“So now I swim laps, but I pretend I’m a crocodile. I rest my chin on the kickboard, with my eyes just above the water. The board protrudes like a snout, and I kick with reptilian smoothness, slow and steady, observing and thinking. Are the other people just counting laps and watching the clock? Or, like me, are they playing a game? Half the fun of swimming is pretending. In the water, I’m never just myself - I am a long-distance champion, a mermaid or whale or castaway or otter.”