Patt Morrison: Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee, And All That

Patt Morrison's Opinion interviews are published Saturday's. 

The first Queen Elizabeth was standing under an English oak tree when she learned that she had become queen.

The second Elizabeth was high up in a mgumu tree in Kenya when she became queen, at the moment her father, King George VI, died in his sleep more than 7,000 miles away.

That was 60 years ago Monday. Come June, when the London weather is as good as London weather gets and the tourists are massing, Elizabeth Alexandra Mary, the second-longest-reigning monarch in British history and only the 40th in nearly 1,000 years, will officially celebrate her diamond jubilee.

And so, in our way, will we — the same country that, at bayonet-point, told her great-great-great-great grandfather, King George III, "Here's your crown, what's your hurry?"..