The Brotherhood of the Traveling Pants

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is a huge entertainment franchise. It started off as a best-selling book, then the sequel came out. They made a movie about it, and it was such a hit that sequel is coming out too. It's a cash machine that will surely be around for many years to come.

All this may make you wonder, then, why the producers haven't tried to further expand the franchise. I mean, why wouldn't the premise work for guys as well? I've taken the liberty of writing that book's first page, but if Hollywood shows any interest I will happily write the rest.

Winnemuck University is a sparkling green diamond on the north coast of Michigan, smack dab in the middle of what's got to be the prettiest corner of the whole wide world. Lake Winnemuck is blue as a sapphire, the answer to a prayer for thirsty birds or exhausted college students looking for a carefree break. Winnemuck Mountain, a couple miles out of town, is dotted with majestic pines and just aching to be climbed. Every night as I walk back to my dorm, there's always a family of deer munching on the grass, or a passel of raccoons on a scavenger hunt, and they all pause to wink goodnight to me.

Seems like most of the incoming freshmen are just plain folks like me. Some thought they'd expand their horizons, leaving that small town with one main street and one street light to see what else the world held. Others were looking to escape the unfriendliness of big cities, seeking refuge in a place where nobody's going to look at you funny if you stop and watch the world rush past. Seems like whatever you're looking for, Winnemuck is the place to find it. Heck, they even say that on the sign that welcomes you into town.

One afternoon my philosophy professor decided he'd rather go hiking than teach, so I got back to my dorm room about five minutes after I left. I swung the door open and saw Ryan, my roommate, laying on his bed looking as guilty as a possum in grandma's pie cupboard.

Wait, I thought. Are those my -- Ryan cut off my thoughts midstream.

"You will absolutely never believe this," he said excitedly. "I saw your pants hanging in the closet, and I thought, wow, those are incredibly small! But then I took them off the hanger and held them up against me, and all of a sudden they looked almost average size. I put one leg in and it wasn't too snug, so I put the other leg in and it fit too! All of a sudden I was wearing them! I thought, wow, that is freaky. I mean, these could almost be mine."

I looked at the pants and saw his point. There's a huge disparity in our heights, so you'd think the pant cuffs would be mid-calf on him. But there they were, just hovering over his socks.

"If I really yank on the waist," Ryan continued, "I can get the zipper about halfway up. But buddy, look at us! You're little, and I'm huge! Would you ever have guessed they'd fit so well? It's like there's something almost spiritual about it. Is it so crazy to think, like, there's some magical force in the universe telling us that no matter how different we are, no matter where we come from or how we were raised, we're all absolutely identical in some weird way?"

"Well, maybe," I said, soberly pondering his words. "Okay, it's possible. So why's my jockstrap on your head?"