While other very young children were interested in cowboys or clowns, I was fascinated instead by the British Royal Family, particularly King Edward VIII and his love for the American woman named Wallis Warfield Simpson. I spotted photos of His Royal Highness in newspapers or on magazine covers and would sit alone for hours, smiling and studying his face.  Needless to say, my friends didn’t understand my fascination. The world was watching and listening as the story of Edward VIII’s abdication unfolded in the news media.  My mother explained details of the story to me as best she could explain to a tiny boy – that Edward was King and he loved Wallis but the rules in England did not permit him to marry her and continue to be the monarch. Echoing his famous abdication speech in late 1936, I ran around our neighborhood telling how Edward “gave up the throne for the woman he loved.”  I silently made a wish to meet this couple one day – an unusual wish for such a very young child. Edward did, indeed, give up the throne and in June of 1937, he married Wallis Simpson.  Together they were given the far less impressive title of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Sometime later, my parents and I were driving from our New York home into Canada to spend time at our summer beach house.  We crossed a bridge near the border and heard sirens and saw a motorcade passing the border, going in the opposite direction from us. When we arrived at the guard gate, my father asked who was in the motorcade.  “Oh, that was the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, on their way to the airport,” the guard answered. I remember sitting in the back seat thinking, “I got that close to them!” In my late teens, I entered the Army and spent time as an instructor and later in Special Services as an announcer for various performers who toured the bases.   I was stationed in Italy on the Lido de Venezia and met many famous people, including an American woman named Elsa Maxwell, who was the most famous party giver and party planner of the time. She had a reputation not only for counseling people on throwing lavish parties, but for charging large fees for some of her well-known friends to make an appearance at the party.  She would book these friends to attend the party and charge perhaps $10,000 to $25,000 for their appearance.  Elsa would, as their “agent”, take a percentage of the fee. She and I met while we were both strolling the beach one afternoon on the Lido. When I said “Hello” she realized I was an American, too, and we struck up a conversation. I gave her some psychic messages and she suggested I have tea with her and the people whose villa she was staying at, the following afternoon. “The woman in particular is fascinated by fortunetellers”, she said (that was the popular term for those of us in the spiritual and psychic world at that time). I accepted the invitation and arrived at the villa the following afternoon.  Elsa greeted me at the door and led me into the parlor.  “My friend will join us shortly,” she announced.  Before long, the parlor doors opened and a dark-haired woman entered. To my amazement, I recognized her immediately. Elsa and I stood and Elsa said, “Kenny, may I introduce you to Her Royal Highness, the Duchess of Windsor.” (The Duke insisted on Wallis being referred to with the royal title even though the monarchy had actually forbidden her to formally have the title). My childhood wish had come true.  I was in the presence of half of the couple I’d long admired! Throughout our afternoon tea, I gave a psychic reading to Wallis Simpson, who was indeed enthralled by the psychic world.  She listened attentively, asked questions, and was a true believer.  Halfway through the reading, another door leading to the parlor opened and in walked the Duke.  “Darling,” Wallis said, “I’m having the most wonderful messages from the spirits!” He walked over and we shook hands.  I could tell he was distracted and not entirely convinced of the psychic world, but he loved his wife so much that anything she wanted, including the reading, he would approve of. As if this one meeting was not enough of a fulfillment of a dream, I was invited to give the couple (and Elsa) readings on a number of other occasions.  Wallis finally convinced her husband to sit still for a brief session and he agreed.  It is my custom to ask clients to speak their first name three times before I begin, so that I can hear their voice and begin to receive spirit information.  As those familiar with the psychic world know, this technique is called “clairaudio.”  I also held a piece of their jewelry, using the art of psychometry, to pick up vibrations. Thus, during the reading, they called out their given names.  I heard “Wallis, Wallis, Wallis” and then “David, David, David.”  Though the former King’s first name was Edward, David was part of his name and the name he preferred. He got a twinkle in his eye, thinking, I suppose, “Imagine this person, whom I do not know well, calling me, a former King, David!” He listened politely to a few brief messages and then excused himself to go play golf. But Wally, the nickname her friends called her and as I was privy to begin calling her, was enthusiastic about bringing back relatives in spirit.  I recall very few specifics except that I did bring back her “Aunt Bessie” on one occasion. This pleased her immensely. My memories of the Duke are of him attired mostly either in golf attire or in pin-striped suits, while the Duchess was either in a suit or long-flowing hostess gown.  What drew my attention, always, were the jewels she’d hand me during the reading for the psychometry session.  There I was, holding a pearl choker or a gorgeous ring with huge stones never realizing that many years later there would be a flurry of activity over the auctioning of those very pieces. I went on to read the couple outside of Italy as well – in New York at the Waldorf Astoria, and in Beverly Hills at the Beverly Hills Hotel. I know without a shadow of a doubt that these two people were soul mates.  The Duke’s signature love song to the Duchess, I was told, was “Mr. Sandman”, and the Duke would instruct someone to insist that the bandleader anywhere they attended a party or gathering begin playing this song when they entered a room, in honor of her. I once asked the Duchess what advice she would give to women the world over and she smiled, saying, “I would tell them ‘Don’t complain and you’ll never have to explain.’ “ I asked the Duke where he felt most at home, since he had lived so many places.  Was it New York? Paris? Palm Beach, Florida? Unhesitatingly, and with a warm and intimate smile, he said, “Kenny, home is where my Duchess is.” This level of love has not occurred often within Britain’s monarchy. Princess Margaret was deeply in love with Captain Peter Townsend but was not permitted to marry him because he was not only a commoner but more importantly, divorced. Prince Charles and Camilla were instant soul mates, but their union took many years to come to fruition since Charles was, according to tradition, expected to marry a young virgin (Diana Spencer).  Charles and Camilla’s union was only made possible following their respective divorces and the tragic passing of Diana. How times have changed, though, that a potential future King (Charles) is now able to be in line for the throne and have married a divorced woman. That is all that Edward VIII asked for…and was denied… all those years ago. The most notable royal soul mate relationship that I can identify today is the love between Prince William and his bride, the former Kate Middleton.  Theirs is a true love story and I hope for a happy life for them.  My only concern is that I have felt for years, since first visiting Kensington Palace in London to give readings to Princess Margaret and the Queen Mum, that the Palace is haunted and negative. It worries me, psychically, that the couple is moving into the Palace and I ask for healing thoughts to be sent to them. In the first edition of my book, I Still Talk To…, I detail more of my relationship with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and a spirit contact with Wallis.  In a newer edition of the book, I include a chapter on Princess Diana.  Without giving too much away, the Duchess was instrumental, in spirit, in arranging the spirit contact I had with Diana for the book. The dreams of a small child really can come true. My conviction that I would one day meet the Duke and Duchess of Windsor is spiritual proof of that and only one example of the rather charmed and lovely life I’ve lived. Image ©www.britannica.com/EBchecked/media/155557/Theduke-and-duchess-of-Windsor   ]]>