“You wouldn’t think this, but I almost never went to the beach as a kid, even though it was only a few miles away. The first time I ever went to the ocean I couldn’t believe it. My dad took us, and I was so scared at the size of the ocean. Also, I had light skin that burned easily and I didn’t like squinting against the sun for hours. Once I went with my friend Rich Sloan and I kept my jeans on so the sun couldn’t get to me. And there was barely any surfing either. I tried once and got conked on the head with the board. So Los Angeles and California were more about the idea of going in the ocean than they were about actually going in the ocean. I liked to look at it, though. It was sort of like a piece of music: each of the waves was moving around by itself, but they were also moving together.”