Lunch with a Mennonite

Posted on by Mitchell Toews

HERE IS A QUICK RECOLLECTION of a lunchtime talk I gave at a Charlotte, NC advertising agency.

I worked for a Southeast Manitoba manufacturer and our weltlich new VP of Marketing – a Ka’toolsch from Montreal – had hired a new agency. As the advertising manager, it was my job to work with them.

The agency was made up mostly of transplanted New Yorkers, New Jerseyites and Penn State folk who had moved to warm and charming Charlotte. They all had pre-conceived notions of what a Mennonite was and now they had a new Canadian client spending money like it was znackzote.

Our contact at the agency conscripted me to give a presentation about Mennonite culture and religion. I felt largely unqualified, but I agreed to step up to the plate.

I sat on a tall stool in the centre of the office bullpen, surrounded by mostly female media people, graphic artists, creative types, PR professionals and copywriters. They sat with their pens poised expectantly above unsullied, lined notebook pages, legs crossed.  Their freshly glossed southern lips made me nervous and unsure.

Piety anxiety of the highest, and most distracted, order.

I spoke and they, well, they listened. Intently. They nodded silent approval as they played with their hair; tiny beads of perspiration dotted the bridges of their pert noses and those belle cleavages. I gulped back my self-doubt and forged on past einbach and zweibach and beyond, my figurative cleats digging up clods of antebellum red clay as I rounded second base and bore down on the Holy Ghost. I slid home; safe in a cloud of mixed metaphors.

It was astounding – I had discovered . . . Mennoporn!

Afterwards, there was quiet conversation together with rollkuchen and watermelon and I allowed to my agency contact, in my very best Barkman Avenue utsproak, that it had been a successful, and tasty, “launch”.

allfornow – Mitch (from one parallel north of Minnesota)

 

Copyright Mitchell Toews ©2016

 

 

 

 

The Blog Post I Always Wanted to Write

Posted on by Mitchell Toews

As a high-functioning anonymist, I sent this note to two of my low-brow friends. OK, I am low-brow; they are actually quite cultured. I liked it and wanted to share it with other friends — any brow will do — and so, here it is.

“Hey,

Greetings from the most beautiful place on earth. Jan and I love life, BUT, we are old and we are working too hard. We are almost done — then we can revert to being lazy sloths!

Cheers to slothdom.

So…you two and various cousins and friends from the Stein (for whom I have no email addresses) are my imaginary audience when I write my shitty little stories. (Oh no — am I over-selling?) Anyway, I have a blog.

Highly writerly. Although there is little ennui. A definite lack of ennui. Some angst. A bit of introspection. But mostly Mennonite guys blowing stuff up and putting it on YouTube.

You, as my imaginary audience, should be my literal audience, I reckon. If you don’t like it, you can revert to the imaginary.

My Blog is called Flies in the Outhouse. NO, WAIT — that’s my soon-to-be-a-major-motion-picture life story.

My blog is just called Mitchell Toews. http://bit.ly/MitchellToewsBLOG

Snip: I recently registered mitchellaneous.com

I have nine stories accepted to lit journals; eight published and one undergoing some edits. <he spits, derisively>

In other news, we had wieners & beans last night. I had three wieners and no regrets. THAT is the kinda guy I have become, Goddammit! Writerly like crazy.

We should have a fall event. Daaaaave?

allfornow – m

P.S. – I admit I had to look up how to spell ennui. BTW, I hope Satan is not bothering you too much, now that you have the gays in Steinbach.

Yours, in ennui,

which is rather risky,

Sincerely,

Mitchy”

 (Always close with a poem. Tres writerly.)

Copyright Mitchell Toews ©2016

Red River Valley – Stories 2 & 3

Posted on by Mitchell Toews

THE SECOND STORY in the Red River Valley Trilogy takes place within a year of the first. It is set in Manitoba in the early Seventies.

A Vile Insinuation  At a bordertown baseball tournament, several young Canadians meet a ballplayer from the States. The issue of the Vietnam war and the draft comes up. The boys, from Hartplatz, a largely Mennonite village not far from the border, speculate on how life could have changed had their forefathers chosen to re-settle in the USA instead of Canada.

