"Mom! That's Professor Sandburg! The guy I was telling you about."

Roberta smiled quietly to herself, enjoying her son's obvious pleasure at seeing a favorite teacher. Recalling some of the conversations she had overheard over the past year, she realized her son Scott, was not the only freshman to speak in glowing terms of the, somehow, charismatic Professor Sandburg. From a safe distance of a couple of picnic tables away, she observed the young professor, attempting to discern what it could be about him that drew students to him.

Swigging her beer thoughtfully, she regarded the man.

Well, barely a man; he could almost be my son.

Not much taller than she herself was, maybe 5'7" -- he had neither the size, posture, nor demeanor that she had expected of an authority, a potential mentor, an object of hero-worship.

He seemed somewhat feminine in some ways . . . but really not. Yes there was the short stature, shoulder-length wavy hair, and mildly wriggly hips. But he stood in a solid stance, didn't mince. His T-shirt was tight enough to suggest well-muscled arms and chest. She thought maybe the legs would be muscular, too, but those baggy jeans were in the way....

Scott had drifted over to greet both him and the older man who seemed to be with him -- a man who was clearly unsure that he should be there. She thought it intriguing that a man with such an imposing physique and stance would hang back, off to the side, avoiding eye contact.

Professor Sandburg was introducing her son to this other guest, who smiled politely, shook hands, but still hung back awkwardly.

At that moment, Scott turned to her and called out, "Mom!" come here!"

Leaning down to give a reassuring pat to her puppy resting under the picnic table, she warned it, "Good dog, you stay." Then, leaving her "baby," she ambled over to her son's side, smiling gently.

"I've heard a lot about you, Professor," she began, then seeing the honest-to-god *blush,* added "most of it good, of course."

"Mom!"

She smiled sidelong at her son and exchanged a smile with his teacher, who finally spoke.

"Please, 'professor' is, like, so formal. ... Besides, technically, I'm not a professor, yet, just a teaching fellow . . . until I finish the dissertation."

"I've been a college student before . . . I know you don't have to have the degree to be a good teacher . . . so I don't see why you can't take on the title," Roberta countered with a smile, glancing up in time to catch the twinkle in the eye of the older man, who stood behind the teacher.

Blushing, Blair argued gently, " Yeah, but I don't mind the technicality. It's a rite of passage." He shrugged, "Rites of passage are important to communities, even academic ones."

"Yeah, I know . . . but rites can take you only so far . . . " Roberta's eyes unfocused briefly and a serious look crossed her face. "I mean, a wedding is a rite of passage, but if you don't love well going in, you don't magically come out loving any better . . . "

Roberta caught Jim's eye and saw him wince in pain. Bet there's a story there.

Blair nodded slowly, "Yeah, you can 'profess' your knowledge or 'profess' your love, but it takes a lot more to actually teach . . . or to love."

And I bet that for you, to teach is to love. . . . No wonder your students love you!

"So... what should I call you? 'Mr. Sandburg?'"

"Oh, please, just call me 'Blair' -- OK?"

"OK, then, it's Roberta, to you."

She heard a small, throat-clearing "ahem," and realized that the other guest had taken a half step forward.

"And this is Jim, my roommate."

The older man took another step forward and shook hands, a smile in his light blue eyes.

"Are you a professor, too?"

"No, ma'am, I work for the Cascade Police Department."

A cop? They really are the Odd Couple! "How'd you come to be roommates with -- ?"

"It's really a long story, I --"

But the story would have to wait because Roberta was distracted by the sound of a loud, whining howl. Her puppy had tangled itself in its leash and now called to her. She returned to the picnic table, followed by the other three, and freed her baby from its leash.

"What kind of dog is that?" Blair asked.

"It's a standard poodle."

"A standard poodle! Wow! Jim, these dogs are supposed to be amazing -- really intelligent! . . . . How old is he?"

"He's only 4 months old. . . . . His name is JJ, named after James Joyce."

"James Joyce!?" Blair laughed, "Cool!" He reached down to pet the dog. "He's so big. Are you sure he's only 4 months old?"

"Yeah, that tends to surprise everybody. His sire weighed about 100 pounds, so he'll probably be pretty big."

Jim spoke up, "He doesn't look like most poodles I've seen, bigger and not all tarted up."

"Roberta laughed, "Yeah, I decided on what they call the 'puppy cut,' just sort of an all over trim, without all the tassels and perfume and bows and shit. He's a dog, not a doll! . . . . And he really is smart -- can't leave him home alone or my long-distance phone bills will skyrocket . . . "

Scott added, "About the size thing . . . There's a story that goes that the original poodles were the big ones. They were hunting dogs. But during one of the wars . . . . Napoleonic, or something . . . they were left home with the women while the men went off to war. The women kept breeding them smaller and smaller so they made better lap dogs. And that's how we got the little miniatures and teacup types."

Roberta smiled, "Could be true, could be folk legend..."

Scratching JJ behind the ears, Blair said, "I've never seen a brown poodle before."

