I be punished for having someone contact me—but that’s a whole other thing.

I get along great with my dad though. Sometimes when he’s passing through Naboo for work, he makes a stop and we hit the cantina together. He still makes the same annoying dad jokes, but after a drink or two, his jokes are almost funny.

Sometimes I don’t know how to join together the child you raised and the man I am now. I used to hide behind your legs when you brought me to social functions and run to you for kisses when I skinned my knee and now I don’t know how to call you back when you leave a holomessage or explain to you how things are going at work. I make my own lunches now and remember how you used to draw goofy faces on the bananas you packed for me and I just think, things will never be the same, will they? When’s the next time I’m coming home to visit—you make it sound like it’s because you miss me and Dad wants to show me his upgrades on the Falcon and Rey is getting so tall but sometimes I think you’re just afraid of me, afraid of me becoming myself, because what if my self turns out to be something like him so you have to keep an eye on me and make sure that doesn’t happen. His shadow looms over you and you think I’m the one casting it. When you kiss Rey on the forehead and look at her like she’s a princess I wonder if you’re thinking, well, the first one got all messed up, but this one you’ll raise right.

So, sure, I’ll come visit for dinner soon, and we’ll smile and laugh and Dad will beat all of us at sabacc, but don’t think I won’t see you when you look at me that way from a distance and I know you still see the sixteen-year-old.

Ben what do you do in your free time

You know me, I still enjoy studying politics and writing poetry and drinking caf (ugh my Corellian press is my one true love). But one new hobby I’ve picked up in the last few years is strength training, surprisingly!

Yep, that’s right. Baggy sweater boy is gone. I’m Ben SWOLE-o now.

“You got kicked out of a store??” asdvkkobgukbuhjbu not to keep bringing up the time you flipped a table as a young teen but like. Buddy. Glass houses

you two really ARE sibling lmao

Touché. At least Rey isn’t all obsessed with Darth Vader and the Empire like I was. Haha.

We may not be related by blood, but we do seem similar in some ways… Rey says she has trouble making friends at school, and often feels alone. Maybe that’s why she’s been so into following trends lately.

It’s weird to see her become so materialistic. She was telling me that there’s this one brand of water bottle that all the girls at school have, and she’s dying to get one too. Is it some kind of army knife water bottle that turns into a flashlight or plays holograms or something? Nope, it’s just a water bottle.

That kid always was a terrible hoarder though. Her bedroom? Yeesh. Threepio couldn’t navigate the inside of it, ‘cause you basically had to maneuver around all the piles of stuff like a ninja. I asked her why she had a collection of empty soda cans. She said maybe she might need them someday.

Well, I guess minimalism is one trend that will never catch on with my sis!

Journal Entry #40: Trying to figure out my purpose.

I’ve been thinking about the Force lately. I wouldn’t say I’m super in touch with it, but I’ve come to understand that it’s always there. If I quiet my mind and sit in silence, I can sense it, like a humming in my chest. But…I don’t often make the time to meditate.

I elected not to become a Jedi, but I think I have a higher Force sensitivity than most. Especially since my uncle has taught me how to recognize the Force—not to wield its power, but to observe its energy passing through me.

I wonder what it means to be a Force-sensitive non-Jedi. To be a Force-sensitive working a 9-to-5 desk job in the most banal sector of corporate news media. Am I serving some higher purpose in the galaxy, with my restaurant reviews and community event coverage? Is it the Force’s will to assist me in meeting a Friday deadline, or not losing my mind when that one coworker is getting on my nerves?

I think of Luke, rescuing orphans and training them in the way of the Jedi, empowering them and sending them out to bring light into the darkness. I think of my old pal Fannie, one of Luke’s students, who went back to Ryloth to help free women from slavery. It’s no question that their lives’ work hold immense purpose.

My life runs on a never-ending loop. My alarm goes off in the morning, I get up and make caf, drag myself out of the apartment, go to the gym, go to work, come home, scrape some kind of dinner together, look at memes, go to bed, and then do it all over again. And it’s like…what am I even doing? Did my parents fight a war just so I could do…this?

Sometimes I think that, if I took some time to attune myself to the Force, everything would become clear, and even the most mundane of things would come alive with a new sense of meaning and purpose. But somehow, I’m afraid to reach out to the Force. I feel like the Force knows me…knows that I am a son of Skywalker and yet denied the path of the Jedi. And for what? To sit at a desk, churning out low-stakes articles for people to glance at for two seconds before they scroll to “breaking news.” Is there now a hole in the galaxy where I should have been?

Maybe I was supposed to become a Jedi after all, as much as that scares me. Maybe I’ve missed my destiny…

Or maybe there was no destiny written for me in the stars, and the pen lies squarely in my own hand…and I seem to have the worst case of writer’s block, ever.

My mom didn’t want me to move out and go to college. She was worried about Snoke preying on me again if I was separated from the family. If I was going anywhere else, she wanted me to be with Uncle Luke so he could watch over me. But Dad and Luke stood up for me, which surprised me, and reluctantly, Mom let me go. I think part of her was hoping I’d come back home after I finished my degree.

I wish I could prove to my mom that I’ve done it. That I’ve made my way, and that I’m happy with my life. But my life doesn’t feel quite right, somehow, and I’m not really sure what’s missing. I mean, things are okay. But I don’t think life, this grand adventure only experienced once, is supposed to be just okay.

I guess I need to spend some time thinking about this. But, like I said, my life is on a loop and now it’s time to make dinner. One plum-tomato and sardine sandwich and a blue milk protein shake, coming right up.

So how's Kid doing?

I wonder the same thing.