As we rejoin our story....It is Sunday, the day of the big Flea Market.
Little colorful shade structures and tents have popped up here and
there, and hoomins have been carefully arranging their wares atop
folding card tables in the lots they have rented for the day. Racks of
clothing appear, and cardboard boxes of vinyl record albums. Rainbow
jumbles of plastic toddler toys are placed upon blankets spread in the
grass, and are quickly joined by tottering stacks of worn paperback
books. Romances. Westerns. Microwave Meal Magic. Learn Spanish! Invest
in Alpaca. The Search for the Aliens Among Us. Wooden crates of curious
bits of brass hardware and incomplete socket wrench sets are unloaded
from the back of heavily laden pick-up trucks. Packs of children run
between the tables, yelling, and are angrily cautioned to slow down, to
no great effect. The sky is blue, the sun is golden, and rising into a
sky fringed with pine and hemlock all around.

The hoomin parents dragged their two wailing children away, mollifying
them with promises of corn-dogs and colas. France muttered dangerously,
and rearranged her spines where the little girl had touched them,
despite that little girl's having read and understood the paw-lettered
sign warning against touching the Pigmy Porcupine. The sheep dragged
the hose back from the nearby utility shed in his teeth and helped the
Otters re-fill the blue plastic kiddie wading pool, and the rest of
the members of the Petting Zoo stood together in a loose circle and
gossiped scathingly about the state of hoomin parenting in this day and
age. Ping stepped in a puddle that had formed on the ground near the
wading pool and partially washed the black soot off of one of his back
feet. Now he was a rare black Russian mink with one gray foot! He and
Puma trotted over the the barbecue pits to see if there wasn't a cold
pit that they could find some replacement soot in.

Then it was time for the dog, the Noble Allis Chompers and the Sheep to
discuss their upcoming Border Collie Demonstration. By now the sun was
nearly directly overhead, so the two lay down together in the shade
beneath the belly of the big green tractor. The grass was cool there,
and they had a good view of the hoomins walking by and staring at their
friends with some amazement. Phrases such as "Mommy, can I have an
Ocelot?-" and "Those look just like the Otters at the Ecotarium!" came
to them on the breeze, and they had the satisfaction of seeing the
occasional dollar drift into the honour box.

Allis said to the Sheep with a sigh "I have never actually done any
herding before, although I suppose it's in my blood."

"Maah," said the Sheep. "We don't need anything fancy. I go left, you
run circles around me the whole way. The hoomins will clap. I go right,
Maah, the same thing. I've done this before."

Allis nodded and said "I can be fast."

"Maah,"said the sheep. "That's most of it. You just run and run and run
and make lots of tight turns around me. I'll go slow."

Allis stood up and said "All right. You go to the Baseball field and
I'll meet you there in about ten minutes."

"Mahh." nodded the sheep, and he turned and walked away on his slightly
knock-kneed legs. The Baseball field was just at the edge of the Flea
Market grounds, and the Otters had made paw-lettered signs advertising
two Border Collie demonstrations that would take place there. Allis
held back for a bit and when it was time she trotted over to the Sheep,
who was just a little to the left of the pitcher's mound cropping
dandelion's. A small crowd of hoomins had gathered in the bleachers.

"Pssst!" said the Sheep.

"What?" mumbled Allis, without making it obvious to the hoomins that
her lips were moving.

The Sheep put his nose down in the grass and spoke into it, saying
"Remember, dog. Don't get too excited and bite me. Maah."

"OK" mumbled Allis. "Go left."

The Sheep and Allis both went left at the same time, but the sheep
trotted slowly in a straight line and Allis ran tight circles around
him, giving the illusion that Allis was controlling the Sheep's course.

"Right,"said the sheep. And this time Allis got fancy. Not only did she
run tight circles around him, she jumped completely over his back a few
times for good measure in a zig-zag pattern. The hoomins clapped in the
bleachers.

"Circle," breathed a somewhat winded but altogether pleased Allis. And
the Sheep trotted in a circle, with Allis trotting in a somewhat larger
circle around him, then jumping directly in front of him to bring him
to a complete stop. "Sit!" she breathed in his ear. The Sheep promptly
sat in the grass and again the hoomins clapped. Allis sat too, and
after a minute she and the Sheep trotted away together, back to the
tractor and their friends. It wasn't long before a number of hoomins
followed them from the bleachers in the baseball field. They wanted to
pat Allis, and feed the sheep hands full of grass and clover that they
pulled up from the ground with their hands.

And best of all...they left dollars in the honor box...
More tomorrow
Alexandra in MA

[Posted in FML 5718]