“So, it’s a low draft number. I’m going to Vietnam, unless the war ends, ya know,” Marty finished the thought, and his beer. “They are already in the eighties now. I’ll be called up almost right away after my birthday. You betcha’.”

.

We were quiet for a minute. “Smoke on the Water” by Deep Purple drifted across the beer garden from a boom box near the bar.

.

“What song is that?” said Marty.

.

“You said your Mom was a Menno from Winkler, right?” Cornie asked, ignoring Marty’s question.

#

The last installment of the Red River Valley Trilogy takes place in the present. The characters from the ball tournament have aged. (Or, they may have aged.) One of them is facing a situation he had hoped to avoid.

In Without Reason, the concepts explored in the preceding stories are tested and re-evaluated.

He loved that old truck. Dietrich had it just the way he wanted it. His one prideful excess – Lord knows he could afford it – was the retro Cragar chrome mags. There were two other customizations: he had one handle from a favourite pair of ski poles as the knob on the stick shift lever. Also, the kids had given him a Reggie Jackson autographed number 44 Louisville Slugger bat. He had mounted a gun rack in the rear window for the lovely wood bat to reside, riding shotgun with him on the still streets of Hartplatz.

I hope you enjoy these stories and I would love to hear your thoughts. Your perspective may be entirely different than mine and there may be things about the incidents that you can refocus. I welcome critical comment. (Honest!)

Even if these stories are not your bowl of borscht, CommuterLit is a wonderful – free – resource for readers. Give it a try!

In the future, if my stories pass this ezine’s strict editorial scrutiny, I hope to have more work published on CommuterLit! For a linked list of my published pieces:  http://en.gravatar.com/mitchtoews

…allfornow – Mitch

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Thank you for your response. ✨

 

Copyright Mitchell Toews ©2016

 

 

Henderson has Scored for Canada!

Posted on by Mitchell Toews

Paul Henderson scored his first NHL goal on January 29, 1964, against the Chicago Black Hawks. According to Wikipedia, “it came late in the game against goaltender Glenn Hall and resulted in a 2–2 tie.”

You probably did not know this.

But if you were born north of the 49th parallel between the Atlantic and the Pacific, you likely know about another of Henderson’s goals – one that came later in his career. (Americans who are drawing a blank can find plenty of appropriate, alternate sports references: from Bobby Thompson to The Miracle on Ice. Brits might conjure up Roger Bannister.)

Unforgettable moments – “against all odds” – are a staple of sports. Just ask Jesse Owens, or maybe better yet, Kevin Costner.

As an “emerging” writer (more often submerging) I had a Henderson moment recently when I received a copy of Rhubarb Magazine Issue 39. Looking at the cover, I saw a credit; my name, Mitchell Toews. I may have raised my arms. Just a little — my chewed-up rotator cuffs only allow for a limited joyous celebration. Besides, as my friend Dave sometimes reminds me, too much gesticulation is off-putting.

Anyway. My little story is not on a par with THE GOAL, but it was kinda cool. Por moi.

And the little town slept.

#

Here is an excerpt from, “A Fisherman’s Story”, which is in this issue of Rhubarb:

The birds flew without effort, in trail formation, gliding into the wind with their wingtips inches away from the curling edge of a breaking wave. They suddenly banked up and out toward the dim, salt-misted far shore of the bay, snaking around in a circle and landing clumsily behind the wave. Rising and falling on the swell, the birds floated quietly until a big male took off, flapped twice, then dropped to scoop a fish. The pelican nodded strenuously to reposition the quarry in his large bill pouch while his wingmen watched the water around him with unblinking eyes.

“Pescadooooo!” Jose had said, flashing his bright smile.

Find more published works, here: http://en.gravatar.com/mitchtoews

…allfornow – Mitch

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P.S. – The photo is of my dad, Norman “Chuck” Toews. Early Sixties here — he might have been just a bit better than Henderson.

 

Copyright Mitchell Toews ©2016