Product Placement

I didn't always want to be a teacher. I didn't always want to work in a video store. I didn't always want to manage a book warehouse. And it was never in my life plan to install modular office furniture. Nonetheless, these were some of the jobs that I have done, but once upon a time I had a vision of myself as an entrepreneur.
Way back in the autumn of 1977, after I had seen "Star Wars" for the fifteenth or sixteenth time, it occurred to me that an injustice of a galactic proportions had taken place. Chewbacca, the Wookie, did not receive a medal. Han, who was looking for more than something to hang around his neck if you get my drift, got one. Luke, who was on his way into Tosche station to pick up some power converters when the fate of the Republic fell into his lap, got one. Chewbacca, faithful co-pilot of the Millennium Falcon and regularly marginalized minority, got nothing. Zip. Zero. Nada. Zilch. Goose Egg. Black Hole. Why not?
C-3PO, human cyborg relations, stayed back at headquarters to fret with Leia. R2-D2 got his head blown off for all his trouble. At least he got repaired. Chewie was on the front lines, just like his shorter human counterparts, and yet the powers that be couldn't be bothered to dig up a chunk of space platinum strung together by two strips of canvas for the big guy. Probably some sort of budget issue back on the fourth moon of Yavin, but honestly, if the Cowardly Lion could get a badge of courage, why couldn't Chewbacca?
I decided that I would print up T-shirts, from a silkscreen of my own design, and sell them. Part of the proceeds would go to the oh-so-clever me, but some of the money would find its way to a fund that would eventually set things right in a galaxy far, far, away. One shirt was made. I wore it out once to gauge the public's reception of my slogan: "Equal Rights For Wookies!" Strangers ignored me. My friends scoffed. My dreams of setting up a table at the local comics shop to hawk my goods died as abruptly as a womp rat who gets bullseyed by a T-16 back home.
I let that go for years, until my son began defending Jar Jar Binks. This numbskull Gungan may have had all kinds of good intentions, but he may also have single-handedly brought on the rise of the Empire. And they made him a senator. All Chewbacca did was line Luke up for his shot at taking out the Death Star. Is there no justice in the universe? Back to the drawing board.