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side.”
    Mostly, I remember, I simply didn’t like putting my face under the water.
    Miss Cathy told me I could use the backstroke, if that’s what I wanted. But I was going to check off every item on the practice plan. “You’re going to learn,” she said, “one way or the other.”
    I complained and whined some more.
    Even so, I finished every item on her plan. And soon enough Ilearned how to flip over onto my tummy and learned to swim the freestyle.
    It would be a couple years yet until I would be diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. All everyone knew, in particular my mom, my sisters, and my coaches, was that I had all this energy and that I could bleed off a lot of it by playing sports: baseball, soccer, lacrosse, swimming, you name it.
    What I discovered soon after starting to swim was that the pool was a safe haven. I certainly couldn’t have put that into words then but can look back and see it now. Two walls at either end. Lane lines on either side. A black stripe on the bottom for direction. I could go fast in the pool, it turned out, in part because being in the pool slowed down my mind.
    In the water, I felt, for the first time, in control. Swimmers like to say they can “feel” the water. Even early on, I felt it. I didn’t have to fight the water. Instead, I could feel how I moved in it. How to be balanced. What might make me go faster or slower.
    It would be ridiculous to say that I was a world-class talent from the very start. If it wasn’t for the fact that Hilary and Whitney were swimming, I probably wouldn’t even have started swimming.
    I was a kid. A kid who was given to whining and—it’s true—crying. I was seemingly forever on the verge of tears. My coaches remember a kid who was constantly being picked on. When I was younger, it seemed like almost anything could set me off into an emotional jag or launch me into a full-on tantrum, throwing my goggles and generally carrying on.
    All this agitation was probably just my way of seeking attention. Mostly, I wanted to fit in, especially with the older kids. I just wanted to be acknowledged.
    And yet, amid all this drama, I already had a dream: I wanted to win an Olympic gold medal.
    One.
    Just one. That was it at the start. Just one medal.
    I also knew that winning Olympic medals was, truly, possible. It happened to people I knew. When I was seven, Anita Nall, a North Baltimore swimmer, won a gold, a silver, and a bronze at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona. When I was eleven, Beth Botsford, another North Baltimore swimmer, won two gold medals in Atlanta.
    My Olympic ambitions might not have been obvious, granted, especially early on and especially in the mornings, when I’d have to get up for practice. I have never been what you’d call enthusiastic about being up early in the morning.
    Mom would come to get me out of bed. It would still be dark out. She would turn on a soft light in my room, a little night-light, and say, “Good morning, Michael. It’s time for morning workout.”
    I would grump and groan.
    Mom would go down the steps. I would just lie there in bed, nice and comfy. A few minutes later, she would come back and say, “Pop-Tarts are coming out of the toaster now. I’ll be in the car waiting for you. Pick them up on your way out the door, because Bob’s expecting you at workout.”
    My mom would go out to the car and sit, waiting for me. Bob is a morning person. He likes to get up before dawn. It’s his favorite part of the day. Always has been.
    Later, into middle school and high school, I remember driving in the dark to the pool and there never being any lights on at any house on the way there, and it would just be my mom and me, alone, going to practice. Sometimes my mom would yawn; I still can’t believe how loud she sounds when she is yawning.
    Once my mom had dropped me off at Meadowbrook, about 15