Think ICT

We’ve been watching the Netflix series The Crown. It’s been fascinating to compare what we see on screen to what we remember over the years about the royal family. Sometimes I think about where I was or how old I might have been during a particular episode. We’ve now seen a few episodes featuring Princess Diana and wondered if the drama that was unfolding was accurate or perhaps stretched in some way. Of course, much of it we know from the news, such as that after she moved into the palace, she developed an eating disorder and that Charles was unfaithful from the beginning of the marriage. What was surprising was to see that from the beginning, the royal couple were not really in love. Would they have eventually grown to love one another? Perhaps. But what are the conditions in which two people grow into love or grow out of love? From my very limited view of Charles and Diana, it sure would have helped if he had been willing to truly cut the ties with Camilla.

Nevertheless, it got me thinking about couples in general, and what came to mind was the scene from the Fiddler on the Roof in which Tevye asks his wife, Golde, if she loves him. She almost brushes the question off entirely, but he keeps pressing her for an answer and at one point he emphatically asks again “I know, but do you love me?” And what is her reply? “For twenty-five years I’ve washed your clothes, cooked your meals, cleaned your house, given you children, milked your cow, after twenty-five years, why talk about love right now?”

And right there, she is still perplexed by his question. He keeps going. He starts talking about the first time he met her on their wedding day, since apparently it was an arranged marriage. And then they both express how they felt — scared, shy, nervous, and so on. They recall how their parents said they’d learn to love each other. At that point in the conversation, they both realize that after so many years of life together with all its ups and downs, she says yes, “I suppose I do.” And Tevye replies the same.

So what is it to build a life together? It seems it’s give and take, compromise and willingness to bend, practicing patience, determination to see the bigger vision of a life of service together rather than alone. One scene in The Crown showed Margaret asking the family to stop the marriage ahead of time because she could see there were issues. But the queen goes to Charles and talks with him about how his grandparents learned to love one another over the years, building a life together. She implied they should go forward but left the decision to Charles. Why couldn’t Charles and Diana manage this? Perhaps it was all the extra complications of being royals and all the expectations and limitations that come with it…. or maybe the intense media pressure that constantly surrounded them. Regardless, relationships are complicated — and so is life itself!