Just a little more about the quarreling queens

Nothing human is alien to me. And nothing inhuman either, because I could of course write about much more important things than diving into the gossip sewer, but still I choose the latter. Because gossip is gossip is gossip and that is incredibly nice at times, especially when it concerns the vips. Just scratch off that golden, shiny layer. Just know again that they have the same problems as we do. And that when they have problems, they are also widely covered in the press. All over the world.

On Monday, we were served another amuse of gossip. There was trouble between Queen Letizia of Spain (you know, that beautiful lady who was a journalist first) and her mother-in-law Queen Sofia. After attending the Easter mass, the old queen seized her moment, draped her arms over her granddaughters' shoulders, sagged through her left hip (okay, I’m making that part up) and nodded to the horde of photographers. It’s allowed. Come on, seize your moment.

‘But hey, wait a minute,’ Queen Letizia must have thought. ‘This won’t do.’ She tiptoed on her heels (by the way, from Nina Ricci, professional deformation) towards her mother-in-law and blocked the picture. She stroked her hand along the hair of daughter Leonor and angrily scrubbed a lipstick mark from grandmother off the royal forehead of her daughter. She wiggled her cute little bottom back and forth (dressed in trousers by Hugo Boss with a dotted blouse by Carolina Herrera, professional deformation part 2) until everyone understood the message. This photo was not welcome.

What is happening in the royal casa? Is Letizia still not taken seriously because she is not of noble birth and was married before she said ‘I do’ to her Felipe? I can’t imagine that. Queen Sofia must be an open-minded woman. If you read that her husband has had at least 1500 mistresses, you would at least expect that.

Option two. Does Letizia hate playing the perfect picture for the cameras? Queen Sofia knows no better. When her relationship with her husband balanced on a cold low point and they went their separate ways during vacations, she always made time for a press moment where they feigned satisfaction and happiness for the lenses of the photographers.

Letizia seems to, like Lady Di, struggle with the pressure of the royal house. For years she battled with her weight, but it seems that motherhood does her good, because we see a healthy, beautiful, and stable version of the queen. Just a thumbs up for Letizia; she ensured that the law was changed when her daughter was born. Since then, women can also be first in line for the throne.

Spain seems to choose the side of Queen Sofia. It does not show decorum to behave like that in front of the world towards your mother-in-law. The grandmother of your children, no less. I would like to argue that if you always live in the public eye, you sometimes feel less spied upon. Or that at some point, you just don’t care anymore. That you are so irritated that you can’t just blow it off.

What do I think further? That I find it all quite manageable. Has there been swearing? Has there been hitting? Someone stood in front of someone else and the world is in an uproar. I would like to say to Letizia: if something is brewing underneath, let it out. And preferably in a place with many witnesses with cameras, so we can enjoy it a bit too. See rules one and two of this piece. And a small consolation: tomorrow they will roll the pescaditos fritos in those newspapers.