Dave would greet a swan by raising his arm straight up in the air, with hand pointing down. This would be accompanied by an angry swan hissing noise. He identified with the ugly duckling from the children's song.  The misfit, rejected and told to “Get out of town”  Please read Peters account of hostility towards Dave at a swimming pool In “ A major incident”  
When Dave was 19 and and I was 13 I stumbled on the idea of making money by selling cream teas in the front garden as a summer job.  Whenever there were customers in the front garden. Dave would go round the back make himself scarce. Anti-social  Asperger behaviour you might think. When I quizzed him about changing his route he said “It’s because I make people feel uncomfortable” He was caught in the double bind of having to accommodate for other peoples inability to accommodate him. No wonder he was so frustrated and enraged as a child.
It may well explain his love of superhero such as the Incredible Hulk and Spiderman. In a world where you can’t fight back, super hero provide wish fulfilment. The Incredible Hulks name was “David Banner”  and Bannerman his most loved song has the line “He was 10 feet tall and he touched the sky, I wish I could be a banner man”. This was played at his funeral. The only other song, played as his coffin was lowered into the ground was music from Swan Lake. Dave believed the myth that a swans wing was so strong it could “break a mans leg” A creature to admire gliding elegantly through water. With it’s warning hiss and powerful wings it was also a dangerous force to be reckoned with. 
One of the only ways to get Dave to set of enthusiastically on a walk, was to take him somewhere there would be swans. The YMCA which housed the Adult Learning Centre where he went to work Monday to Friday was situated by Bridgwater canal. Giving the swans some bird food was a much loved daily ritual.Dave named a signet on the canal Ayesha after his niece. Ayesha was unfortunately the sole survivor of the three eggs. “ Arianna and Leon (named after another Nephew and Niece) were eaten by rat’s” He solemnly stated “ I saw the rat running over the mum’s back and out of the nest” Luckily the remaining signet   “Ayesha turned into a  most beautiful Swan” who finally left the canal  “for a different pond”