Betsy's Writing Selections

Musings About Death: Thoughts on Diana, Princess of Wales

Written by Betsy R. Delaney
September 9, 1997

I've always been fascinated--and a little obsessed by--death. Over the 33 years of my life I've experienced the loss of my great grandmother, all four of my grandparents, and my mother, who died when I was 14.

The last time I felt this bad about a celebrity's death I was in our cabin, near Garden City, Utah. Friends of my Dad's were staying at our place on the way to their new home in San Francisco. We were having dinner, and I remember listening to the news with half an ear until the story broke that Harry Chapin had died suddenly in a crash on the way to a concert in New York.

I had seen him that February, during the same concert tour. I knew Taxi, Cat's in the Cradle and a few other miscellaneous songs he'd managed to get on the radio, but the concert opened a whole new world to me. And as suddenly as I had discovered his music it was gone.

Within hours of the announcement, the press was speculating about the cause of the crash. It was never clear whether it was drunkenness, a heart attack or a successful suicide attempt that caused the crash.

So it was then, as it is now with the death of Diana, Princess of Whales. That same summer I witnessed the fairy tale wedding - and bought into the fantasy of her life. In a way I can't really describe I found myself identifying with her. I was two years younger than she was, I was babysitting (my first real job) for the timeshare company down on Bear Lake, and though I could never have been related even remotely, I had just been to London for the first time in January of 1984, where her engagement paraphernalia was everywhere. So when I got up, in the dark, and tuned in my tv to watch her marriage, it was almost as if I'd gotten a personal invitation to the wedding.

Now, 16 years later, I've gotten up in the dark to watch her funeral. I was hoping for some kind of closure. After all, many of my friends had lost, the same night (and within an hour of Princess Di's death) a friend to AIDS. But the feelings are different. With John, who had been diagnosed well over 10 years ago, his end was inevitable. He had been in and out of the hospital more and more frequently in the last couple of years. His death (though not the timing) was expected. But the senselessness of the deaths of Princess Di and of Harry Chapin just beg the question of what it is we're doing on the planet in the first place.

I can identify more now with her and the family she left behind. Prince William is only a year older than I was when my Mother died, though mine had been sick with MS for the entire time I knew her, and was mostly gone from my life from the time I was 5. When my Grandfather died two years later, I had no warning. He collapsed, and less than 48 hours later, he was dead. That was hard to deal with.

Prince Charles is significantly older than I am, but my parents waited a long time to have me - that makes Queen Elizabeth II in the same age range as them. She could, without a great deal of stretching, be my mother.

Princess Diana was young, and innocent enough to be considered safe for Prince Charles, who just didn't seem to want to settle down. But the writing was on the wall the summer they got engaged - the press ate up the photos of Lady Diana Spencer, holding one child by the hand and another at her hip, the sun shining through her skirt to show off her legs. In many ways, it's amazing she lived as long as she did.

So, now that she's gone, will there be a change in the behavior of the press? After watching the funeral, and the collection of people trotted before the cameras to explain why they were there, I don't think so. Maybe the photographers, who ultimately drove her to her grave, will wise up for a time and lay low. It's nice that the papers are finally promising not to hound her sons out of respect for her memory (or fear of retribution from her fans and family). It just seems like too little, too late.

Why did I watch the funeral? I'm going through the classic steps for dealing with grief. While the sense of closure I got from watching the hearse carry her into the Spencer estate for the last time helps, I'm still angry about the circumstances. The finger pointing and stupidity of the paparazzi, the media, and the French police just make it worse. But at least, for a few hours, there was honor - and an outpouring of support and understanding that was worldwide.

That night in Utah, I sat up listening to a radio station from somewhere very far away from Bear Lake, while a DJ played Harry Chapin's song Circle over and over. I can't listen to it now without remembering the night he died, though it gives me less pain than it did.

I believe Bernie Taupin and Elton John's new version of Candle in the Wind will do the same for me, given time.

Betsy R. Delaney

• Man's Inhumanity to Man April 1, 2005
• Thoughts on Iraq (What do we do now?) - May 11, 2004
• September 11, 2001 - September 15, 2001
• The Impeachment Witch Hunt of Bill Clinton - December 16, 1998
• Musings About Death: Thoughts on Diana, Princess of Wales - September 9, 1997
• The Story of the Wedding Dress - June, 1997

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