It’s time for Meghan to stop ghosting her dad
It might not be the new royal’s fault that her wayward father is embarrassing her from the sidelines, but only the Duchess of Sussex has the power to sort it out, writes Kerry Parnell.
Here are the royal resolutions I wish the Windsors would make this year.
1. Meghan calls her dad. While it is not her fault her wayward father is whining away on the sidelines after embarrassing and then ditching her on the biggest day of her life, only Meghan has the power to shut Thomas Markle up. Ghosting your dad doesn’t work if he ends up haunting you. So maybe she and Prince Harry could call in some crisis counsellors, phone her PA and attempt to get things back to normal.
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2. Eugenie starts a family. Who doesn’t love a royal baby? Maybe we can have not one but two this year if newlywed Princess Eugenie and husband Jack Brooksbank get down to business.
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3. Beatrice finds the one. You wait years for a royal wedding and then two come along at the same time. Now we have the bleak prospect of no nuptials, no dress dramas, no George and Amal, for years — unless Princess Beatrice makes it official with her new boyfriend Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, as insiders are predicting.
4. Andrew and Fergie remarry. If Beatrice isn’t ready maybe her parents are: It’s not such a crazy idea — Prince Andrew and Sarah, Duchess of York are the happiest divorced couple in the world, share a family home and she’s been accepted back into the royal fold. It’s been 33 years since they first said I do and that toe-sucking scandal is long-forgotten. And can you imagine how good a party it would be?
5. Catherine dresses her kids like normal people. I know they’re directly in line to the throne and they have to behave more than their cousins Mia Tindall and Isla and Savannah Phillips, who are allowed to go feral and wear practical clothes like leggings and trainers. But poor Prince George, Princess Charlotte and inevitably Prince Louis are always so uncomfortably clad in woollens, shorts and shiny shoes straight out of the 1956 royal child’s handbook, they might as well be in straitjackets. Can’t this be the year they let their hems down?
6. Meghan keeps it real. Whether she does a doula waterbirth or a C-section is her business. But what would be really fabulous is if Meghan rebels against the photocall on the steps with a blow-dry and dress five minutes after becoming a mother, like poor Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge has had to do three times.
Instead, I’d love the duchess to stagger out in leggings with wild hair and baby sick on her top, waving cheerfully. She can’t do anything right anyway according to pundits, so she might as well go the full Scummy Mummy Monty.
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7. Harry does baby-wearing. Despite the protestations of Piers Morgan who predicts Prince Harry will “wear a papoose 24/7 to ‘expunge the last toxins of masculinity’ from his poor emasculated soul,” I really hope Harry does carry his precious cargo. There is nothing sweeter than the sight of a proud dad pounding the pavement with his baby on board and it would be the ultimate statement of shared parenting. Even though we all know the “sharing” will eventually fall mostly to nannies, we can pretend they’re right-on royals for a little while.