The rumor started like this ... It was a nice spring day and Perry and I were having lunch in the dining hall with a big group of people. There were probably 12 of scrunched into one long table, chatting about the upcoming weekend, which was prospective freshman weekend--a weekend where prospective freshman and their parents come to visit the college. It was a brilliant sunny day and after eating, everyone was looking out the windows at the pond that surrounds the dining hall.
Suddenly, a swan swooped over the pond and gracefully landed right into everyone's field of vision. We'd all seen the swan before--it had been living in the pond for the last few days. Our school's pond had never housed a swan though--a few ducks here and there--but never a swan, and people were genuinely excited about it. Especially the stoned hippies--"whoa brooo, a beautiful creature from mother nature, he kinda even looks like Jerry Garcia if you look at him from a weird angle," you get the picture.
One of the kids at our table commented on how great it was that our pond--whose bottom was, and still is, filled with empties and other garbage--was now home to a beautiful white swan. His statement caused my mind and tongue to run wild, Perry backed me up, and the great swan purchase rumor began:
Kid 1: That swan is so cool. I love that it's living in out pond. It's a gift from nature.
Me: Yes, it's nice to look at, but have you considered the financial and ethical implications of that swan?
Kid 2: What?
Me: The president of the college paid 20,000 dollars for that swan. He bought it because prospective students and their parents are coming this weekend. Then they injured its wings so it can't fly far enough away to leave the pond.
Kid 1: Wait, what? No. That can't be right. Why would he do that for prospective students?
Then Perry jumped in. He knew what I was up to. He was like Van Damme in Bloodsport ... no hesitation, no fear, no mercy, a professional killer totally in the zone.
Perry: You didn't already know about the swan? I thought everyone knew about the purchase of the swan. What the hell happened to campus activism? Anyways, the president bought the swan so prospective students and their parents will walk past the pond, see the swan, and then think "hey look at that magnificent swan. This place is lovely, it's like a fairytale campus." Then the parents will be like, "shit Jr., I'll pay 50 grand a year to send you to this place. Wait, let me get my camera, pose in from of the swan." Next thing you know, we have a bunch of kids enrolling for next year who before seeing the swan were only 'considering' even applying.
Me: Ya, the idea is golden. I heard they crunched the numbers and calculated that the swan will get at least one or two prospective students to come to this dump. Think about that, over four years that's like $200,000 a person. If the swan convinces 5 people that this is a quality campus ... BAM SONNNNN it's like a million dollar swan. Granted there are ethical considerations, like the livelihood of the animal itself, but the president doesn't care, he's a bottom line kind of guy. The swan's pain is our gain.
Everyone at the table in unison: Wowwww. That's crazy, that poor swan ...
The whole table believed EVERY word of our story. Perry and I walked back to our dorm chuckling about the cock-and-bull story we'd just concocted. But we didn't think much of it after that.
Until two days later. While in the dining hall, we overheard some hippies talking. "Dude, did you hear the president payed like 20 grand for that swan? Ya, to get prospectives to come here. But the messed up thing is, man, they injured its wing so it can't fly far enough away to leave campus. It's really, really kinda effed up." We turned around and looked back at who was speaking. We had never even seen these dirty hippies.
Two days after that, a girl we vaguely knew came up to us to chitchat. At some point in the conversation she threw in "hey guys, did you hear about how the president paid like 20,000 dollars for that swan, then like broke it's wing so it can't leave campus?" "Nooo, really? Tell us about it, it sounds like foul play me," we'd respond.
By day five we'd heard our story about the great swan purchase from at least 10 totally different, seemingly unrelated people each. The story had completely rounded the campus. It had economics kids debating cost benefit analyses of the swan purchase at lunch, and philosophy kids debating the ethics of animal exploitation at dinner.
The story of the great swan purchase culminated when the college newspaper wrote an article that debunked the rumor. But it was too late, we'd had our fun.
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