This is Rousseau, a new resident in my neighborhood. He and I hit it off very well at first meeting... so well in fact, that I could see the woman he was with, while friendly enough, was startled that he and I had taken to each other so well. How could she have known that I take pictures of everything and that I am particularly fond of noble savages; so when I learned his name and remembered that his namesake had written an important book about the Noble Savage back in the Eighteenth Century, how could I not stop everything so we could get acquainted.

I sat on the sidewalk, fished my camera out of the bag. Rousseau checked out the camera and then settled back for his portrait. His companion, who said I could call her “T,” waited patiently while Rousseau and I got acquainted and he sat for pictures.

I’m really quite excited about his having moved upstairs to an apartment in the building where I live. I don’t expect much in the way of philosophy out of the friendship, but you never know about these things. When I first met Mozart, a springer spaniel, I didn’t expect much in the way of music. Nothing musical has come of that friendship, except that he does bark a lot in his old age. He barks and wags, so it’s O.K.

About that Eighteenth Century Rousseau, I’ve been fascinated for a long time with his ideas about education, inequality, and particularly about “The Social Contract.” He was born in Geneva, a city which I like very much. Frankly, without Rousseau, that beautiful city might be known primarily for the decidedly more dour John Calvin; and that would be a shame indeed... remember Calvin’s teaching’s about “the total depravity of man.” Rousseau’s mother was the daughter of a Calvinist preacher, but early on Rousseau didn’t put much stock in anything as definite as the ideas of the completely self-assured Calvin. Some might consider Rousseau wishy-washy. He converted to Catholicism at one point, but then became a Presbyterian again when faced with the fact that he could’t be a Genevan citizen if he was a Catholic. I was a Presbyterian a long time, but I could never buy into the idea that God predestines some people for hell, which is neither here nor there and has absolutely nothing to do with the Rousseau who lives upstairs in my building. If I were required to be a Presbyterian to be a citizen of San Diego, I’m quite sure I’d say “to hell with it” and go on being a latter-day, not very convinced or convincing Methodist. But meeting this new Rousseau got me thinking about the Geneva Rousseau’s ideas and especially about his keen wit. I remember reading his proud description of his father who was a watchmaker. He wrote, “a Genevan watchmaker is a man who can be introduced anywhere; a Parisian watchmaker is only fit to talk about watches.”

The Eighteenth Century Rousseau slept around. I don’t have a clue about the Rousseau I met today, but I think “T” probably wouldn’t like to talk about it, so I won’t bring it up. One of the things that has always puzzled me about Rousseau, something I learned after I had become completely convinced that many of his theories of education and children rearing made very good sense was that the man had at least four children by a mistress whom he convinced to give each of them up to a foundling hospital... which just goes to show that what I believe and why I believe it sometimes is not well grounded in respectable reality.