When I was a kid, I traded my Death Star for a Land Speeder and 5 bucks.
The kid who talked me into the trade wasn’t really a friend by choice. He was the son of some of my mom and dad’s friends, and we’d play together at his house while our parents listened to Fleetwood Mac in the den with the door closed, giggling about stuff that just didn’t make sense to me, at all.
So we were like prisoners of war, forced share a cell together, knowing that once the war was over, we’d never talk again.
I was aware of this situation, even at 8, so I was naturally skeptical of anything he offered me. He was already 10, and in Double Digits, so I knew that I should be a little wary of him.
The offer came to me one afternoon in his backyard, next to his parent’s swimming pool. I’d brought over my Death Star and some Star Wars figures, so we’d have something to do. There was no way I was going to endure a repeat of the last time I’d been there, where I my only entertainment was watching him organize and gloat over his collection of exotic matchbooks.
So we were sitting by the pool, which was doubling for the shore of an exotic new planet, where the Death Star had been relocated. He drove up his Land Speeder, and as he began to help his passengers out, I casually admired it.
He immediately offered a trade, but I declined. There was no way I was about to give up my Death Star for a Land Speeder that didn’t even have any obvious guns.
He expressed some shock at my reluctance, showing off its exciting and retractable wheels, and exquisitely-detailed dashboard sticker.
Although I was intrigued, I resisted. I really liked my Death Star. It had a cool Trash Compactor Monster.
He then let me in on a secret that only the ten year olds knew: Death Stars were lame. Land Speeders were cool.
This was news to me, and gave me pause for consideration. Did I really want to keep this Death Star, knowing that it was lame? How many of the Big Kids were laughing at me while they raced their own Land Speeders around, as I sat with my Death Star, wheel-and-stickerless?
While I wondered about this, he made a very generous offer: He would trade me the Landspeeder for the Death Star. He didn’t need to worry about what the other kids thought, he told me, because he also had an X-Wing Fighter and Darth Vader’s TIE-Fighter. This combination, he went on, was even cooler than a Land Speeder, so he was alright.
While I considered this new information, he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. He would give me five bucks to sweeten the deal.
Five bucks?!
I didn’t need to hear another word.
I made the trade, willingly handing over the deed to my Death Star without so much as a handshake. He gave me the Land Speeder, followed by five bucks from the front pocket of his Rough Riders. Shortly after that, my parents came out of the house, telling me that it was time to go home, after a stop on the way to pick up many bags of potato chips and pretzels.
Now, I know this seems like a shitty trade, because it was, but at the time, five bucks was as good as one million, and that Land Speeder did have wheels, man! WHEELS!
With those wheels, I thought, I could ferry four of my Star Wars figures across my kitchen floor with just one push!
One push was all it would take for Princess Leah and Luke Skywalker escape the dangerous prison The Empire had built from Tupperware cups and a Styrofoam drink cooler in the shadow of my parent’s refrigerator! They could be accompanied on their journey to the safety of the Rebel base, which was cleverly hidden from the Empire beneath the breakfast table, by C3P0 and R2-D2, who would be attached to the back of their seats via amazing foot-peg technology! This vehicle was all that stood between the rebel alliance and victory! I couldn’t believe that I had even considered for a moment not trading my very un-cool Death Star for this magnificent chariot.
The entire drive home, I sat on the back seat of the 1971 VW Bus, paying no attention to the cool strains of the Grateful Dead playing out of the 8-track. My mind was focused on the coming prison escape, and ensuing battle, where I just knew the Empire would enlist the help of GI Joe and He-Man. Good thing Luke and company had this new Land Speeder to get them out of danger!
Sadly, once I was home and on the kitchen floor, the reality of the trade did not meet the grand build up it had been given by my young imagination. That single push did not send my heros to quick safety. Rather, it sent them forward about 6 inches and to the left, coming to an anticlimactic rest against the front of the dishwasher. Only the constant presence of my grimy 8 year-old fist would give them adequate propulsion away from danger. And the foot-peg technology was quickly replaced by the more reliable scotch-tape-and-rubber band technology.
