American Royalty

I have this fantasy. It will never come to fruition, but it's fun to daydream sometimes.

Let me lay a bit of groundwork: In the UK, the Queen is just a figurehead. The real chief executive is the Prime Minister, who (as I understand it) goes about running the country while the Queen performs representational and ceremonial functions.

In other words (and I know this is a gross oversimplification, but because this is the foundation for a fantasy, I don't need to worry about the details), the Prime Minister drives while the Queen sits shotgun and waves at people.

Well, in America, we have no such institution. The President has to drive AND wave at the same time, and that's just dangerous. This takes place sometime a few years from now, so the ages of certain younger people work a bit better. Let's say... 2 years from now.

Well, in my daydream, Congress decides that the President needs to stop waving at all the people and focus on driving. However, SOMEBODY has to wave at all of those people, so they decide to institute an American Royal Family that will serve in a symbolic, representational capacity: no actual executive, judicial, or legislative power, but they attend various functions and dress nicely and so forth. NBC seizes upon the opportunity to make a bit of profit, and secures the television rights to the audition process for the American Royal Family. The show dominates the ratings, and through an audition process that includes extensive interviews, mock state dinners, mock media scandals, and other tasks and trials, the candidate families (one from each state) are slowly eliminated, week by week, by popular vote from the viewers. My family, of course, makes it through to the final round. The final task is for my family and the other finalist family to attend the British state dinner (no more mock trials for us), and the viewers would observe the way we interacted with world government figures in that setting.

The seating for this particular state dinner is somewhat different than previous dinner-like tasks, in that the families are not seated together, the idea being that the audience could better see how the individual units of the family functioned apart from each other in formal settings. My parents and the parents from the other family are seated at the Queen's table with the Prime Minister and the President. I'm seated at a table with either Prince Harry, of the UK:

Or Pierre Casiraghi, of Monaco:

...depending on what I feel like on the day that I imagine this particular scenario.

The cameras start off by giving equal time to the Queen's table, where my parents are engaged in conversation with the Prime minister and Queen; the children's table, where my adorable niece, Cayden (4) and nephew, Whit (5) finish eating their macaroni and cheese rather quickly and start playing with James, Viscount Severn (UK, 4) and Lady Louise Mountbattern (UK, 8), and the grandchildren of the other finalist family; my older siblings, who are discussing the Olympics with Prince William, Prince Carl Phillip, and the other two Casiraghi siblings, Charlotte and Andrea; and my table. However, as the night progresses, and as my conversation with Prince Harry/Pierre continues, the cameras notice a certain crackle in the air around us, because we have great chemistry, which in turn makes for great TV. We flirt shamelessly throughout the dinner, forgetting about the competition, and the cameras, and when the dancing begins after the dinner is over, we instead walk outside to the courtyard, where we continue talking. At the end of the evening, he kisses me, and then I go back in my limo with my family to our rooms.

The show airs a few days later, and the celebrity gossip blogs start churning out stories about Prince Harry/Pierre's unexpected new romantic interest in the young American princely candidate. At the results show a few days later, broadcast live, performances by pop stars lead up to the final results. I stand there with my family onstage, and as the emcee opens the envelope, I see Harry/Pierre sitting in the front row of the auditorium. I smile at him, and he smiles at me...

...and then I lose him in a sea of confetti, because WE WON the competition! The audience LOVED the romantic twist at the end of the season, and the next few days are a flurry of appearances on television shows, and then finally, the coronation. However, the celebrity blogs are still buzzing over the quickly blossoming relationship between Harry/Pierre and myself.

As a royal family, we set fashion trends and enjoy vast popularity with the American public, and the tabloids try to dig up dirt on us, but it doesn't work.

At this point the fantasy generally kind of fizzles out, because I get distracted by other things.

But yeah. It would be totally awesome to be a prince. And then to date a foreign prince.