Every little girl has their princess and Carrie Fisher’s Leia was mine

FILE - In this Nov. 13, 1978 file photo, Harrison Ford talks with Carrie Fisher during a break in the filming of the CBS-TV special "The Star Wars Holiday" in Los Angeles. On Tuesday, Dec. 27, 2016, a publicist says Fisher has died at the age of 60. (AP Photo/George Brich, File)

This post has nothing to do with legalities. I am going to pull back the curtain a little bit and show you a side of me that doesn’t typically come through in my Legally Speaking posts.

I am going to show you, or tell you about, my “Star Wars” side.

Celebrities and musicians die each year and, though we honor them at the time of their death, we often honor them again at the end of the year or during the various awards ceremonies. Well here we are, at the end of the year, and we had two deaths of celebrities that were simply too young to have died: George Michael and Carrie Fisher.

I liked George Michael, but I loved Carrie Fisher. Or, more accurately, I loved Princess Leia Organa-Solo.

You see, every little girl has her princess when she is growing up. Yes, even the strong-minded, adventurous, stubborn tom-boys all have princesses they love and want to be. For the past couple decades, these came in the form of Disney princesses — Belle, Ariel and Elsa.

But before all of them came another princess.

My princess, the one I wanted to be, was Princess Leia. She was strong, smart, stubborn, kind and a leader. That is exactly the kind of role model a little girl should look up to. To this day, when people ask me who my favorite “Star Wars” character is, I say, without hesitation, “Princess Leia.”

Yes, I understand, she was a character and the woman that played her was far from what we saw on the screen. Fisher had a tough time with drugs and being bipolar. That being said, she was on the mend, things were looking up and she still had another 20 years ahead of her, which would undoubtedly have included a couple more “Star Wars” movies.

Unfortunately, Carrie Fisher is no longer with us but the princess she portrayed will live forever in my mind and in the minds of countless other women like me, who were once little girls who wanted to grow up to be a princess.

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