Before you get too excited, this has nothing to do with my life going fabulously well in comparison to other era’s of my life (hard to do when most of them are as yet to be experienced). It does, however, have everything to do with how similar my current disposition and situation seem to mirror that of Belle’s. Given the pop culture climate I feel it’s important to distinguish that I’m referring to Disney Belle and not Belle de Jour of the very entertaining and popular, Secret Diary of a Call Girl series. Not prostitute, Disney princess. Good? Good.

While California coastal towns are not exact replicas of French provincial towns they are kind of the same in that there is a family owned bakery where they make bread everyday, and as in the movie, no one speaks French. The same people doing the same things is starting to wear on me and I generally feel more at home in a bookstore than anywhere else, though since the advent of Visa no kindly shopkeepers with hair in their ears are handing me my favorite books for free.
[Sidenote: I don’t know what crazy story she’s reading with the prince, and the hidden identity thing, and this clueless heroine who can’t figure shit out for three chapters is, but that crazy Shakespearean/ Bourne Identity nightmare is not available on my Kindle.]

Without a doubt, I feel that both Belle and I are destined for as-yet-undiscovered great things. Hers involved falling in love with some kind of angry, talking minotaur and I’m hoping the object of my destiny falls more into the tall, handsome, and human category, but why quibble over details? Chick ends up with a castle and a kick ass library. Which is worth it even if she apparently has to waltz about the ballroom in the same yellow dress every evening for the servants’ amusement. People already think I’m exceptionally strange, just like Belle, but also are typically willing to forgive this character flaw if I hush up and sit pretty the rest of the time. I can only pray that no neck-less misogynistic hunters are plotting to surprise marry me, but one can never be too careful. I think that stalker I had totally qualifies in this instance. My dad likes cars and Belle’s dad likes, um, moving conveyance thingies. And the inanimate objects in my house do not talk to me, but I certainly talk to them. Maybe you didn’t need to know that part.

So, obviously, Belle and I are exactly the same and now all I have to do is wait for destiny to follow its natural course and I too can have the privilege of presiding over a kingdom that no one knows exists, since 10 years is adequate time for a castle and monarchy to be entirely forgotten and hidden in a dark forest full of wolves. If you’ll excuse me, it is half past singing loudly in the middle of the street time.