A child.  You can sense his confidence has grown a week on.  No inflatables around his arms today.  You approach slowly, taking time with breath and stroke, working to establish a smooth rhythm; leg-kick, head-dip and body-stretch.  No more than three years old and legs hardly long enough to scramble onto the starting block; he is fiercely independent.  On the block now and straight off into the deep end, ignoring a mother’s nervous outstretched hand.  He rises to the surface gurgling and kicking as you reach the end of your first length, curl up, feet on the wall, turn and push off for the return and avoid him.  You grin at his bravado.