The Lego Death Star

                As I tossed the last piece of my Lego Death Star into the box, I am filled with a series of memories.  That 3803 pieces of plastic could be imbued with such emotion shocks even me.   I’m typing this with a sore thumb, and a heart filled with joy and sadness.

                The saga of the Death Star begins and ends with my oldest daughter, Lilly.  When Lilly was five years old, she begged me to tell her stories as we drove in the car.  Quickly she tired of ones that started “There once was a five year-old girl named Lilly, and she had a mommy and a daddy and a sister named Katie…”  So I started burning through every one I could think of that began “When I was a little boy…”   After those were exhausted, I had a breakthrough.  The next time Lilly said, “Tell me a story Daddy.”  I began with, “Long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away…”  It took me three car rides to get to the climax of the story, and as I pulled up to the curb, shut off the car and helped Lilly out of her seat belt, I told her, “I guess if you want to see the end of the story, you’ll just have to watch the movie.”   Lilly’s eyes bugged out of her head and she squealed and clapped with delight.  “There’s a MOVIE daddy!?”  Needless to say, dinner and bedtime was a little late that night.

    What could make a dad more proud than having his five-year-old daughter become a Star Wars nut in front of his eyes?  We tore through all three movies by the weekend, and soon got the Lego Star Wars game for Playstation 2.  Around the same time we started receiving a Lego catalog which I threw in the backseat of the car to amuse the girls along with the other junk mail.  Lilly was amazed by the Lego Death Star.  A $400 piece of Danish craftsmanship, it really was a thing of beauty.  Literally, the most expensive item in a very expensive catalog.  Lilly wanted it with the passion that only a five-year-old can muster; I figured it would be out of favor within a few weeks.  However, months went by and the Death Star was all she talked about.  Gone were the Disney Princess movies, and Barbie dolls.  Lilly was all Star Wars all the time, and about 50% of the time was focused on the Death Star.

                At Christmastime she was just sure that she would be receiving it.  My wife and I had fallen into a bad habit of referring to ourselves as “Santa” when we were talking amonst ourselves and our friends about buying gifts for the kids, and Lilly caught me off guard one afternoon, again as I was pulling up to the curb. 

                “I think I’m going to ask Santa for the Death Star,” she said from behind the now-battered catalog.

                As I gathered my briefcase and the girls’ lunch boxes I replied casually, “I don’t think Santa can afford the Death Star for you honey.”

                The trap snapped shut.  “Daddy, Santa doesn’t need money.  He makes all the toys.”

                Thinking quickly, I turned around and looked at Lilly in her car seat.  I used the most mocking and disdainful voice I could muster without laughing, “Lilly, are you serious?  Do you really think Santa has a Lego factory at the North Pole?  Of course he has to buy the toys.  Sure, he makes the wooden ones and stuff, but he’s got to buy the rest.  I’m sure Lego cuts him a deal, but come on.”

                This was enough to chew on that it shut her down long enough for me to escape the car and escape into the house.  But the seed had been planted, not with her, but with me.

                That summer my buddies took me to the casino for my birthday.  I won a poker tournament for $500, I used some of the winnings to fix the transmission in my van.  I went back again in the Fall and won another $300, I spent some that money on a fire pit my wife wanted.  The third time I went back I told myself that if I had a really good trip, I would use some of the winnings to buy the Death Star for Lilly.  Almost a year after she had seen if for the first time, it was still her heart’s desire.  I left the poker table up $1200, so excited that I could make my daughter’s dream come true.  I mean, how often does that happen?  Think about the object you want more than ANYTHING in the world.  A house, a car, a piece of art, whatever.  Will you ever have the money to make that happen?  Probably not.  But here, this one time, I could make my daughter’s greatest dream come true.

                When I got home and ordered the toy, it was backordered and took several months to arrive.  In the meantime, I lost all of my bankroll, about $1000, in my final casino trip.  Shortly after that, my wife and I divorced.  Money was very tight of course, and I considered cancelling the order several times.  I had never told Lilly I was getting it for her, and she would never know how close she came.  But every time I tried, I just couldn’t do it.  Lilly was handling the divorce very well, better than I was for sure, and knowing how happy this would make her feel, I just couldn’t cancel the order.  It was connected to those happier, hopeful, times and I suppose I needed that as much as she did.

                When the package arrived, the hugs, kisses, and screams were appropriately ecstatic.   But once the packages were opened, and the mini-figs put together, the magnitude of the project started to wear us down.  Online sources said that it was a 25-30 hour assembly.  Lilly’s “help” and my own stupidity (I didn’t realize that each bag represented a specific step, so I ripped them all open at once to get the mini figs and weapons out and had to resort all 3803 pieces.) added at least 10-15 more hours.  Since Lilly was only with me every other week, and we could only really work on it in the time after her younger sister went to bed, we only got a third of it done in a month.  I finally started doing it myself on the weeks when she wasn’t with me before I went to bed.  I made quicker progress that way, and it was a great way to focus and relax, but I was so melancholy during those months.  As I was tearing it apart today, the tactile sensations in my fingers made me really sad.  At one point I thought I might take up Lego building as a relaxing pastime, but after today, I don’t really think I’ll be able to do a major project without dredging up those feelings.

                Even after it was done, and the initial feelings of accomplishment wore off, the thing only had a few months of play value.  Lilly still loved it and played with it a lot, but her little sister was just too young and reckless…even now she has a penchant for throwing things when she is upset.  So I had to keep it on a high shelf and would only get it down for her if her sister were napping or otherwise occupied.   The Death Star sat in my bedroom getting regular, if sporadic, play for about a year.  But by the time I was ready to move in with my new fiancée, Lilly had moved on to other things.  She was now hooked on Harry Potter.  The Death Star still has a lot of monetary value; Legos don’t really depreciate, so I asked Lilly if she would be upset if I sold it.  She said, “Can we buy Hogwarts with the money?”  I told her no way, because she would want to play with it all the time and I didn’t want her to lose any pieces for such an expensive set.  I was meticulous with the Death Star and 2 years later I’m pretty sure all 3803 pieces are accounted for.

                However, last weekend, my friends Tim and Tony made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.  They are both huge Lego fans, and had been trying to buy the Death Star from me for a while.  We were at the Lego Store in Castleton, and Lilly was ogling the Hogwarts Castle.  They were wanting to buy it for her as a gift, but I was balking, saying it was way too generous.  Tim said, well sell me that Death Star for $200, and let me buy the Castle for Lilly.  That way you can say that part of the castle came out of the sale of Death Star.  While the logic is weird, it made perfect sense to me.  Lilly gets an amazing gift that she absolutely adores (she built the whole thing in less than 24 hours) and my friend gets an amazing toy that he and his family will enjoy a lot.

 As I was finishing deconstructing the final layer this morning, I got a message from my new wife.  She said, “Are you sad to see it go?”  I replied, “A little.  It served its purpose though.  It’s time to move on.”