i would be the last person to admit that i particularly care about the royals, those foppish britishers, especially.
not even the systemic schadenfreude in the media from the royals'’ interminable gaffes interest me, at all.
but today, hearing about the news that finally that fumbling future king of england married the woman he has loved for more than three decades, i couldn'’t help feeling a bit toasty myself.
so much so that i tivoed whatever there was on the telly about the couple’s wedding, or civil ceremony, or whatever they call it there in those isles of the bloodiest of weathers.
unembarrassed being awashed with this vague feeling of warmth, i watched as these two “boring old gits” (as the notoriously mean london tabloids routinely described the two lately) got all spruced up for their early saturday morning civil union.
without surprise here, i didn'’t initially catch the irony as the couple recited parts of the traditional marriage text from the 1662 book of common prayer.
we acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, recited charles and camilla earnestly.
almost everyone with tv these days know their love story. they first met as students in the 1970s and carried on with this illicit affair through the prince’'s marriage to his equally adulterous first wife, lady di.
charles, have you resolved to be faithful to your wife, forsaking all others so long as you both shall live? the archbishop of canterbury asked the star-crossed lover-prince.
that is my resolve, with the help of god, the prince said without flinching.
camilla was asked the same and publicly stated her resolve, as well. then the choir burst into a lusty bach cantata.
today'’s event, though, was a far cry from the prince’'s first marriage.
although both of charles'’ photogenic sons were in attendance (prince william standing as the fidgety best man), most of the other crusty royals, those incestuous royals of europe, weren’'t there. and they didn’'t have the decency to invent some lofty excuses to skip the ceremony.
charles'’ father refused to postpone a trip to, of all places, germany. and one of his distant relatives, sweden's crown princess is too busy opening an ikea store in japan.
in that lavish royal wedding a quarter of a century ago, prince charles wore this elaborate military dress uniform, complete with an anachronistic sword.
this time, armed only with a lasting love for his not so radiant wife, the prince wore a kind of a dull morning suit.
but there was no mistaking it. shedding the foppish uniform he wore the last time, the prince looked this time like the real mr. darcy, a mr. fitzwilliam darcy with balls.