Call me crazy, since I'm certainly no school girl, but this time of year makes me .... lovesick. Suddenly I'm more...amorous, I feel more hopeful about life, in general. I find myself dashing out for the latest "pink" shade of lipstick and a new spring shoe makes me giddy. This year, as I'm purging clothes & items before moving into our new home here in the Chattanooga mountains, I'm especially giddy.
Take, for instance, the upcoming royal wedding....I'm absolutely excited and I'm not even on the guest list! Not to mention I'm old enough to be the future King of England's ...um...aunt? :) I wasn't on the guest list for Charles & Dianna's nuptials, either, but that certainly didn't stop me from throwing a royal-watching party for a few of my closest friends.
It was the summer of 1981, we girls were all abuzz about heading off to college.I had a sleepover so we could all sit up, do all the girly things teens do and then watch the wedding LIVE (there was no DVR back then.) But as close to the precipice of adulthood as we were, that day, we were all transformed back into 5-year-olds as we watched Lady Di glide up the aisle to meet her prince and live happily ever after. Or so we thought that great day. History would dictate, otherwise. But since we were not psychics, we just sat back & dreamed about how lucky Lady Di was. She was marrying a prince! And there was a lovely gold & glass carriage and trumpets blaring her procession. I remember how we all sighed in awe of her beauty, her gown, the pomp and pageantry that accompanied that grand day in jolly old England. It was all I could do not to burst!
I smile now when I think about my group of girlfriends and me, all just unmarried gals on the verge of college,watching that wedding, which was soon followed by our own careers, weddings, babies, etc., but that day we were innocent girls who swooned over the notion of love and happily ever after...you know, the way it was read to all of us at story time as we lay in our little beds.
Flash forward to a hot sunny evening in August, 1997, when I first heard Princess Di was wounded in an automobile accident. Her boyfriend was already dead and we were all waiting for updates on the princess, herself. She'll never be the same, I thought. Her boyfriend died, she was with him, how could she live with that, I remember thinking to myself. Then came the chilling announcement that Princess Dianna was also gone. Unthinkable, how such a bright shining star could be snuffed out at once.
Although 16 years had slipped by between my "wedding-watching" sleepover, I came home the next day to an answering machine jammed with messages from gals I hadn't heard from in years, living all over the state, but all forever linked to me through our mutual admiration of the royals and Princess Di, in particular.
Today, although I am old enough to know that not all fairy-tales have happy endings, I don't know anyone who isn't rooting for William & Kate to make it, long term. I know I was among those who were most unhappy with Camilla Parker Bowles' part in the whole Charles-Di-Camilla triangle scandal, but there is one thing some might not have stopped to think about...Charles loved Camillia long before he married Dianna. He simply wasn't ready to marry her before she married her first husband, Anthony and by then, the clock, in royal terms, anyway, was a-ticking. So he married his princess as was his duty, but his true love for Camilla never stopped, as much as even I hate to admit this. So although Dianna's death was a tragic ending, one I'm sure (or at least I hope) Charles never wished for, he did, in the end, get his "happily ever after," despite how many hearts were broken in the process.
So this April 29, as my 6-year-old daughter and I pretend to be proper Brits, sipping tea and eating crumpets (or Oreos) and watching William and Kate take their vows and ride off into the sunset, I can only hope that because there was no pressure on this young and vibrant couple, who appear to have already sewn their royal oats, and because they waited until they were mature enough to handle the responsiblilites of royal duties (do they really have any, anymore?) maybe this time, there really will be a happily-ever-after storybook ending after all, one in which any little girl can really believe.
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