"Looks like you, Chief," Jim smirked. Then, clearly much more relaxed, he pulled out a few more beers and passed them around, ignoring Blair's look of embarrassment.

JJ chose that moment to begin tugging on his leash in the direction of one of the hiking trails. Roberta, glancing sympathetically at her giant puppy, sighed, "I think I'd better take JJ for a walk, stretch his legs." Catching Scott's eyes, she added, "I'll be over at the dog park -- maybe your friends could come by later."

Jim's gaze drifted to the retreating figures. Her graying long brown hair swaying in counter-movement to her hips, Scott's mother began to glide peacefully for a few steps, until JJ yanked at the leash, jerking her off-stride a few steps, causing her to trip over her long denim skirt. She recovered quickly and Jim smiled but then a puzzled look crossed his face.

"Dog Park?"

The two younger men watched Jim watch Roberta for a moment before Scott explained.

"Yeah -- dog park. The County set aside a few blocks' worth of the park so that people could take their dogs off their leashes and just run with other dogs. It's totally fenced off and has a couple of benches at one end for the owners to hang out on and schmooze."

"But don't the dogs get into fights?" Jim wondered aloud.

"Interestingly enough, not usually. They seem to get into fights more often when they are on their leashes than when they get enough space to spread out."

"And they really seem to have fun playing together!" Blair added.

"You know about this place, Chief?"

"Yeah! I've come to watch the dogs play a lot when I've wanted to clear my head. I've observed a lot of fascinating things about their behavior. They have their own social systems -- it's almost as though the dogs have their own culture! "

Smiling, Jim rolled his eyes.

"No, Jim, really!"

"I believe you, Sandburg, anything you say." Jim laughed gently.

Leave it to Sandburg! He couldn't just take a walk in the park and watch dogs run around; he had to turn it into a thesis!

Scott observed the two men, surprised to see his teacher looking so flustered. Interesting He raised a Spock-like eyebrow. "Professor Sandburg -- I mean, Blair -- I have to stay here and take care of the barbecue, but . . . . why don't you take Jim over and show him. Besides, I think Mom thought he was kinda cute." Ahh . . . Good! The big guy is blushing. Glad to get him back for Blair . . .

The two men began lazing along one of the hiking trails, Jim strolling fluidly, Blair jog-trotting to keep up.

"Really Jim! Dogs are great to watch! They remind me of people sometimes!"

"You mean like when pets and their owners look like each other?"

Blair joined him in a laugh. "No, it has to do with how they behave . . . Like sometimes dogs can wrestle and crawl all over each other but other times they somehow cross some sort of line, break some sort of personal space rule, and then out of the blue -- at least for us it's out of the blue -- they'll start fighting. And it's like some dogs can break the rules and others can't..."

"Sandburg! Will you just breathe! Slow down, what are you talking about? What's that got to do with people?!"

Her mind having wandered so far that she could not remember where it had been, Roberta was returned to the present by the sight of Blair and Jim, still a long way off, slowly approaching.

The tall man strolled slowly, calmly, evenly -- beer bottle hanging loosely from his fingers, hands swinging gently at his sides. He seemed to be alert to every sight and sound on the trail but not distracted from the flow of words bubbling forth from the "professor's" mouth -- words Roberta wished she could hear, wanting to know what was bringing an unaccustomed smile to what she was sure was normally a stoic face.

Pausing to take a long draught of her beer, she closed her eyes and then looking back down the trail, realized with a small sigh that it probably had nothing to do with the words themselves. Who could resist smiling at that!? She just grinned, shaking her head and watched.

For every long stride the taller, older man took, the smaller one bounded, must've been about five. He bounced on the balls of his feet, not quite jogging in place, not quite dancing as he rambled restlessly from one side of the trail to the other, waving his hands around, grabbing his hair and then letting it fall to his shoulders, wriggling his hips -- never ceasing his flow of words.

He bounded and scampered in zig-zags, first in front of his friend and then behind. He gadded, flitted, looped, and pranced. He dashed ahead for a moment to look at a wild flower then darted back to his roommate, who rolled on, taking periodic swigs of his brew.

And though zipping and bobbing erratically, jouncing and bouncing, Blair always managed to swerve with great agility, usually managing not to bump into Jim, but not always.

Not exactly 'bumps,' Roberta corrected herself. More like playful punches, impulsive hit-and-run taps maybe to punctuate his points. Never very hard, always on his shoulder or back or bicep.

And Jim just continued, unruffled, in his forward amble as though his roommate's bounces, bumps and zigs were the most natural thing in the world, sometimes reaching out to tap him lightly on the top of his head, as if to ruffle the hair of a toddler.

Then, after suffering a more forceful than usual bump, Jim stopped for a moment to grab onto Blair's shoulder and hold him out at arm's length, almost bringing the smaller man to a complete standstill, though unable to quell the bouncing completely.

They were close enough to Roberta that she could tell that Blair had stopped speaking at that moment. He then surprised Roberta by seeming to shrink even smaller for a moment.

