Spare Parts

What to do with the spares?  Some people just don’t like leftovers.  If you’ve got an extra part, do you hold on to it or not?  Spare parts are easy to give away If they’re free of charge, as in the French, lagniappe.

As to spare parts, they might be on the shelf, as surplus, but we keep them, just in case.  They’re held in reserve, as a backup.

When putting anything together isn’t there always at least one spare partWhat are we supposed to do with the spares?  Is there a place for spares in the world? 

IKEA furniture is notoriously complicated to put together.  It might have something to do with the “rules for assembly,” which require some interpretation.  No wonder there’s a spare part or two left over when you’re finished.

We Americans don’t naturally take to being told how to live our lives, pioneers that we are.  We pitched-out the rule-book, long ago.

But when you’re from a centuries old royal family that has rules for geniture and pretty much everything else, their hierarchy demands that you live a certain way.  I think the feeling in that historical institution, family or not, is that the perks balance the inconveniences of being born royal, or marrying into the royal family.  It’s also known as noblesse oblige, or nobility obliges.

The late Queen Elizabeth, II set the standard for her family and those tied to the monarchy, regarding this moral obligation of those of high birth and in powerful positions.  It is their duty to behave with honor, kindliness, generosity, charity, and Christian virtue.  Working royals have jobs, tied to noblesse oblige.

There is a subtle expectation in America, as well, for those privileged with wealth and fame, to carry out noblesse oblige.  The Kennedy family comes to mind; and they paid a hefty price.

A few of the perks of royalty, fame, or celebrity, are recognition, admiration, and wealth.  The inconveniences are recognition or misunderstanding, admiration or the expectation of perfection, and wealth or lifestyle maintenance.

So, what if a person is spare Oh boy, Spare, the royal book of complaints and family drama amongst the privileged, jealous, ambitious, and leisured, has dropped.

I believe there is space for spares, just as there is a place for heirs.  Spare parts are dealt with in families, in convoluted ways.  I guess when you’re royal, you try to birth a spare heir, just in case.

“Don’t you have anything else to do” comes to mind when I say leisured, in reference to Prince Harry of the Sussex’s.  I get it, since he and his wife were cut off from British funds when they resigned from their family business, they had to make some big bucks in order to fund their fame.

Having already contracted for an extraordinary paycheck, after the first project, then another project, and another paycheck, from Netflix; they’re well on their way to funding their lifestyle.  However, with Spare now hitting the shelves, what’s not to sell, making a couple of notorious rich kids richer and their fame-hungry souls, more talked about?

Even if you’re the spare, it seems to me that there surely are more benevolent ways to work through the pain of your past, not to mention, to make money, than selling your family secrets, to the highest bidder.

I confess, I like a good memoir or biography; in fact, it’s my favorite genre.  However, I’m not so partial to tell-all’s.  They smack of revenge porn.  From the snippets being leaked from Spare, there are cringe-worthy stories in the book, that nobody should want to know about.  Can you say private?

And, airing the dirty laundry of your family, that’s just in poor taste.  I know the man had a ghost-writer, but perhaps he should have written in a pseudonym and classed it as a novel set in another time, place, and planet, even.

Is it even close to fair, for Harry to have so boldly and publicly told his side of the story when he knows full well, that it’s royal protocol for his family to “never complain, never explain;” therefore, they will not tell their side?  Patti Davis, the now-seventy-year-old child of a famous family has some advice for Prince Harry, “Be quiet.”

Davis also published a tell-all in her younger days, about the in-fighting and feuds of the Reagan family.  In her seasoned adulthood, she has said that her truth back in the day, was only one version of the truth, of which there are many versions depending on who is doing the telling.

“The other people who inhabit our story have their truths as well,” Davis said.  Her twenty-twenty hindsight, informs her to not have exposed the innermost secrets of her famous family, at least until she could “stand back and look at things through a wider lens.”

Davis continues in her wise, but certainly unheeded advice to Prince Harry, “Silence gives you room, it gives you distance and lets you look at your experiences more completely, without the temptation to even the score.”  She further says, “Not every truth has to be told to the entire world…  not everything needs to be shared, a truth that silence can teach.  Harry seems to have operated on the dictum that ‘Silence is not an option.’  I would, respectfully, suggest to him that it is.”

So, if you have a hankering to air your family’s dirty laundry, because you’re the spare, take Patti Davis’s advice and “Be Quiet.”  Sometimes it’s just better for everyone to keep your feelings of lack of appreciation or value, out of the public sphere.  Air your dirty laundry inside the fence, so to speak.

Perhaps you could metaphorically sit on your spare parts for a few years.  Let them mellow, and move on with your life.  Maybe you’ll find a use for those spare parts, or you won’t, and no harm’s been done.

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