WHEN I WAS growing up in Los Angeles, I hated going to the beach. I didn't mind it so much at sundown, when it was empty and you could wear a sweatshirt. It was daytime beach culture that scared me. All those families with their out-of-control kids and those floppy-haired surfer boys with their knee-length, Velcro-waisted Quicksilver shorts. They flaunted a sense of unchecked physical freedom that I, a late bloomer who stitched hook-rug dachshunds while my sister was out earning her varsity letter, was wholly unprepared for. I didn't even like the ocean.