Even death cannot break the bond between twins
AS THE mother of identical boys I naturally take a deep interest in twins and their relationships. Although mine live at opposite ends of the country they remain close, speaking to each other by phone almost every day. When they were little they didn’t exactly have a private language but their vocabulary was sprinkled with peculiar words unique to them.
“Shadowmamar” was one of them. “Santamafountain” was another. They’d point excitedly out of the car window and repeatedly say: ‘Shadowmamar! Santamafountain!” in delighted unison. Their father and I never worked out the meaning or what they were pointing at. They eventually stopped and now neither has the faintest memory of what they meant.
So I was fascinated – and as I’ll explain, deeply moved – by a newspaper interview this week with award-winning photographer David Loftus (he takes all the pictures for Jamie Oliver’s books) who lost his identical twin John 30 years ago in a medical blunder and three decades on remains traumatised by his loss.
It was the seminal event in his adult life, he says. “I always feel empty. There is always something gone.” This is hardly surprising: it’s clear John and David shared an intense bond.
David remembers their fourth birthday: they were taken to the coast and given big spotted hankies to wave at the boats. David dropped his into the water and his twin immediately threw his own one in after it in an instinctive act of camaraderie.
Years later John took a gap year and travelled to the Greek islands. This was in pre-mobile phone days but back in England David had a powerful sense that something was wrong. So he went to Greece and somehow tracked his twin down to Paros, living alone in a tent and stricken with loneliness, depression and desperately missing his twin.
“He just burst into tears when I arrived… he made me promise there and then never to go travelling without him.”
After John’s needless death David tried to pick up the pieces with his photographic career. But one day he suddenly realised something very strange. All his pictures were of pairs. If he was shooting photos for a gardening magazine he never took one of a single flower. It was always two and they would be intertwined.
David says he hates shaving because it means looking into the mirror and seeing his brother’s face. He took part in a TV programme and when he watched it, all he could see was his brother and the gestures he used to make, he heard John’s voice, not his own.
Now he’s writing a book The Diary Of A Lone Twin and it’s proving cathartic. When it comes out I’m going to give a copy to my boys. Maybe they can review it here. It’ll be fascinating to see what my twins make of this lone twin’s story. I just hope it doesn’t bring them to tears – I’ve already had a little cry.
And in between snivels I send David Loftus my warmest wishes for his future happiness and peace of mind.