Prince William’s choice of his late mother’s engagement ring to offer to his prospective new bride Kate Middleton struck me as intimate, honest and sweetly respectful. He’s clearly a man who doesn’t want to be rushed into anything — they’d been together for nine years, for heaven’s sake — and he has thought this through.
It would have been far simpler to source something new and unassociated with his parents’ failed marriage and his mother’s early death. Then at least he could have avoided the din of tut-tutting types saying it will bring bad karma to his marriage.
But no, he chose his mother’s 18-carat sapphire and diamonds in memory of Diana. He told the press ‘As you may have recognised, it’s my mother’s engagement ring, so of course it’s very special to me and Kate’s very special to me now as well…It was my way of making sure my mother didn’t miss out on today, and the excitement and the fact that we’re going to spend the rest of our lives together.’
Of course, the doom-sayers have got a point about objects holding negative or even dangerous associations. Cognitive psychologist and neuroscientist Professor Bruce Hood demonstrated this by showing his Bristol University students a sweater he said belonged to serial killer Fred West. Not only would few try it on, but many recoiled from having contact with it, all the while laughing nervously as they knew how illogical they were being.
This demonstrates how our intuitions can conflict with what we rationally know. We look for cause and effect to try to give meaning to life’s rather frightening randomness. So wearing the wrong ring — apparently tainted by a marriage that ended in divorce — becomes the reason why things might go wrong in the future. But having his mother die when he had only just turned 15, William has probably struggled with life’s randomness more than most people his age.
Many of us have inherited jewellery from our mothers, grandmothers and in-laws. They may not be currently valued at £250,000 like Kate’s new ring, but they carry enormous sentimental value, and by wearing them regularly we keep in touch with people we love and who love us. With this act, William found a way he could honour his late mother — and show his fiancée just how much she meant to him.
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