The light is pale and you can’t see where the water ends and the sky starts, but it’s not exactly mist. You can’t touch it, it doesn’t settle on your skin. It’s just that the air is a bit thicker, that it smudges all the edges of things.

The water is beautiful and the ripples from my fingers run out toward that invisible horizon. It’s early evening and the walkers are sparse on the shingle. The cloudy sea is flat, still, a mirror waiting to be broken. I strike away from the beach, away from the sheltered bay between the groynes. The blues are muted to the point of white, shades like a wall paint chart. They shimmer with the shifting of the light.

The ends of my hair under my bobble hat splay out like spider’s webs on the water. It’s very quiet, just the soft whisper of the water lapping. I don’t stay in long, a few gulps, kicks, gasps, then out to change against the darkening sky feeling renewed.

I’m raising money for the Alzheimer’s Society. Please sponsor me at http://www.justgiving.com/swimbonnieswim