If you had asked me a week ago,” the stranger was saying as Andrew Jackson pulled up a chair and seated himself at his usual table in the café, “I would have told you flat out that the worst possible place in the City of Winnipeg to put a restaurant would be the middle of a bridge. But I would have been wrong.” He paused to take a sip of coffee.
“Hey Andrew,” said Grant Toews who was already seated at the table. “Meet Carl Regehr.” He gestured toward the stranger. “Carl’s from North Kildonan. Carl, Andrew.”
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Are we going to call this meeting to order or what?” Brady Jackson leaned back in his chair and looked…
“Nice to meet you Mr. Jackson,” said Carl.
“Same to you,” said Andrew. “But you got me curious. Bad restaurant locations. Don’t let me interrupt.”
“Right,” said Carl. “Last weekend, some sadistic monster who shall remain nameless, because he is my daughter’s boyfriend Mark, gave my wife and me two tickets to eat at a restaurant which you will not believe how bad the location of was.”
“You sure know how to stick a preposition on the end of a sentence there,” said Andrew. “And where was this restaurant?”
“On the ice,” said Carl, “in the middle of the Assiniboine River.”
“Oooh,” said Grant. “Romantic!”
“It is not possible to be romantic,” said Carl, “when you have to hold a champagne flute while wearing foost haunstche.”
Andrew gave the man a blank look.
“Ask Mr. Toews,” said Carl.
Grant nodded. “It’s low German,” he explained, “for mittens.”
Carl nodded and spoke directly to Andrew. “The reason Mr. Toews here says foost haunshtche means mittens is because he’s too embarrassed to tell you what the direct translation is.”
“I’m all ears,” said Andrew.
“It’s two words,” said Carl. “Haunshtche, which means gloves, and foost which means fist.”
“Fist gloves?” said Andrew.
“Try being romantic when you’re wearing those,” said Carl.
“I see your point,” said Andrew. “But I’m curious — how was the food?”
“Spectacular,” said Carl. “Unbelievable actually. And definitely not too hot.”
“So you enjoyed it?” said Grant.
“The food? Yes.” Carl nodded. “My wife was driving that evening,” he continued, “and when we left, instead of turning right towards Kildonan, she turned left towards St. Vital. Why are we going to St. Vital? I asked. Those are not our people. I am going south, my wife said. How far? I asked. Till I can feel my toes, she said, or till Florida, whichever comes last. OK then, I said. We made it all the way to Emerson but when we saw the sign I reached out and put my hand on her arm. Wait, I said. We forgot something. What? she asked. Donald Trump, I said. Oh crap, she said and turned around and drove us back home.”
There was a lengthy pause.
“I would have done the same thing,” said Grant.
“Any sane person would,” said Andrew.
“You know what I thought of when I saw the border sign?” asked Carl.
“No. What?” said Andrew.
“When the United States invades Canada, whose responsibility will it be to yell ‘TANK!’ and move the net off the street?”
“Good question,” said Grant.
“I hope we mount more of a resistance than that,” said Andrew.
“I know what we’ll do in Kildonan,” said Carl. “We’ll greet them as liberators. We’ll invite them inside and feed them borscht and farmer sausage and put them up in the spare bedroom overnight, but in the morning they’ll look out the window and go running outside in their pyjamas yelling, ‘WHERE THE HECK ARE OUR TANKS?’ And we’ll stand in the doorway and say, ‘Oh, sorry, didn’t you know? It’s a snow route.’ And then we’ll lock the door and go stand by the big living room window and flip them the bird with both hands.” He pushed his chair back and got up. “But of course we’ll do it the polite Canadian way so they won’t even know. They’ll just think we’re giving them a friendly wave.”
“Why will they think that?” asked Andrew.
“Because we’ll be wearing foost haunshtche,” said Carl, and turned to head for the door.
Andrew and Grant sat in silence, watching him go.
“A restaurant in the middle of a river?” said Andrew, at length. “City people are crazy.”
“Snow routes though,” said Grant thoughtfully. “That’s a pretty good idea.”
“What if we get invaded in the summertime?” said Andrew.
There was a brief silence and then they both laughed aloud.
“Right,” said Grant. “I wish them luck figuring out which week that will be!”
“Too true,” said Andrew. “Too, too true.”
