I'm still on an anniversary high. And also feeling melancholy because of Prince Philip's death. He wasn't my favorite royal. My favorite is Diana, Princess of Wales. I'm very much like her - honest, truthful, rebellious, impetuous, and so open with my affections and opinions. Very unroyal haha
Royalty demands loyalty to duty. That's it. Even if that means suffering in silence. Like Diana, I don't believe in suffering or silence. Harry and Meghan are exactly like Diana. So am I! So you can tell who my new favorite royals are. I didn't really like Meghan before - she was so outspokenly feminist and then she joined the royal family and she became voiceless. Meh. So I like her now because she spoke out. I like it when women speak up.
However, I also believe in how, when, and where we speak up. I don't think Diana's Panorama interview and H&M's Oprah interview were good ideas. But I'm not a public personality so who am I to say the proper when and where, right?
I know people like dignified silence. It's not for me. As a survivor of abuse, I know that silence is what allows abusers to continue doing what they do. Society has made silence a virtue because how else can evil be perpetuated if we all speak up? On a lesser scale, if not evil, then all the little things that make us unhappy in our job, our family, our marriage, our church, our society are forced on us. How then can life become better if we just accept everything that makes us unhappy?
So I like how Prince Philip did it. He wasn't quiet, mind you. Like I said, silence won't get you anywhere. And Philip did raise a fuss. He resented his "kept man" status, the humiliation of not being allowed to give his last name to his children, and the fact that he had to give up his naval career for his more important role as royal spouse. He may have complained but he and his wife (the Queen!) managed to navigate those bumps and create meaningful roles for him. So even though he didn't like certain things about his life, he was able to make changes so that he eventually liked it. I mean, just because you chose something doesn't mean it's perfect. So you speak out, talk it out, make compromises, and smooth out the rough parts until you find a life that you love and cherish.
Much like how Prince Philip wrote here:
In my middle age, that's also now my only ambition - combined existence and a profoundly joyful one, too. All I want is to have a happy family, a stable home, and to make sure my kids are fed and happy and one day be wonderful members of society.
It's not a shallow ambition. As we all know, that's actually hard to achieve. I've been married 14 years and not all of those 5,110 days were happy (my husband will always say every day was happy - gosh, I love him). Vince and I had to do a lot of adjusting and fighting and talking and compromising and crying. There were days of silence, too, but that just made things worse. Always speak up! Maybe not all the time, and maybe learn to choose a good time. I know, for example, to never bring up anything bad when he's hungry and to back off and shut up when things get too volatile, because he'll just clam up and he won't talk to me anymore haha So we've learned to gauge each other's silences - not to keep silent, but to learn when it's time to talk. Because that's the only way we can fix things and move forward.
See? A combined existence is not easy for anyone, not for ordinary people like me and Vince. Not even for power couples like Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip. Even the love and devotion they famously had for each other didn't mean everything was smooth sailing for them or for their family. Two people becoming one is not easy. Two people adding little people into the mix while those two people are still figuring each other out is a bit insane, too. So it's a lofty ambition and one that I am determined to see through.
Just like Prince Philip and his queen did. I want that more than anything in the world.
