Braveheart, Not the Queen of Hamilton

Braveheart. ..not the Queen of Hamilton

I started out wanting to tell you how it came about that I am now the Queen of Hamilton.  Even though I am a King at least by marriage it just doesn’t feel right to say I am the King of Hamilton – it’s a whole gender thing.  Come to think of it I cannot believe a woman has not yet claimed kingship somewhere but confess I do not feel women should take from men in the quest to be equal and that includes gender specific titles. ( Although Queens of all genders should be treasured).

The point is that while the subject should be about my self imposed royalty it is in fact about Braveheart because that is what I have been watching for the last couple of hours.  Rewatching.  It is one of my fav movies even though Mel Gibson was too old for the role.  He was still an icon at the time, not yet experiencing his downward spiral exiting the royalty of Hollywood.  But it is a good story, a good film.  The actual story and events of the film are somewhat different ..of course.  Has there ever been an actual accurate movie portrayal of history?  Nah.

In the movie version there are all these kilts and fine brogues.  There is passion- love lost, rights fought for, battles, blood, revenge and justice.  There are evil Kings  (Longshanks), misguided future heroes (Robert The Bruce), Hamish who has his own charm, as does the crazy Irishman you can only love.  And an ending to die for – well at least William Wallace died for it.

When I was in Scotland I followed the tale of William Wallace and yes he is a true hero.  In the movie old Mel was a peace seeking man who goes to battle because the evil English overlords killed the woman he loved.  His one true love.  

In fact he was a rebellious teenager who loved fighting and got in trouble for fighting the English who had by the way killed his father as in the movie.  But the sheriff made one mistake that is accurate in the movie, they killed the woman he loved in retribution thinking it would bring him to his knees, when in fact it spawned a rebellion and lit a fire in the hearts of the Scots that remains today.  He freed the Scots.

And yes he was betrayed, captured, tortured, hung and quartered with his remains sent to the farthest corners of the earth.

Years later, the English did conquer and one can assume all live in peace now, however, the Queen Mum ..our present queen’s mom who was Scots, once said to the leader of an English conquered nation, “We Scots understand exactly how you feel”

So to my English, Irish and Welsh friends..Aye we are okay!