Lyons family
complications
by Jilliana
Ranicar-Breese
After uncle
Claude had said I was no longer welcome in his
home because I had spoken Italian to Anna. Also
because I had treated her like a servant he said.
Well I remember Gino had the flu and Anna did a
lot of running about taking care of him.
Obviously Claude felt left out not speaking
Italian but the main reason, my mother discovered,
was that I introduced Anna to a friend as Anna
and not Mrs Lyons! Well she was not yet Mrs Lyons.
Divorce had not yet come in.
With nowhere to stay I moved in with my cousin
Ruth and her husband Lionel Hodes from South
Africa in Child’s Hill off the Finchley Road.
I had just got a temporary job at the Ideal Home
Exhibition at Earls Court.
I never saw uncle Claude again but two
synchronistic things happened. It was near to
Xmas and I was visiting a friend in West End Lane.
She wasn’t ready and so I had to wait in the
hall on a telephone seat. Casually, for no reason,
I looked at the envelope lying on the seat cum
table. It was obviously a Xmas card addressed to
Claude Lyons that had gone to the wrong address.
I thought about putting a message on the back of
the envelope but thought better of it. I lost my
chance of a possible reconciliation.
The second time I was in the local wine shop on
the Finchley Road just by Westend Lane where I
lived. I was waiting for the manager to come to
serve me but he was busy with a customer at the
back of the shop. He was writing the delivery
list for the wine ordered. Then he left to speak
to the client who was behind me.
For no reason I glanced at the delivery sheet and
gasped. It was made out to Claude Lyons from
William Lyons! I turned to look at the client and
saw that it was an embarrassed William, my first
cousin who never invited me once to his home
despite being one block away from my flat. That’s
family for you!
Written
6/1/25 in Nightingale.
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