Momentarily concerned, she sat upright, alert, and studied the men carefully and discerned that there was no real threat or fear there. She relaxed and took another pull from the beer bottle.

And then she heard the older man blurt,

"Sandburg, will you just breathe?!"

She watched in amused silence as Blair quite visibly took a slow breath and even more slowly exhaled and somehow regained his height. Afterwards, he resumed his bouncing and chattering, but less frenetically now, his friend smiling gently and shaking his head.

"May we join you?" Pausing briefly for Roberta's nod, Jim and Blair sat beside her on the bench. The men sat in silence a moment, sensing that she preferred to enjoy the view quietly.

At the moment, there were only a few dogs in the enclosure, running in relaxed laps between her bench and the far fence. The leader of the informal pack was some sort of brown, short-haired mixed breed. He was about twice the size of JJ and though he was clearly relaxed, he had a very imposing carriage.

"For some reason, JJ's really taken to that one," Roberta observed.

Blair couldn't resist returning the earlier tease, "The big guy looks like you, Big Guy...."

"Whatever you say, my little poodle."

Roberta shot them an amused look. "I've always found watching the dogs' interactions kind of interesting -- especially the interactions between puppies and the alpha males."

"How so?" Jim was beginning to feel out-numbered by dog-anthropologists.

"Well, the puppies get away with stuff that the adult dogs would get trashed for."

Blair began nodding, his head bobbing up and down, the bobbing soon resonating through his entire body. "Yeah yeah yeah!! Just like people!"

Roberta continued, "I've heard that it's the puppies' smell that keeps the adult dogs from roughing them up. But I think there is something in the way they move . . ."

The three drifted to silence as they observed the loping dogs running laps.

The dogs paused at the far end of the enclosure. JJ trotted right up to the pack leader, yipped right in his face and then backed up. He stretched his forepaws out before him and lowered his head between them, his tail wagging enthusiastically. He then bounded up and out to the side barking playfully. The leader stood calmly observing the youngster as it bounced and yipped.

Then, the lead dog began ambling to the eastern fence, enjoying the smells, followed by the bouncing puppy.

The taller dog strolled slowly, calmly, evenly -- feet falling gently with each step. He seemed to be alert to every sight and sound on the trail but not unmindful of the flow of playful barks bubbling forth from the poodle.

Pausing to take a long draught of his beer, Jim closed his eyes briefly, then rolling the beer bottle on his forehead, looked over at Roberta, who met his eye. He just grinned, shaking his head, and watched.

For every long stride the larger dog took, the smaller one bounded, must've been about five. He bounced on springy paws, not quite prancing, as he rambled restlessly from one side of the trail to the other -- his silky brown ears flapping from side to side, his hind-quarters wriggling, the short barks never ceasing.

He bounded and scampered in zig-zags, first in front of his "playmate" and then behind. He gadded, flitted, looped, and pranced. He dashed ahead for a moment to sniff at something in the grass, then darted back to the leader, who strolled on.

And though zipping and bobbing erratically, jouncing and bouncing, JJ always managed to swerve with great agility, usually managing not to bump into the pack leader, but not always.

Not exactly 'bumps,' Jim noticed. More like playful punches, impulsive hit-and-run taps. Never very hard, always on his shoulder or back.

And the leader just continued, unruffled, in his forward amble -- the puppy's bounces, bumps and zigs obviously the most natural thing in the world. And sometimes the larger dog would reach out to punch JJ lightly on the shoulder as if the puppy had suggested a game of tag.

Then, after suffering a more forceful than usual bump, the larger dog stopped for a moment, growled, and knocked the puppy over with one punch of his muzzle.

The smaller dog rolled onto its back and became very still, waiting quietly, ceasing his barking but still wagging the tail cautiously.

Momentarily concerned, the three humans sat upright, alert, and studied the dogs carefully. Discerning that there was no real threat or fear there, Roberta reassured the men, "It's okay."

Jim took another pull from the beer bottle, then turned to see what Blair was making of all this.

Blair felt Jim's eyes on him. "What?!"

Jim and Roberta just chuckled, "Oh, nothing...."

And then they heard the larger dog bark again and then lope away, JJ following him more cautiously this time.

Roberta sipped the last of her beer and murmured, "Yep, just like people. . . " She pretended not to notice when the roommates turned to stare at her.

Blair was the first to blurt out, "Well, interspecies analogies can be taken, like, only so far, ya know . . ."

But before Jim could chime in, Roberta burst out laughing, and her two benchmates turned to see what had so amused her.

Blair cringed at what he saw: the puppy had lifted itself up onto its hind legs, rested his forepaws on the lead dog's back, and proceeded to hump the air at the larger dog's side.

"Oh, I don't know, Chief, looks pretty much on the mark, to me."

But Jim's smug expression faded as he watched the older dog knock down the younger, turn him and climb on his back to show him how it's really done.

"Whatever you say, Big Guy."

--Finis--