The novelty of rolling that Land Speeder around the floor quickly wore off, and I really missed my Death Star.
Fortunately, all was not lost: I had that five bucks. Five bucks to spend anyway I wanted. I was rich, man. Filthy rich, and that made me a god amongst the kids on my block.
For weeks I sat in my bedroom, atop my Chewbacca bedspread, holding that 5 dollar bill in my hands, just looking at it, admiring it, basking in the glow of unimaginable wealth while the noe-forgotten Land Speeder gathered dust in the back of my closet, behind Mister Machine and a partially completed model of the USS Arizona.
I capriciously thought of ways to spread my new found wealth amongst the other kids in our group…A pack of Wacky Packs stickers for Scott Anderson, some Toffifay for Joey Carnes, maybe even the invitation to Kent Purser to play doubles on Galaxian, my treat.
I was going to be very generous with my new wealth. I was going to be an 8 year-old philanthropist. Maybe I’d set up a foundation for the kids around the corner, who always wore the same clothes and smelled funny.
Maybe I’d stand outside the doors of Sunland Discount Variety, offering low-interest loans to kids wanting to play Gyruss or Star Castle.
I even thought about opening a savings account at the local Crocker Bank, where I’d get my own passbook and a set of Crocker Spaniels as a thank you gift.
Ultimately, though, like any normal 8 year-old, I kept it for myself, and there was a brief but shining moment in the summer of 1980, when I was allowed to ride my bike all the way to Hober’s Pharmacy, stopping at every intersection to check the front pocket of my two-tone OP shorts to ensure that my 5 dollar bill, which I’d folded into a tight little square and tucked into my Velcro wallet, hadn’t somehow escaped my possession. I took that five bucks, and bought myself Wacky Packs, a Slush Puppy, and enough surgical tubing to make several water weenies. I even had enough left over after playing Bagman, Donkey Kong, and Asteroids Deluxe to take a chance on the intimidating wall of buttons that was Stargate. It was one of the grandest days of my young life, and helped soften the disappointment that came when my friend Stephen proclaimed that my Land Speeder wasn’t “rad”, but “sucked.”
I recently went back to Sunland, hoping to pick up a Slush Puppy, and maybe see one or two of the phantoms of my youth haunting those stores, but they were nowhere to be found. I ended up getting a Mellow Yellow-flavored Slurpee from 7-11 and heading back home, where I spent some time looking for that Land Speeder in my garage.
I don’t know why, but I still have it. There’s an inscription on the bottom which proclaims “THIS IS WIL’S LaNdSPEEdR! kEpP YOU hANdS OFF OF It OR ELSE!!”
I took it out of the box, and dusted it off. I held it in my hands for the first time in twenty years, and suddenly that trade didn’t seem like such a bad idea, after all.
Look out, Darth Vader. You can build your Prison Fortress on my kitchen floor, but the Rebel Alliance has a new escape pod on the way, and you’d better “kEpP YOU hANdS OFF OF It OR ELSE !!”
177 thoughts on “The Trade”
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This brings back bad memories of when I sold my Hoth set (complete with guns and breakaway ice) at a garage sale in 1990 for $5. Plus about 5 figures for $1/each. Damn! I still have a Star Destroyer and Tatooine set at least (but without any of the extra parts) plus 20 figures, all missing their guns/accessories 🙁 I had a cool X-Wing model but melted it trying to dry the glue with a heat gun.
I’d like to join the “Encouraging Wil To Write A Book” team, please. Also the “What, no model Enterprise?!?” brigade. No Kirk action figure, to foreshadow what was to come? How disappointing. 😉
If you want to make This American Life, you may need a slightly weightier message… I don’t mean to be mean, they just have very clear guidelines about what they take (see http://www.thislife.org/pages/faq_extras/faqsubmissions.html and http://www.thislife.org/pages/faq_extras/howtogeton.html). I’ve always been confused about how you pitch something to them since every show is a theme show. just $.02 from a freelancer.
anyway, here’s how we know our man is from Southern California: surgical tubing for water weenies. awwww yeaah. represent!
