I was born Antonia Tuzio.
And I had curly hair.
I liked neither.
I spent the majority of my younger years (if not all of them) wishing I had been called something exotic and that my hair had been straight.
I remember one day crying my eyes out cause a little girl told me her name was “Solange”.
Wow… sure that was an exotic name!
And she had blonde, straight hair.
She was a real princess.

While I was just Antonia Tuzio, with curly hair… and a mustache (yep!)

I spent a fortune through the years making sure no one would ever see my curls again… and my mustache!
I also ensured no one knew my real name, in fact I used to go by the name of Antonella, hoping it’d sound a bit cooler.
When I met my husband, he thought that was the most amazing name, till he learnt that in Italy every other girl is just called the same 🙁
So when dad died, I’d promese him I’d keep the name Antonia (as his mum, who used to be the healer of their village and was very proud of her powerful name), but the surname had to go… cause geeezzz….who wants to be called Tuzio?????

So Antonia Lyons got straight hair and got rid of her mustache…and rather than just a princess she became instead the “Queen of Bethnal Green.”

Till the corona virus decided to screw up even all our beauty routines, and so suddenly the curls are back.
And I feel cheated on, ’cause as I look myself in the mirror I’m left with having to accept what I see.
Isn’t it funny? The whole world is crumbling, and I’m hoping that accepting my real hair will make me a little less vain and more enlightened.
Kind of “hey, I’m the one who accepted her curls, call me Dalai from now on” 🤣.
These pictures were taken 26 years ago, and I kept them hidden ever since.
I wonder how many other skeletons this virus will bring out of the close.
Antonia Lyons

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