Thursday was the 62nd anniversary of The Queen's ascension to the throne. The Queen has now been reigning for over 62 years. The longer she reigns, the more I root for her to surpass Queen Victoria's record. It would be awful if she had to reign for nearly 63 years, only to go down in history as the
second longest reigning British monarch. I really hope she makes it.
On Ascension Day a friend of mine asked me, on my Facebook status about Ascension Day, why I like the British Royal Family. I stared. Usually, when people ask me why I like the British Royal Family, it is a verbal question, asked in passing, which allows me to retort with something like "Why do you like Benedict Cumberbatch?" and walk away without answering their question. But this was a written question. On the Internet. I couldn't just ignore it.
I also couldn't answer in in a Facebook comment. I don't think Facebook comments have word limits, but it would be rather bothersome to read paragraph after paragraph when you aren't expecting more than a line. Which is why I decided to answer her question on my blog instead, and post a link in the Facebook thread. No one minds reading paragraph after paragraph on my blog. Well, maybe they mind, but at least they're expecting it.
Why do I like the British Royal Family? I'm not British, so it isn't patriotism, and I don't particularly care about the other aspects of British (or any) history or government, so it isn't a thirst for knowledge. And my interest isn't just limited to William and Kate and George and other 'celebrity' royals, so it's not only because I'm obsessed with famous people. It's because I'm obsessed with things in general.
Ever since I learned how to acquire information for myself, I've had a certain something that I was obsessed with. The Lion King. Enid Blyton mysteries. Boarding schools. I would spend all my time either thinking about or reading about or watching that one thing, and it would last until I found the next subject of obsession. The older I got, the longer each obsession lasted.
When I was about eight years old, I read my first Harry Potter book, and I absolutely loved it. I found it impossible to wait for the new ones to come out, and while I waited I would watch the movies and, as I grew older, read the fanfiction. That obsession soon died; after all, there was only so much you could do after the last movie came out. But although Harry Potter was only temporary, it will always have a special place in my heart. From there began my love for all things British.
At some point in the middle of the Harry Potter period, I accidentally stumbled across the Princess Diaries series one day in the library and read it. As someone who had just turned thirteen, I was fascinated by Mia Thermopolis. She seemed so grown-up to me, with her high school antics, crushes and subsequent boyfriends, and, of course, tiaras. That didn't last long; I loved her boyfriend, envied her position and wished I was her for about a year before turning fourteen myself and realising that I was doomed to a lonely, tiara-less existence. From there began my love for all things royal.
Then, in 2010, Prince William proposed to his long time girlfriend Kate Middleton, and it was an event that combined my love of all things British with my love for all things royal (I should clarify, I knew that the British Royal Family existed long before William asked Kate to marry him. I have a vague recollection of asking my mother, when I was younger, why Prince Philip was not the King even though he was the Queen's husband. She told me that that was just how it is. My mother didn't have a clue.) Immediately, I Googled Kate and, after a perfunctory look through her Wikipedia page, I had a long decision with one of my friends about whether she or Diana had a better engagement dress. I stand by what I said about Kate choosing a better dress, but now I can see what a rookie mistake it was to compare every little move of Kate's with Diana's and I feel tempted to smack my head against something.
I forgot about William and Kate in the months that followed, until February, when my school took my entire class to see The King's Speech, probably only because it was likely to win an Oscar. After the movie, we all had to write a report about Bertie's struggle with overcoming his speech impediment and how it gives serves as inspiration to everyone with speech impediments. For some reason, unlike the rest of my class, I did a little bit of research about King George VI and, as it would be every time I read about the royals, one page led to another, which led to another, which led to another. In less than a week, I had gathered enough knowledge about the royal family to make me glad that there was a royal wedding coming up.
I had a holiday on the day of the royal wedding and I was super excited about it. I woke up early, and watched all the royal wedding specials that they were showing on TLC, and watched the guests arrive, exclaiming whenever I recognised anyone. I didn't exclaim very often, and I probably wouldn't do the same if I were to watch a royal wedding now because I'd just be exclaiming the entire time. I didn't know who Princess Beatrice was when she stepped out of the car with her crazy hat, but that didn't stop me from Googling her - and Princess Eugenie too. In fact, I was Googling everybody whose name the hosts of the show mentioned.
And then Kate was on the screen, with her beautiful wedding dress and her dazzling smile and I was enchanted by the fairytale of it all. A prince was marrying a commoner and they would live happily ever after. I'm glad that I got to watch at least one royal wedding without a clue. I'm sure that at Harry's wedding I'm going to be trying to identify as many minor and foreign royals as I can and judging Cressida or whoever based on what I knew of them already. With Kate, I knew nothing. And it was wonderful.
After the wedding was over, I went into a frenzy to find out as much about the new Duchess of Cambridge as was humanely possible. I read about her past, I read about what was expected from her in the future. I couldn't stop. Looking for pictures of her led me to what had become one of my main sources for royal information; The Royal Order of Sartorial Splendor. Order of Splendor, introduced me to the world of foreign royals; Maxima, Charlene, Mette-Marit, everybody. The knowledge that royal families existed outside of the United Kingdom made me wonder if all the royals were somehow related. Spoiler: they are.
By this time I had amassed a substantial amount of royal information. I was leaps and bounds ahead of my peers, and it was evident to everyone that the British Royal Family (who were my favourite, owing to my aforementioned love for all things British) were my new obsession. At that point I figured if I was going to obsess over the royal family, why not go all the way?
What happened next is a bit of a blur, but all of a sudden I went from someone who couldn't tell the difference between Prince William and Prince Harry to someone who spent the entire week fangirling after Prince George was born, and who actually understood the implications of a birth in the family. I spent a lot of time reading and writing about them, either on my blog or on Royal Central, which has given me so much more insight into the royal world than I had earlier, and over time I grew to love the royal family as my own.
Of course, none of this explains why I like the British Royal Family. And honestly, I don't know. Maybe it was because I loved all things British and all things royal. Maybe the wedding just happened to take place at the time when I needed something to latch onto. Maybe I just like Kate's spunk but don't want to judged by people who think that she's a useless model with no better purpose than to produce heirs. I'm not sure. It's kind of hard to explain why you like something, isn't it?
I mean, why do you like Benedict Cumberbatch?
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