First off, heads up ... don't read any further if you are either (a) a fan of the SW films who clings to the euphoria of ROTJ's final celebration scene on Endor, and wants nothing to do with 'all of those books that come after', or (b) a fellow fan of the EU who hasn't reached the New Jedi Order yet. (If you don't fit into either category, feel free to scroll down, but please don't hate me when you end up as melancholy as I've been for the past few days ...)

OK, here goes ... (deep breath)... Chewbacca is ... no more. Yes, I know, if you're like me, you probably had to read those words at least twice to arrive at any comprehension of their meaning. So, let me try it in a different way ... I'm on my 37th EU book a year and a half, obviously trying to ease my post-last-SW-film ache. I get about two-thirds of the way through; Han Solo and Chewie are on yet another planet where there is yet another New Republic emergency/disaster/crisis, and I'm fully prepared to turn the page and find out how they pull it off this time. And yet ...

They don't.

I won't get into the specifics of who and how and where - that's a whole 'nother barrel of emotionally charged comments for a whole 'nother day - but I will say this: after walking around in a bit of a fog for the past few days as I mourn one of my favorite SW characters (and favorite figures of popular culture, period), I have come to the point where I can now say - with only a little mist in my eyes -

Chewbacca is dead - long live Chewbacca.

I don't know if that type of saying confused you as it did me when I studied history in junior high; my pre-adolescent mind was thinking, What's wrong with these whack jobs, if they know the king is dead, why are they all wishing him a long life posthumously??? It took me another couple of years to get it - the old king was gone, and although a state of mourning was still in effect, it was time to usher in a new era, to herald the reign of a new leader.

Well, cuss it all, I liked the Wookiee I had just fine, thank you, and I was in no state to move on and try to love these new NJO characters with the same passion I had loved this 'walking carpet' - this hero of the rebellion, babysitter of 3 Solo children, and co-pilot of Han Solo - since I was 7 years old. Seven years old!

In my sadness, I was reminded why I love the SW saga so much, how I explain my obsession to others - it's got a little bit of everything in it. Even though it might take place in a galaxy far, far away, our SW heroes - and villains - are dealing with the same stuff we take on every day - war, work, joy, loss, family, anger, passion, betrayal - you name it, anything you've experienced intensely in your life, it's there. One of the reasons I lost my heart to Anakin's character in the PT, even though I knew he turned out to be the Big Guy who scared the bleep out of me when I was 7, was because I knew how it felt to lose the person most important to you - the grief, the anger, and, finally, the seemingly impossible acceptance of its finality , the inescapable fact that your loss is permanent.

So here I am once again empathizing with the galaxy far away's loss, except this time it's Han Solo who's grieving. He's understandably lashing out at everyone who is, also understanably, tring to find the 'right thing to say' (like there is such a thing). And I think of what people tried to tell me when I lost my mom - 'She's in a better place'; 'She'll always be remembered'. I think of the old adages about living a life worth remembering, living a life worth emulating. I used to think that in one's last moments, a human being's greatest concern would be this: have I lived a life that someone else will remember? In the church in which I was raised, the memorial service for the recently departed contains a line that says 'May their memory be eternal'. And so I tell my little girl that as long as we remember Grandma, she'll always be with us.

But I wonder, now that I'm a little older - is that what it's really about? Do we live our lives worried about the memories others will have of us when we're gone, or do we go out triumphantly knowing that we've lived the kind of life in which we can take pride? I once thought the two were one in the same , but now I'm not so sure. Sometimes, when I find myself crying for those I've lost, I realize I'm really crying for myslef, for I, like most humans, am selfish; like Anakin, I want to somehow avoid the suffering that comes along with loving those who aren't immortal, who will one day leave us. But it occurs to me that even when you're crying it's possible to smile - smile at the though of what satisfaction it must have brought someone you love to look back and think, damn I had a great life. Whether it's a life someone remembers or not, I know it was a life worth living. I know I made use of the talents I was given, the love I had to give, and the days I had to spend. Maybe my life wasn't perfect, but like the cotton candy at Coney Island, I ate it up, picked it off the cone, and licked it off my fingers. And relished every bit of it.

Chewbacca may have had regrets. Life debt or no, it must have been hell leaving Lumpy and his wife on Kashyyyk while he fought in one conflict after another with Han Solo - often, in the EU at least, for very unappreciative New Republic leaders. And I'm sure that the death and destruction he saw on some of those missions made his heart feel the same way we did when we heard his signature, Han-going-into-carbonite Wookiee wail. But the bottom line is this (and with a Wookiee, of course, it's a big bottom line ) - Chewie went out like, well, Chewie. He lived his life in a big way, but even if he had never been a hero of the HoloNets, I'm pretty sure he still would have liked the life that was his life. And although I'm sure none but the most enlightened of us ever meets his or her last moments with complete acceptance, at the end I love Chewie for how he went out - not screaming with fear (like I probably would!) or in anger (like I'd assume he would), but with a battle roar.

'Cause he's a Wookiee, y'all. He's Chewbacca. He spent his life sacrificing for others, and he ended it in a defiant cry as he met his fate head on. For a true warrior knows that 'wars do not make one great', and a truly good soul knows this: that meeting the end with the knowledge that you lived a life that truly mattered in your eyes is more than enough.