The queen is dead; Will God save the king?

Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor, born in 1926, the woman known around the world as Elizabeth II, or simply “The Queen”, became monarch by an accident of history, with the abdication of her uncle Edward VIII and the premature death of her father. But monarch, she was — indeed for more than 70 years, as she was crowned in February 1952.

For all of us, regardless of our background, she was for so long one of the most recognizable faces in our lives. iconic. I speak for myself. One of the most distant memories of my childhood was going to watch the documentary “Coronation” with my older brother, taken by my father. I don’t remember going to the movies with my father either before or after this transcendental “event”, which demonstrates how present she was in our collective memories.

Much later, in 1968, the queen visited Rio de Janeiro. Me, with all my credentials of rebellion, of participation in the student movement, shouting “down with the dictatorship” on the eve of the enactment of the infamous Institutional Act 5 a few weeks later… I couldn’t resist. And there I was in the wide halls of the family’s apartment on Avenida Atlântica, all just for the chance to catch a glimpse of her, just for a moment, profiled in the Rolls-Royce convertible by the sea. They say it is the same Rolls-Royce that today serves the most controversial functions in Brasilia.

Years later, I saw her a few times at official functions, always from a distance, I never talked to her, unlike what happened sometimes with the now King Charles III – after all, he was the patron of the NGO I still serve, Help the Age. But he kept watching her from afar. Incredible. Always with a strap bag on her forearm (left, I don’t know why), a bag that is one of the great state secrets. After all, what was so precious that she kept in that little bag she never parted from? Anyway.

Two things fascinated me. The ability to show kindness to everyone (I read somewhere a long time ago a comment attributed to her: you may never remember the occasion or context again, but the person you exchanged brief words with will remember for the rest of your life) . The other fascination is that she didn’t need to express any desire. Once, she tasted a drink she didn’t feel like. Without looking back she gestured, still holding the goblet that disappeared and, in a split second, was replaced by another… Apparently to her liking as she tasted the contents and didn’t repel it.

Fascinating. A life of royal privilege and yet loved by her subjects. Universally. From children to those as or older than she when she died today. And what a challenge for the aging monarch who will succeed her. Charles is far from his mother’s charisma; Camilla, the wife, much less. Many have not forgiven them for the tragic events that led to Princess Diana’s death.

Queen Elizabeth II will leave a long legacy. Will be missed. The UK’s troubled times outside Europe promise to last longer. Many of the Commonwealth countries did not separate or become republics (as Barbados recently did) out of respect for it… Including the United Kingdom itself. I usually say that a long life holds surprises and we have to be prepared to face them by cultivating reserves to demonstrate resilience. To see if Charles will have done it.

And that, above all, the royal doctor did not make the mistake of putting “old age” on the death certificate as the cause of death. Because if it did, I promise on behalf of civil society here and around the world, to fight with the same determination we showed last year until the mistake is corrected.