AP Photo and AP Story
BERLIN — Petra the swan has a new home and so does her beloved swan-shaped paddleboat.
In 2006, Petra, a black swan, became so attached to the boat — shaped like an outsized white swan — that she refused to leave its side at a lake near a zoo in the German city of Muenster.
Petra and her paddleboat were taken to the zoo.
Zoo officials finally parted bird and boat last week after Petra settled down with a real white swan and the boat was returned to the lake. But the romance was short-lived. The zoo says that on Saturday her new beau flew off and sought out the company of other black swans.
A zoo statement says that Petra “appears to feel lonely” and is swimming around in an agitated state. The solution? On Friday, she will be taken back to the nearby lake and her faithful paddleboat.
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I’m not an expert in “attachment” issues of critters, much less people. But I do know there is truth to the phrase that “birds of a feather flock together.” Petra seeks companionship. Maybe she even seeks family. Who knows what is going on in her swan brain? But we all need others who are like us. And it’s clear we gravitate toward those who are similar to us.
In this year’s presidential election we seem to be hearing more and more how voters almost always vote along familiar lines. Blacks are drawn to Obama. Whites might be drawn to Hillary or McCain. Females might be more drawn to Hillary. I’m sure it’s more complicated than that, but in the end – perhaps there is something to people voting for a person who seems most like them.
Familiarity. Similarity. Petra wants both. For whatever reason she has found it in the big swan paddle-boat. It makes me consider what I’m looking for when I search for familiarity or similarity. And it forces me to realize that in many ways I’m like Petra, unwilling or unhappy to do something different. I like who I like. I love who I love. I want what I want.
And like Petra I can become frustrated, depressed and agitated when forced to gather with birds of a different feather.
