H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth II

There is a palpable and profound feeling of grief and shock–around the world, but especially in the United Kingdom–at the passing of the Queen. Most of us have known no other monarch and are now struggling to get used to the idea of having a King instead. My mother was a devoted Royalist and would have been devastated at this sad event. She used to love making period costumes for dolls and in the 1970s she sent one similar to this to the Queen. Within days she had received a letter of thanks from Buckingham Palace conveying Her Majesty’s appreciation. My mother treasured that letter, and I still have it nearly fifty years later. The state funeral will be unlike anything we have seen before as the world pays tribute and respects at the conclusion of the second Elizabethan era. We are now in the third Carolean era, and just as we have only ever known a Queen, children born now and in the years ahead will only know a King. Although things will never be the same in the United Kingdom, I look forward to the future with every confidence that His Majesty King Charles III will reign with the same dignity, compassion and sense of duty that his mother never wavered from. Long live the King.