Every time I step onto the deck of Sava pool in the Sunset, I feel like I'm walking into that pool scene from Cocoon. Maybe it's the echoey atmosphere, or the weak sunlight. But I'm pretty sure it's all the old people floating around. My favorite time to go is weekday mornings and that's when the senior swimmers are out in force. Now where I'm from, swimming pools are strictly associated with hot, summer, and kids, so an indoor pool populated by floating oldies is an otherworldly experience, more akin to Eastern European health spas than the dunks of my youth.

You may not realize this, but San Francisco has a fine network of neighborhood natatoriums. In the city of "the coldest winter I ever spent was summer in San Francisco," an indoor pool is both a blessing and a necessity. Besides Sava in the Sunset, there's Garfield (Mission), Balboa (Balboa Park), Hamilton (Western Addition), North Beach, and Rossi (Inner Richmond). The price of admission is $3.00 (12 swims for $28 and, of course, senior discounts). Be warned: don't just show up and expect a good swim. The schedule is a labyrinth of free swims, laps swims, baby swims, etc., so check individual pools for times before you go. There is a Sasquatch-like website that lists all this information: I swear I found it once and even bookmarked it, but like Bigfoot, it's proven elusive. Phone numbers are listed below.

Your three bucks will gain you entry into a strictly utilitarian affair: a dressing room with the requisite damp benches, chloriney smells, group showers, and dented lockers (it's BYO lock if your a security nut); and the pool, with more requisite dampness but also lanes, lifeguards, kick boards, and of course, the old people. I always go for the lap swim and the set up is thus: oversized lanes for slow, medium or fast swimmers (for the Cocoon sessions, that's slow, slower and standing). Choose your speed, jump in and lap swim till your arms drop off. The whole experience has a quality of brusque healthiness, of we're all doing this for our own good, that will nearly override the ridiculousness you feel squeezing your white, white body into that old suit.

It really is terrific and lovely to be paddling away in the warmish pool with Jessica Tandy and Wilford Brimley while the fog rolls by outside. Afterwards, you will feel spent and clean and sleepy and giddy. I promise.

Additional pools in the East Bay, check local phone books.

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