Toe in the Water

A Flower for Ted

A Flower for Ted

For a long time I have felt that the dead live on in the memory of the living. Only when a person is forgotten by all who knew or may have read of him, is a person truly dead. In this way, it could be said that Alexander the Great (or Grape, as the old joke has it) still lives in a way because he is not forgotten, even these thousands of years later. And this may be the unconscious motivation behind gravestones - a last effort to be remembered by at least the passerby, who never knew the deceased when alive.

This idea was the reason for the poem I wrote for Solace.Bring ’s Express It In Eight when the prompt was the word “prank.” It brought immediately to mind an old friend, Ted Flower, that I had not thought of in years. While not a true prankster, he delighted in the practical side of jokes and we often cooperated in bringing one into reality. It was the least that I could do, to write a poem in homage to the man ("Homage to Ted Flower"  if you’re interested).

My duty done, Ted began to slip away into the past again. Then, this week, Lilli 🧿 ☕ selects the prompt “mirror” for the Promptly Poetry Challenge. It did it again, didn’t it. My mind went racing back to old Ted and a remarkable ability of his. He could write forwards in the usual manner but he could also write backwards. Then he proved that he could write upside down (the writing, not him). As if that wasn’t enough, he could write mirror writing that could only be checked if you looked at its reflection in a mirror (I did and it was perfect). And then he tears the ring out of it by proving he could write in all the other weird ways in mirror writing.

I checked them all and there were no errors. Yet he wrote them all at the same pace, unhurried but without pause, as though it were the easiest thing out there. If there was a trick to it, I never discovered it.

An ability like that makes one stop and think. It’s either some weird, inexplicable natural talent, like an idiot savant thing, or Ted must have spent hours, weeks, maybe even months or years, training himself to do it. I can’t imagine what would drive one to such extraordinary lengths to acquire a skill. Especially one so useless and pointless.

You could say that he picked a certain sentence and concentrated only on learning that. I can’t remember the sample sentence he actually used. But the time and effort required for even that is so unimaginable that I must confess myself baffled.

So that was one outstanding thing about Ted that I had forgotten over the years. He died quite young, in his forties, I think, and time has laid many strata over those days in my mind. But I wrote a poem in celebration of his odd talent and you can read it here (again, if you’re interested): "Mirror Man" 

There’s more, much more. Thinking of Ted has brought back plenty of memories. He was married to a delightful young lady, a German of irrepressible optimism and stocky frame, and my family had an intermittent friendship with her that lasted for a few years after Ted’s death. But she lived some distance from us and we were only able to see her on rare occasions. No doubt she keeps the old rascal’s memory alive and I do not need to feel too guilty for him drifting into the past as he has.

And, for a few days, he lives again in this unlikely writing talent of his. Good on yer, Ted.


Word count: 627