Yesterday. Saturday. I'd just returned from taking my young daughter to dance and running a few errands, and I sat at my table with a bite to eat before buckling down to accomplish some overdue tasks when the doorbell rang. My husband, a Clark Griswold-esque type for the ages who annually spends most of his home time in December on a ladder tinkering with his megawatt holiday display, was also taking a breather, so he answered the door. Coming into the kitchen, he called, "Hey Pam, it's a package from Melinda!" with an enthusiasm that illuminates his knowledge of how happy that makes me in and of itself. But this, my friends, was more than just a package.

A while ago, not long after my mother died I believe, my contribution to my and Melinda's ongoing snail mail correspondence included a bit about my reserve about the holidays this year, two days in particular. At the time, a part of me was dreading both Thanksgiving and my birthday, which occurs during the holiday season. My mother was a unique individual, so decidedly un-motherly in many ways, so not what most of us think of when we utter the word, "mom." Yet on those two days of the year, my mother's quirks were the backbone of my celebration. Thanksgiving was all about gravy, a story since past that I may tell another day, but my birthday still looms.

The box that arrived yesterday included a Christmas package and card, which, in spite of the date on the calendar, I opened anyway. I'm like a kid at Christmas! I can't resist the pretty paper and the promise of a gift that will make me smile like the 9-year-old I once was. Inside was a handmade, fleece Star Wars blanket which lays across my lap as I type. It's beautiful, black with the trademark Star Wars logo and a Darth Vader image emblazoned repeatedly on it. I love it, love it, love it. Knowing Melinda, several similar packages went out recently to several in this blogosphere who have become fast friends in the past three and a half years. More about that in a minute.

What prompted this missive today is what remains, unopened, in the box from Melinda and will remain so until December 26. There is a card whose envelope reads, "Happy Birthday, Pam," and in bright blue, very un-Christmasy paper as was my mother's tradition, there are three boxes.

Some of this is old news, but there are enough new bloggers around that this story bears repeating. When I joined this blogosphere in May of 2005 after lurking on and off for a few years, my heart had suffered the biggest blow that it had to date. My best friend, a woman I had known since I was a child, had been killed in a car accident less than two months before, and though I didn't know it at the time, coming here was a crucial step in more than just my Star Wars fandom. It was a lifeline that would get me through my life's darkest days. In February of 2007, a dear family friend who was like a son to me was killed in Iraq. Last December my grandmother, who truly was the nurturing "mother" that I'd lacked, died just four days before Christmas. And this past July 31, my mother succumbed to cancer. Prior to May 2005, I'd lost no one to whom I was as close as I was to these four people. The prior forty-two years of my life did nothing to prepare me for the past three and a half, in ways both tragic and beautiful.

I have made many friends here and have blogged about them on various occasions, much to the probable dismay of the moderators. I do understand their need to uphold the site's rules, even if I don't always agree with them. This is a forum for the publication of our thoughts on Star Wars, our own, personal online diaries about a long ago galaxy, far, far away! We can talk about the films or light sabers or gaming or conventions and I love all of that, but for me, for THIS, old, original fan who was fortunate enough to have seen Star Wars in a theatre 31 years ago for the first time (three times, actually), Star Wars is about the people who share my passion for it. It is about the best friends I've ever made in my life, who mended the holes in my heart that were left by those I've lost. It is about the acceptance and understanding I've always wished for but never had until now.

It is about the beautiful, amazing person who is JediMelindaWolf, this angel in my life who knew how deeply my heart would hurt on my birthday and wrapped her yet unknown gifts in bright blue paper. I don't even have to know what they are to say thank you, dear friend. Thank you.