Imagine any other 93-year-old who is still doing the same job they did in their 20s. Photo / Getty Images
Imagine any other 93-year-old who is still doing the same job they did in their 20s. Photo / Getty Images
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If the Queen was anyone else, we would be deeply concerned.
She is a 93-year-old woman who has worked nearly every day for nearly seven decades, straight. She does not take sick leave, complain or shirk her responsibility to occasionally spend the day lolling about in bed reading the Racing Post and eating Hobnobs.
This week Her Majesty presided over the Order of the Garter service. It is a deeply ceremonial occasion where senior members of the royal family including Princes Charles and William, along with 24 personally chosen knights, don blue velvet capes, blingy gold chains and feathered caps for a sort of noble dress-up day at St George's Chapel in Windsor.
It is a day steeped in pomp and ritual and which dates back to 1348. The service has been held annually since 1948 which means that the Queen has overseen 67 of these feathered, fancy shindigs in her role as Sovereign of the Garter.
And it's a reminder of the unremitting nature of her job. Sure, on the face of it, being Queen sounds like a plum gig. You get a throne, numerous palaces, a personal vault stuffed full of crowns and tiaras and theoretically have a personal navy.
The Queen has outlasted 13 British prime ministers, 13 US presidents and 8114 episodes (truly) of the Bold and the Beautiful. Photo / Getty Images
But, the reality is that being the monarch involves serious hard graft. Since her coronation in 1952, the Queen has acquitted herself with tenacity and dedication.
What is so fascinating, and actually deeply impressive, is that this steadfast approach to her professional life has not shown any hint of abating as she has become older, despite the fact she has outlasted 13 British prime ministers, 13 US presidents and 8114 episodes (truly) of the Bold and the Beautiful.
Her stamina and work ethic would even make Brooke Logan look like a bit of a slacker.
A key part of being the Queen means fronting up to official events. According to statistics pulled together from the daily Court Circular, which publicly details what the Windsors get up to, in 2018 the Queen undertook more engagements than grandsons William and Harry and their wives Kate and Meghan.
A key part of being the Queen means fronting up to official events. Photo / Getty Images
In 2018, William managed 225 engagements while Harry notched up 200. And Her Majesty? She actually increased her workload last year, besting her 2017 total and edging towards a whopping 300 official events.
It's worth noting that this part of her job is actually both quite involved and yet also deeply boring. It is widely believed that the Queen has met more people in the world than anyone else.
To still front up to garden parties, official jaunts, State Banquets and government receptions and to still have the commitment and verve to make polite small talk (rather than say hiding in the corner with a tray of miniature beef wellingtons when she is meant to be meeting the Latvian minister for agriculture) is incredible.
While many of these events are afternoon teas or cocktail parties, it's not like she gets to while away the hours stuffing her face with finger sandwiches or quaffing champagne while avoiding Boris Johnson when he wants to talk Brexit. Instead, it is hour upon hour of unrelenting small talk with nervously sweating minor dignitaries.
Then there is the paperwork involved in being the monarch. (No, it's not just all responding to fan mail from obsessed royal writers.)
Like British government ministers, she receives an official red box of correspondence and government paperwork to look over each day. She conscientiously and efficiently ploughs through these reams of information about everything from foreign policy to new legislation 363 days of the year. In fact, she only takes two days off from this tedious, bureaucratic aspect of being monarch - Good Friday and Christmas Day.
Imagine any other 93-year-old who is a) still doing the same job they did in their 20s and b) never gets to take a real break from her gig? In other circumstances this would start to sound disturbingly like elder abuse.
Compare all of this with say Donald Trump. In the first year of his presidency, the Washington Post calculates Trump undertook just 66 domestic engagements. In the same time period, he played 87 rounds of golf.
Barack Obama's penchant for taking a break from the White House was also highly scrutinised — in 2010 alone, he took six different vacations. Heck, even Theresa May, when she was mired in the living hell that was attempting to extricate the UK from a fractious Europe ditched Downing Street in 2018 to spend a week in Italy.
Next month, the Queen and Prince Philip will pack up their helicopter with the dorgis and head north to their Scottish estate, Balmoral, for her annual summer break.
For three months, Her Majesty will technically be on vacation and sure, she will most likely get to enjoy a few lazy outings with her horses and will indulge in a lakeside barbecue. (Seriously, the royal family love having snags while looking out over a loch.)
Yet no matter what, you can guarantee she will get up every morning and get stuck into her job, tackling the mountains of paperwork, taking meetings and trying not to fret too much about the perilous fate of the UK.
Given her track record, there is every chance she will be doing this for years to come. Now that is a serious #GirlBoss.
