This week Toverview is due to send out their 100th newsletter, a pleasantly surprising if not totally miraculous milestone when you consider the rag’s humble beginnings. From the ragtag motley, picked up in various states of circumstance, age, and disposition and brought on board with no promises other than to just go along and give it a go.
At first glance it seemed rather selfish. A retired teacher and sheep farmer – who after a lifetime of work – just wasn’t coping with the sedentary nature of retirement. As enticing as the prospect of stoeptalks at a retirement village was, it was still not attractive enough to convince him to leave everything behind and disappear into a life of playing bingo. He needed something to do. Something worth doing, for himself and – as he would later find out – for others as well.
That is where the first recruits – which I’ve written about on various other articles several months ago – come in. So I’ll resist going in-depth about them at this point, save to say that they couldn’t have been more different in virtually all sociological or biological metrics. From age, religion, politics, habits and characters. So different, in fact in terms of their world views and background it beggars belief how they were able to suffer each other for so long and still continue to be – for the most part – still getting along well enough to send the occasional WhatsApp text.
Maybe it’s because they too were captivated by the overriding desire to be part of something. Something that the urban dweller might take for granted but which is virtually a luxury in the towns we often find ourselves operating from: rural journalism. Real stories for the real people who sometimes take the time to sit down with us and open up.
Under the minted ceiling of corporate media, these backwater yarns would be chucked out, at Toverview they take pride of place. Right there between the gifted writer and historian, R.W. Johnson, and whichever other contributor has felt to contribute something; between serious geopolitics and man’s ambitious exploits up on Mars. They stand as a testament of Ubuntu: that everybody counts, everybody matters – it matters not where you’re from, I can only be when you are. And, if your cries, complaints or joys are not worth telling, then what’s the purpose of telling any story at all?
Maybe that’s been the joy of being part of Toverview: if you thought the story was important enough to tell, they let you go right ahead and tell it. As a result, wannabe musos, artists, fundraising tannies and kids just splashing around at the municipal swimming pool all found themselves on here.
But, as the poet warned, the high point only means that the groundrush will likely be that much more dizzying and quicker. And – with the entire thing being funded by one man – we’ve always known that it wasn’t going to last forever. Nothing worthwhile ever does. So you simply make the most of the last stretch.
You remember the people, their stories, and just how privileged you were that they trusted you enough to share them. You remember the quirky colleagues, even the prolific and committed ones you never got to meet in person. These are memories, man, some sweet, others not so much, but darn, the 100th newsletter – how glad one must be to have seen this small miracle. But mostly you also quietly remember the retired farmer’s wife. These things never happen without the consent of the one who lovingly and dotingly prepares the dinner.