Pretty, Pretty Princess

I just started reading Someday My Prince Will Come by Jerramy Fine, and I seriously just put it down to look up flights back to London. I have to get back there.

You know how sometimes you don't realize how much you love something until you read about how much someone else loves it?

For example, a ton of you have emailed me saying that reading my fairytale beginning made you fall in love all over again with your husband, your boyfriend, your Cayden.

When I got the first of such emails, I thought (after crying like a baby), "Wow, that's odd." I didn't understand it. I couldn't grasp how reading my story had any affect on someone else's relationship.

I mean, I read books with love plots all the time and watch romantic comedies, and for the most part they don't make me fall in love, or like, with my flavor of the week. But maybe that's because I wasn't in love with anyone at the time.

But after the second, third, 10th email like this, I started to figure it out. My story is impacting people because it's true. That small difference sets it apart from those well written fiction books and Nicholas Sparks movies in the smallest yet most drastic way.

Instead of walking out of a movie wishing you were the main character, you're walking away from my blog seeing yourself as the main character in the movie of your life. Our lives are fascinating, in some cases better than most movies, it's all in the way we perceive it.

Many of you have taken the time to write down your own true fairytales and sent them to me. After writing them you're saying, "That felt amazing!" and "I don't even care if you read this. I just had to write it and now I'll keep it to look back on."

(Just for the record, I read and respond to every single email that hits my inbox. So keep them coming!)

Jerramy's story is true as well, and that's why her description of London made me fall in love with it all over again. Coined as a True Adventure of a Wannabe Princess, Jerramy whole-heartedly believes she was born in the wrong family, in the wrong political system, in the wrong country.

She's determined to find her way home—to London. Better yet, she's determined to make her childhood dream come true: to marry the Queen of England's grandson and become the royal princess she always wanted to be. To her, Pretty, Pretty Princess wasn't a childhood game with colorful plastic jewelry and a flimsy crown (I miss that game!), it was a calling. Her calling.

I'll be honest, when I read the press release for this book I thought, "Ummm, is she out of her fucking mind?" Which she admits in the first chapter, is something she heard from everyone and anyone, growing up with hippie parents in a small bassackwards mountainside town in Colorado (OK, I added the F-bomb).

But I was intrigued by her sheer desire to pursue such a far-fetched dream. Suddenly my 4,000+ mile flight to London to be with someone I'd only met once didn't sound so crazy.

I'm only on Chapter 7, and I still think she's a little crazy, but what would our lives be like if we weren't crazy about something?

While Jerramy and I are VERY different people (she prefers Royalty magazine, croquet, and pearls, whereas I'm more of a Cosmo, softball, and gaudy cheap rings and necklaces from street vendors kind of girl), we're both still just women who ignored others' logical advice and chased our illogical hearts to wherever we felt like we needed to be.

Go grab a copy of her book and read it along with me. Then send me your questions because Jerramy graciously agreed to a Q&A. I'll try not to lead with, "Ummm, are you out of your fucking mind?" because I'm assuming that kind of language would offend a princess to be.

With that, I leave you with another reader letter that left me blubbering like a small, snotty child. This is an email I'll save forever. I can't explain how much it means to me.

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Whitney,

I just read through your entire blog, I often get hooked on blogs, but there was something different about your story.

After 5 years of marriage and 2 children, I started to feel the fire die between by husband and I. I'm only 27 yrs old and I already feel like I've been through the prime of my life. But reading your love and excitement for Cayden conjured up all the the feelings I once felt for my husband 8 years ago when I first fell in love with him.

It brought me back to the real him, not the breadwinner, not the "daddy" and not the "husband", but him. I started to recall all our long conversations that would go on way past closing time at our favorite coffee shop. And when you mentioned that hand on the leg, it sent chills through my whole body. It was like I returned to that very moment where I fell in love. I was right there, hovering above a much younger version of myself and my husband. There we were, without a care in the world, so excited to get our words out.

This went on for months, years. Then after a great night out we conceived our first child and even though we had talked about marriage, we didn't really see that in our immediate future.

He wanted to marry me before our baby was born and I was dead set that he was only proposing because he had "responsibilities." I broke up with him and kept our conversations to a minimum and only based on the baby's status.

I was 6 months pregnant when I came home from work and he was standing at the end of my driveway, just standing there. I didn't even park the car, I could see it in his face. He was totally miserable. I ran up to him and he held my face as I looked at him and said "Will you marry me? I can't go on without you and her." We were having a girl.

Of course, I said yes. A month later we married in a garden ceremony before I was so big that I would be waddling down the aisle.

The past 5 yrs have not been the easiest and then we added another baby to the mix, it seemed we grew further apart. I've done everything to hold on, but I no longer saw him with those eyes. A lot of the time I've had contempt or regret when it comes to him. But last night after reading through your blog I got it back. I got the feeling, that memory of what used to be one of the greatest loves I've ever experienced.

In the middle of reading your blog I realized this and sent him a text, "I miss you...badly." He responded "You have no idea how much I miss you." I cried, I'm crying right now as I type this out. We had a conversation like we once use to, there was dialog about things other than "did you pay that bill?" "did you remember it's your day to take a snack?" or "it's your turn at T-ball practice this week."

Before we knew it, it was midnight and we had to get to bed to be at work this morning. We got up to go to bed and he grabbed my arm and turned me to him, pulled me close. And we slowly danced. No music, just held each other and swayed to the music in our heads.

All I have to say is thanks, for a new beginning to my happily ever after.