Thank you for this post. Eloquently took me away from it all, swept into the dim vibrant world of your memories.
When you write your book, I’ll buy at least two copies. You know… one for me, and one to trade.
No only is this a wonderful story BUT I’m writing an economics paper right now and you PERFECTLY illustrated one of the points I planned to make about children and economics. I’m quoting you in my paper, if you have no objections.
Oh, and by the way? You rock. I hpe I’m HALF as cool as you when I’m your age.
Matt
I thought about that, Gus, and I decided that the weightier message was that when we’re kids, we make stupid trades because we’re blinded by impulse.
Then, when we get older, we re-consider the trades we’ve made, like this one, and it turns out to be, surprisingly, not so bad.
Yeah, that’s what I’m going to keep telling myself anyway. 🙂
Wil,
Definitely worth a submission to some venue; it’s quality writing. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it Mello Yello?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Mello+Yello%22
Ah, this reminds me of my brother. See, he had that landspeeder, too. And the Death Star. And pretty much every other Star Wars toy they made…ships, playsets, action figures, the works.
It would take all three of us brothers to employ all that equipment in play. I usually got to play the bad guys, because I was the only one who could do a reasonable imitation of Darth Vader’s breathing.
I have no idea what happened to all Clay’s Star Wars toys. If he’s still got ’em, they’re probably worth money. Come to think of it, there’s a bunch of stuff I had in those days that I wish I still had. Like my first computer…a TI-99/4A complete with the expansion box, disk drive, and 32K memory expansion. Or the shortwave radio that used to belong to my dad…a Hallicrafters S-38B. Or this other radio I had…a big ol’ console radio that once belonged to my grandmother, complete with record player, 12″ speaker, and album storage cabinets.
Maybe this is something similar to what you experienced, Wil…that sense of nostalgia, those good memories of old friends we’ll never meet again. At least you managed to hang onto part of yours. Ah well, I may just find some MP3 files of some early 80’s pop music, play them, and think of the days when I pulled open the door on that big radio, switched it on, waited for the tubes to warm up, dialed the tuner to The Mighty 690 (XTRA-AM from Tijuana, which was Top 40 in those days), and settled back to listen…back in those halcyon days of yesteryear.
Rambling on,
Eric
That put a smile on my face. I have a distinct memory of trading Star Wars figures for LEGO (I was a total LEGO geek).
Nice story 🙂
hey my comment name is Nick uzz off
awesome story. you are a great writer.
Wil
*Standing ovation*
As a 16 year old girl from England (a small indicator in how far you popularity has spread) I can say I have never had a land cruiser or any of the stars wars stuff! (I know I know I was deprived) But the whole “trade” story made me feel like I had n it was me!
Your ability to write doesnt get the approval it deserves – you are honestly a legend!
PLEASE DO ME A HUGE FAVOUR N WRITE AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY!
If you dont I will keep writing untill you do!
Thankyou again for a story which made me laugh n (quite embarrassed to say this) but cry aswell!
Keep it up 🙂
LOL! That was so funny! And I can totally relate to the toys thing. I had a bunch of Star Wars toys when I was a kid. Star Wars and He-Man and Voltron. The toys are either broken or in storage now but I don’t need them to play. I pretend to be Luke and Darth Vadar and have conversations with myself. What? Don’t look at me like that! I have no TV! When I’m not playing on my computer I have to do SOMETHING to amuse myself that doesn’t involve stressing out my hands! 😉
I’ve been on a Star Wars kick recently. Did you know that Luke got married in one of the novels? I was chatting with some people on EQ and they gave me the names of a couple books where Luke finally gets a girl. I have to go find it in my eqnotes file somewhere though. I was reading in Maxim that Mark Hamil nearly died in the car accident that scarred his face. That’s scary. Imagine if he hadn’t lived! Oh, and to go off on a tangent, I adore Mark Hamil! He’s a wonderful voice actor and he made me laugh so hard in Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back. My favorite line from that movie? “Don’t fuck with the Jedi master, son!”
I never saw the pseudo star wars movie with the little kid. I could not bring myself to watch it bc of the kid. Something about him just pissed me off whenever I saw his face. But I might watch the next movie when it comes out on video or dvd.
