Genuinely sad

When Kim Jong-il and Fidel Castro departed this mortal coil, I put up brief posts thanking them for making the world a better place (by dying). There will be no such flippant treatment for Queen Elizabeth. She left the world a better place than she found it, and always by devotion to the same focus:

Duty. Duty. Duty.

She served in uniform during World War Two: old enough to do so, young enough to be barely old enough to do so. Yes, her service (as a vehicle mechanic) was largely symbolic … but it was a symbolism that had meaning to her, and to her family, and to the people her family spent their lives serving (yes, serving).

She was 96 years old. It had to come. We’ll miss her. But, damn, she had a long, good run.