- The Court Circular #6
I cannot remember the exact date.
Nor, if we’re being honest, the precise hour.
It was fifteen years ago, after all, and apparently even this author is not immune to the passage of time.
What I do remember is meeting the King and Queen of Norway.
The circumstances of how are perhaps best left for another glass of wine. Suffice it to say that the meeting was entirely unexpected and, for a brief moment, rather surreal.
Over the years, this author has had the peculiar privilege of meeting quite a few interesting people—royals, heads of state, ministers, Princes of the Church, and more than a few lords and ladies.
One might think the novelty would eventually wear off.
It does not.
But that evening taught me something I hadn’t quite understood about King Harald.
I understood why Norwegians affectionately called him “Norway’s Grandpa.”
His Majesty was extraordinarily kind. Not grand. Not distant. Not particularly interested in reminding anyone in the room that he was, in fact, the King.
And then Queen Sonja did something I certainly wasn’t expecting.
She invited me—this mere commoner, as we might rather cheekily put it—to join them for dinner.
Their Majesties had been planning a private meal, away from the lights and ceremony that so often accompany royal life. Somehow, I was included.
And somehow, I found myself sitting beside Queen Sonja.
There are moments when one should probably have something terribly intelligent to say.
I did not.
We talked about the weather.
We talked about favorite foods.
You know—the great matters of state.
And yet what struck me most was how completely normal it felt.
Their Majesties were remarkably down to earth. Perhaps that shouldn’t have surprised me. Norwegians have a reputation for being practical, straightforward, and rather wonderfully unimpressed by unnecessary fuss.
The evening certainly seemed to reflect that.
I have absolutely no recollection of what we ate.
Fish, I imagine.
It would seem almost rude to have dinner and remember anything else.
But I remember the company.
I remember Queen Sonja.
And I remember King Harald’s warmth.
Those are the details that survive when the years have taken everything else.
Somewhere afterward, the Queen’s office sent me a small silver snowflake as a thank-you for the evening.
It wasn’t enormous.
It wasn’t particularly ostentatious.
And perhaps that’s precisely why I treasure it.
I still have it.
Every so often, I look at that little silver snowflake and remember a rather extraordinary evening when two people who happened to be King and Queen made an ordinary person feel anything but ordinary.
Fifteen years later, I may not remember the date.
I may not remember the hour.
I may not even remember what was served for dinner.
But I remember sitting beside the Queen.
And that, dear reader, is a memory worth keeping.
Some encounters make history. Others simply make an evening you’ll never forget.
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