Thanks for sharing. Now I wish I knew where my star wars toys were. heh.
luv,
-Su
great post… made me think of all the days I spent running around in my star wars t-shirts playing princess leia and shooting at imaginary stormtroopers with my brothers(and who *were* my brothers sometimes)… nostalgia is great – sentimentality be damned!
What a great story, Wil! I love to hear stories about people’s childhoods.. and it’s so important to keep a little bit of that child inside you. To stay gold, like Robert Frost said.
You’re a great writer, keep it up 🙂
I made the same trade exccept that it was for the Landspeeder and an AbbaZabba Bar. I played with it for about 10 minutes and then proceeded to the local Tilt and played Missle Command and Galaga.
sfsdfs
What a lot of us Nicks there are here. So as not to cause a scene in the future – being repressed and English that is *not* the kind of thing I can deal with :~) – I shall now mutate into NickW as of now.
BTW Wil, nice to know you’re not dead. I was beginning to wonder.
PS: Nice to know that Uncle Wil is protecting us from evil spammers. *applause*
Seven words: Where can I buy your first book?
I treasure all my childhood memories. Unlike you, I don’t have much in possessions left from them, we left a lot of things behind when we moved to another country. If I had the gift of writing like you do, I would write a book of childhood memories to keep that as my treasure for old age, when all I’ll have is my memory to rely on.
You’re a great writer. Keep writing!
The toy Death Star had several structural and architectural flaws that made it vastly inferior to the meticulous reproduction of the landspeeder. I would say that, the young man with which you traded Star Wars action objects was quite daft for wanting the Death Star. Yes, the trash compactor monster was a hilight of the toy, but it is actually misrepresented. When the model for this toy was being developed, they did not have access to the genuine species of the “worm” and they had to use Quelli-bryoota Uncha Uncha instead of the proper Quelli-bryoota Cruncha Unka, which is obviously not the same species at all!! Also, the warp drive controls (which few people know the Death Star had) are not even represented on the control deck. I could go on and on with my list of absent functionality, misrepresented layout, and structurally unsound plastic being used to construct the different devices…but I won’t. Don’t worry Will…the deal was FARE.
Seriously,
John O. Swackhammer
“I capriciously thought of ways to spread my new found wealth amongst the other kids in our group…A pack of Wacky Packs stickers for Scott Anderson”
So where’s my wacky pack stickers, wil? It would be impossible that there are multiple Scott Andersons. It just doesn’t work like that. 😛
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Will,
Great story! You brought me back to my childhood. Thank you!!!
Sean
There is actually something I forgot to mention. I remember this trade a little too specifically. Yes, it’s all coming back to me now. I too once traded these exact two items with a younger friend of mine..”Billy” I think I called him. As I also recall, he was quite young and seemed a little, well, un-hip. I was thinking to myself “yes, the worm is the wrong species…let’s be fare, they didn’t have one…No, the drive controls are not on the deck representation. The corrugated pattern used for the raised passages between decks is ALL WRONG because, as we all know, there is no way that a pattern such as that could be structurally sound enough to support hundreds of stormtroopers hauling ass after interlopers such as them!” BUT I also recall reading an article in Star Wars Fanatics Weekly about a certain number that was located on the bottom of the land speeder. If you called that number then George Lucas would show up at your house and “give your mommy a baby”…I didn’t quite understand that at the time, but I was really excited to have a brother because I didn’t have one then, and when I sat up at night shooting bottle rockets at my pillow it just was not rewarding enough. I missed the blood curdling screams of singing a real human…
Yes, I do remember that very very well. HAR!! what a suckah that Billy was…
I wonder where he is now…
by the way, Spudnuts and Gabe…you guys are total SUCKUPS man…get a life. We all know that Senior Will Wheaties wouldn’t wee wee in your Cheerios for you even if you PAID HIM TO!! ME AM BIZARRO…WILL WHEATON HIM LIKE MEE!! HE R MY FRIEND 2!! ME AM ARE 4 U WILLY WHEATON!!