and we'll never be royals

Royal Baby Girl Fated to Lead International Mob of Fake Princesses?

Photo: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images

Hear ye, hear ye! The royal infant princess hath sprung forth from Princess Middleton’s majestic loins, thereby reigniting the royal obsession up to 2013 levels, signaling a severe risk of unwarranted tears and unbearably cloying prose. On May 2, 2015, at 8:34 British Standard Time, the princess of Cambridge emerged from her sacred imperial grotto, donning a gauzy gown of white goo that immediately set the fashion blogs aflutter. It is said that upon arrival, the brand-new princess let loose a wail of existential angst so shrill and unrelenting that attending nurses speculated the cherub somehow recognized, at first breath, that wherever she went on this earth, she would be shadowed by two forces, each equally dark and fearsome. On one side, a phalanx of anxious, clutching, weeping, adoring strangers in British-flag hats; on the other, a gaggle of strangers wielding cameras with enormous flashbulbs attached.

Even now, as the royal goo is wiped from her highness’s royal flesh, these two dark forces gather outside the vaunted Lindo Wing of the St. Mary’s Hospital in London. The obnoxious, clawing professionals in jeans set about angling their cameras and wiping off their lenses in anticipation of the first sight of the her royal highness’s glorious face (which no doubt looks completely unlike every other infant’s squashy pink visage!), while the fawning royal fans stood in a long, long line to read the royal announcement of the royal birth scrawled onto a royal easel (There were no details on the easel or anything like that, not a birth weight or even a name, but it was The. Easel., and therefore a true honor to view with commoner eyes!).

Does her wriggling, self-soiling majesty recognize that she will be fourth in line to the throne in Great Britain (No bratty little brother can leap-frog over her, either! That was recently decreed, in a royal proclamation against royal sexism! Something to really rejoice over!)? And does she also realize that she shall rule over an unfathomably vast international army of 4- and 5-year-old faux princesses, miniature fake royals who are, at this very minute, making ready her glorious path to Real Life, Seriously For Real Princess Greatness, mostly by donning plastic jewels and shiny synthetic frocks and humming “Let It Go” in thousands of different languages?

Or perhaps her blubbering eminence has a mystical knowledge that an international battalion of journalists are currently unpacking their adjectives and taxing their frontal lobes to come up with headlines like “Prince George Reports for Big Brother Duty as He Arrives to Meet His New Baby Sister,” and “Queen Elizabeth Tickled Pink After Birth of Great-Granddaughter,” and “Royal Baby’s Birthday: Which Celebrities Will The Princess Be Celebrating With?” (Answer: David Beckham, the Rock, Lily Allen.) Perhaps she even understands that everyone called to remark upon her majestical birth claims to be either “happy” or “absolutely delighted” because there are but three emotions officially sanctioned by the queen: concern, happiness, and absolute delight. Even though “in serious pain,” “exhausted,” and “already fielding Prince George’s demands to ‘PUT BABY DOWN!’” are the more likely emotional roller coasters playing out in the sacred corridors of the vaunted, fine-champagne-serving Lindo Wing, one must behave in accordance to one’s station as the royal-est and highest eminences of the land, which includes employing the emotional descriptors carefully selected by certain older and wiser royals that may or may not still be stung by a certain now-deceased ne’er-do-well princess with a taste for reckless adjectives and reckless billionaires alike.

In fact, this may be the real reason why the queen herself recently issued a Letter Patent (what is that?) declaring that her drooling highness princess of Cambridge and all of her divinely anointed siblings shall be referred to henceforth and without fail as super-duper royal, always and forever: “All the children of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales should have and enjoy the style, title and attribute of royal highness with the titular dignity of prince or princess prefixed to their Christian names or with such other titles of honour.”

Could the queen possibly be referring to a life lived indoors, in drafty palaces, under constant royal surveillance while battling those twin forces — mobs of photographers donning megawatt flashbulbs and fawning strangers donning British-flag accoutrement — everywhere one goes, forever and ever? Because that sounds neither enjoyable nor dignified.

No matter! Let’s all raise a toast to the brand-new princess of Cambridge, eternal international media obsession and global ruler of diminutive faux princesses the world over! May she savor the style, title, and attribute of royal highness and her oh-so-delicious titular dignity for many, many years to come!

Royal Baby Girl Fated to Battle Two Dark Forces