Prince William: My wife does all the gardeningI have no idea what Im doing
Here are some photos of Prince William yesterday, as he was visiting a Welsh town, Rhyl, which I’m sure has three syllables (at least). This was William’s second solo event of the week, which is certainly interesting. Perhaps William’s crisis manager started on May 1st and was like “wait, you really have so little going on that you’re tagging along on your wife’s events?” It’s true. As soon as May rolled around and the crisis managers started, there’s been a noticeable absence of stories about “incandescent with rage” and “Baldemort is terribly bored with all of this.” Instead we have Normal Bloke Billiam, talking about man sheds and gardening. For real.
Prince William is back in North Wales. The Duke of Cambridge, who lived in North Wales for about three years with wife Kate Middleton when he was a search and rescue helicopter pilot, returned on Thursday to see how the community has coped during the coronavirus pandemic.
A key part of his visit to the town of Rhyl was to see the local Men’s Shed – a group that aims to reduce the causes and effects of isolation and loneliness, poverty and social exclusion in the local area by bringing members of the community together to participate in a range of activities. It mirrored his visit with Princess Kate to the Denbigh branch of the wellbeing organization in 2015.
During his visit, William heard about Men’s Shed, which encourages men who may feel lonely or isolated to get into gardening and grow vegetables. He said it was Kate who does most of the work at home.
“My wife does all the gardening. I really like it, but I have no idea what I’m doing,” he shared.
William was also shown how the organization Brighter Futures has helped support local children, young people, families and older residents of the area during the COVID-19 crisis. The consortium of eight local groups has been coordinating the sharing of equipment, skills and facilities in Rhyl to provide better quality services. Brighter Futures has also played an important role by securing the delivery of food, personal protection equipment, sports and IT equipment, and craft materials and games to help alleviate the effects of the lockdowns in getting to isolated locals and those who are shielding.
First of all, there’s really an organization which tells men to garden away their depression, isolation and poverty? That’s so British. I’m not saying that as an insult at all, and I would imagine many men find it incredibly therapeutic to grow something, to work with their hands, to have something to tend to and keep up. So why is it that William didn’t go to a place of acceptance and brotherhood with the Men’s Shed group? He could have compassionately lied and said that he enjoys gardening too, that he finds it relaxing to fuss about with soil and compost and weeding. Instead, he basically told them “my wife likes that kind of thing, it’s not what a manly man like me is all about.” Can the crisis managers help him with his rudimentary empathetic patter to the peasants? And yes, insert a gardening joke about Rose Hanbury. We all know who tends to the rose bushes, Baldingham.
Earlier this week, William was asked about Charlotte’s sixth birthday and he told people that Charlotte lies and says that she’s 16 when she’s asked her age, and she also tells people, “I’m six now. I’ll do what I want.” Charlotte is going to be a little rebel, I think.
Photos courtesy of Getty, Avalon Red.
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