Where was I when I found out our queen had died ? I was in almost exactly the same place that I had been when I found out that the twin towers were hit. In the Village where I lived and raised my babies, where I tried to survive the afternath of the attacks that took place against me. I unlike the several thousand people who died in the towers and The Queen of England survived, I consider her age in comparison to mine and the fullness of her life, yet this is woman who Ihave never met, never knew, but when I saw her I cried. A woman who by that time was elderly, sat in a carriage, processing at the parade ring with her daughter, why was I so touched by seeing her and then feeling a loss at her passing?
I have yet to really understand why this may be, why I feel the way I do, sad, reminded of my late husbands passing and other family members lost, or maybe it is the fear of what is to come, after all loss, it is the unknown. This is not a family member, but the loss affects every person in the country, without really knowing how the future will be afftected with a change of leader who is going to be a patriarch. Does this make a difference ? Does it affect the country ? Does his ex wife who died in a car crash with her lover whilst he was marrying his make any difference ? In truth it does. As I saw the news flash on the billboard I knew as I did stood on almost the very same place as when the aeroplanes hit the towers, that the reality for people would be very significant, just as it was when The Princess of Wales died In Paris. You see these people are more than human, the lives represent something symbolic. Diana the wife, who refused to be long suffering and died, making the Kings route to power less troublesome. His ownership and Englands ownership of the children more straightforward. Her appeal was worldwide, every country. In those days the popularity, the admiration, the utter brilliance of her style and humanity, defined the Windsor royal family. Perhaps in a manner that was unwelcome in grey suited corners of the country.
When the twin towers fell, I was terrified. When the Priness of Wales died I was destroyed. It was at a time I was suffering domestic abuse, my life growing up, fun, freedom replaced by fear violence and horror. A mother who was unable to escape the domestic abuse and working in an organisation that viewed women as an additional extra. To see the woman who growing up I admired for her sense of not just style, but personal style and an approach to her role that was compassionate and fun. The filming of her body in a tunnel was both macarbe and in retrospect the ulitimate intrusion to a womans life and death. As I watched the coverage the sympolism of an Englishwoman, with bright ideas and classic style that women hated and men were threatened by.
The Queen was again by account of others, fun loving and beautiful and with a strong sense of her own ideas. In older age, after the death of her husband it seemed that as a widow a singl woman, her rule was no longer acceptable, without a man it was not ok. I am not sure of the health status of the Queen, or why she passed so suddenly. Needless to say when I stood in the same place as I was for 9/11 and the death of Diana Princess of Wales, it finally sunk in that her death was enevitable in older age, yet somehow like all death no one is ever really prepared for the loss. It wasnt the horror of 9/11 or the shock of Diana Princess of Wales, but a resigned acceptance that she like all people in England was in the hands of a health service that has overseen the unecessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of people including the loss of our Queen
This is not about blame, or anything like it, purely an observation that things for women in England and people more generally are difficult in terms of health. That the health of the nation is being sacrificed but for why no one seems to know. Then the coffin is led by NHS employees and I wonder that the Queen was not in England at the time of her death, she was in Scotland, where the swaith of unecessary deaths was greater than the comparitive populations of New Zealand. Is it possible that as the world leaders gathered in Westminster Abbey bused in except the American leader in a bullet proof box, it really said more of the situation in the wider world, there for all to see the most recognisable woman possibly in the world laying under a flag that a man tried to ‘nick’ as she lay in state and with a small posy of flowers that were rustic and in some ways a sad representation of the importance of this woman. It seemed to be a visual representation of how far the country slipped, an elderly woman, a head of state, with a sense of humour, a decisive manner and a strong sense of duty. She served in uniform during the war and was a decisive and strong character. Her loss even as I type seems just a bit too much to bear.
The procession, her coffin carried by men, surrounded by men. Just a sea of men. The military the speeches the whole service, men. Then in amongst the service, in the high pulpit arrives the new Prime Minister Liz Truss. It isnt that we have not had a female Prome Minister before. But not one who is both a mother and a partner or wife and modern in both appearance and lifestyle. In the midst of the uniforms she read. To provide context, during the service I was in Winchester Cathedral, sandwiched between a woman with all her tech out, phone tablet so she could sing and follow the service. I have a wry smile as she fafs with the tech and I quietly turn pages in the order of service on paper. She wonders off during the service twice and spends the rest of the time scrlling the phone and tablet, I wondering quietly why on earth she actually attended.
The tears fall throughout the service, singing God save the King is barely audible as i cannot contain the emotion, seeing him motionless and apparently unmoved in the Cathedral where his wife had her service. The man stood to my right laughs literally out loud as the service comes to a close with the Scottish Piper, I stop in my tracks, the tears ebb and I literally swing my head round as if to actually see what I have heard. Yes there he is laughing and smiling. I feel a fury welling inside, Iwonder where from, why ? As a person who expresses very little of violence, I literally want to hot him. How dare he ? Laugh ? the funeral of the female head of state and a man stood in a cathedral laughs…. is this freedom? Is this the expression of freedom ? As the time has passed I am not considering it. England has a KIng and a woman in charge at Westminster, there is progress albeit as a generation age, the next are defining how this is going to look, It is an exciting time to write and the only question I was left with was, when is it ok to write, to speak to move on from the death of the Queen who has been in charge all of my life? ……