Of a Right Royal Encounter

A friend of mind this morning is all excited. Her work place is expecting a visit from Prince Andrew. In fact, she doesn't know this for sure. They've been told its a Royal but not which one. But the hot money is on Andrew. She's in catering and will be making his cuppa tea.

I've never met a Royal although I did wave at Lady D once and she returned fire. I was coming out of a concert in Birmingham attended by Princess Charles and Diana. We decided to leave early to beat the crowds and we took a short cut across the car park. Just as we were getting ready to cross a main road a rather nice car shot by and there they were. A strange feeling came over me. It was like I was caught in a moment. I was conscious of very little except looking down and seeing my left arm waving away at them. She smiled and waved back which was nice of her. She didn't have to.

I watched Princess Andrew at work a few years ago at a Royal Garden Party at Hillsborough. Quite why I was ever invited to this I'm not sure but there I was standing behind a line of guests all waiting to be introduced to him. I was earwigging I suppose. There was about 12 of them in a line who had been waiting patiently to meet him. The rumour was out that he was late because he had been playing golf. Guest number one wisely asked him how the golf went and he politely replied that it went well and thanked him for asking. The next three in the line wisely didn't ask him about the golf but number four (clearly out of earshot from number one) did as did number eight and twelve. The poor fellow responded each time "It went well and thank you for asking". What a boring task I thought.
I came away feeling impressed by the effort he made to engage with people he's unlikely to have met before and unlikely ever to meet again. Likely he'll remember none of them. They'll remember the meeting for the rest of their lives. A strange encounter when you think about it.