The Queen
This post was inspired by this picture from Warwick Davis’ Twitter account. It was such a sweet post it got me thinking about good ol’ Queenie.
I’ve always liked the Queen, and the Royal Family in general actually
and I’m sadder than I thought I was going to be at hearing of her
passing. She’s been a constant in my life and she always reminded me of
my Nan that I lost a few years back. It feels very strange to think we
now have a King. I know a lot of people hold a resentment to the Royal
Family, and what they represent etc but whatever your thoughts, Queen
Elizabeth always seemed like a sweet, kind hearted lady and I respect
the years she put into being our head of state.
I, obviously, don’t really have any stories to share about any real
connections to the Queen, but I will always remember a time in Primary
School when we heard she was going to be driving past. My school was
next to a place called Kneller
Hall, the home of the Royal Military School of Music. She was due to
visit them for whatever reason and was going to a drive-by past my
school. The teachers were all very excited about this, so all week they
had us making banners and little paper tree wavy things. I remember
taking so much time on the bloody thing.
The big day finally came, and we all lined up by the side of the road,
along the route her car would take, ready to wave and cheer. We saw the
car in the distance and as she passes the Year 6s, at the top of the
road, we could see a little hand waving out of the window. This
continued by the Year 5s, Year 4s, Year 3s … it was almost my time to
show the Queen my work of art. As the Queen’s car was nearly parallel
with me and my class I started to raise my arm, and wavy thing in turn.
That wasn’t all that raised, however. Almost in sync with my arm going
up, the open window the Queen was waving out of started to go
up. She closed her window just as she reached my classmates and
I and, a few seconds later she turned in Kneller Hall and disappeared,
never to be seen (by me) again.
Even at that innocent age, I recall being pretty fuming after the wasted effort and disappointment and for some time I wasn’t the Queen’s biggest fan, but I soon moved on and ended up having a huge amount of respect and even pride for her, despite the Royal shunning I endured.
Rest in peace your Majesty and, maybe one day, I’ll see you again and finally get a chance to show you my wavy thing …