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WASHINGTON — Gov. Gavin Newsom said he would not run for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2028 if Kamala Harris does so, appearing to offer deference to the former vice president ahead of a race that could draw a historically crowded field of candidates.

“I wouldn’t run if she ran,” Newsom told CNN’s Jake Tapper in an interview posted Monday. “Why would I? I wouldn’t do that to her. … I wouldn’t do it to you, I wouldn’t waste everyone’s time.”

Newsom appeared to acknowledge a desire to avoid the possibly messy fight for California backers that could ensue if both were to run, saying there would be “pure crossover” between Harris’ supporters and his.

The governor’s effective yield to Harris diminishes the possibility of a showdown between two of California’s most powerful political figures in an election whose stakes are viewed by the Democratic Party as existential. The possibility of Harris making a second attempt at the presidency after her loss to President Trump in 2024 has hung as the biggest question over the potential Democratic field.

Both Newsom and Harris have acknowledged they are considering presidential bids in 2028, but Harris has closely held her intentions. She said last week that she had not decided whether to run, telling former soccer player Megan Rapinoe in a podcast interview that she was focused on working full time to help Democrats win the midterms.

A spokesperson for Harris declined to comment. Representatives for Newsom did not immediately respond to a request Monday afternoon.

Harris has appeared as the party front-runner in multiple polls about 2028, including one in July that showed her beating Newsom by double digits. But questions have continually circulated within the party about whether voters who are scarred from the party’s 2024 loss would be enthusiastic about a Harris run.

Several California donors told The Times in May that they did not plan to support Harris or did not want to discuss a possible bid by her; in a few corners, more enthusiasm came through for Newsom.

The dynamics around the 2028 Democratic primary continue to evolve as party hopefuls jockey for the spotlight, and they shifted notably with the selection of South Carolina as the party’s first primary state. That choice could give Harris a boost if South Carolina’s Black voters move in her favor.

Harris and Newsom came up in politics in the same era and have never before run in an election against each other, operating their political careers largely in parallel rather than in competition. In February, Newsom said on CNN that he had “never gotten in the way of her ambition” and he didn’t “imagine I would in the future,” saying “fate” would determine whether they ran against each other.

Newsom swung through South Carolina this month, the type of move generally interpreted as laying the groundwork for a presidential bid. In the CNN interview, Newsom noted that he did not know whether Harris would run and agreed it was a “pretty good case” to make when Tapper raised the argument that Harris had had her chance at the presidency and Newsom had not yet.

The governor suggested that a fight between him and Harris would split their supporters’ vote in a way that would be “a gift from God for everybody else” in the race, saying “it services no greater good” for both of them to run. He also nodded to their overlapping political circles.

“I know her base of supporters, I know her friends. The [Venn] diagram on that is just pure crossover,” Newsom said. “I wouldn’t do that.”

The interview was filmed in Montana, where Newsom’s in-laws own a ranch, as Newsom and Tapper fly-fished together. The full segment was set to air Tuesday.

Newsom said that in order to decide to run, a candidate needs to be able to “meet the moment.”

“You gotta be honest with yourself,” he said. “Do you represent the zeitgeist of the moment or are you wasting everybody’s time?”

Turn on a radio between 1978 and 1987 and you were sure to hear Journey — any of the more than two dozen sumptuous yet muscular rock hits that shaped young America’s ideas about love, inspiration and wanting it the way you need it. Four decades later, the band’s music is still everywhere, including television, social media and streaming platforms like Spotify, where Journey has more monthly listeners than Bruce Springsteen, U2 or Bob Dylan. Yet Saturday night the group will bring what it’s calling its farewell tour to Crypto.com Arena — a capstone (at least if the band is to be believed) to a long career full of twists and turns.

Indeed, domination was hardly a given when guitarist Neal Schon and keyboardist Gregg Rolie — both of whom had played with Carlos Santana — formed Journey as a kind of jazzy proto-jam band in San Francisco in 1973. But with the addition a few years later of singer Steve Perry, the group found its gloriously dramatic sound and began racking up hits one after the next (though critics were rarely kind). Perry eventually quit, which took the wind out of Journey’s sails until Schon discovered an uncanny soundalike from the Philippines, Arnel Pineda, on YouTube; he’s helped the band get back into arenas and the occasional stadium even as Schon and keyboardist Jonathan Cain, who replaced Rolie in 1980, have battled each other in court over financial matters.

Got all that? To try to make sense of Journey’s path, I’ve ranked all 25 of the band’s hits that have charted on Billboard’s Hot 100, starting with the worst and ending with the best. Hold onto that feeling — it goes on and on and on and on.

25. ‘Walks Like a Lady’ (peaked at No. 32 in July 1980)

Some are born to sing the blues, as Perry once observed — just not Perry himself, who chews his way through this corny come-on like an overserved uncle at the Hard Rock Cafe. Nice showcase for Rolie’s organ work, though, on one of the last Journey singles he played on before leaving the band.

24. ‘Just the Same Way’ (peaked at No. 58 in May 1979)

Rolie and Perry tag-teaming lead vocals is not a form of democracy I’d vote for.

23. ‘After the Fall’ (peaked at No. 23 in August 1983)

Safe? Sterile? Soulless? Look, the haters can’t always be wrong.

22. ‘Too Late’ (peaked at No. 70 in January 1980)

“Before your time has run astray / You’ve got to try to get away.”

21. ‘Anytime’ (peaked at No. 83 in July 1978)

After overseeing Queen’s first few albums, producer Roy Thomas Baker turned his attention to Journey (and to the Cars); this midtempo number from the “Infinity” LP offers a credible approximation of Queen’s trademark stacked vocal harmonies.

20. ‘The Party’s Over (Hopelessly in Love)’ (peaked at No. 34 in April 1981)

Three platinum plaques in less than two years — for “Infinity,” “Evolution” and “Departure” — meant that Journey had no choice but to drop a live record, “Captured,” at the top of 1981. (It went platinum by Christmas.) As extra consumer bait, the double album closed with this new studio cut built around a killer Schon lick (and not much else).

19. ‘Good Morning Girl’/‘Stay Awhile’ (peaked at No. 55 in September 1980)

Phantom of the roller rink.

18. ‘Why Can’t This Night Go On Forever’ (peaked at No. 60 in May 1987)

Propelled by the success of his debut solo album — not to mention his appearance on the smash all-star “We Are the World” — Perry assumed greater control of Journey’s sound for 1986’s synthed-up “Raised on Radio,” which spawned no fewer than five singles, ending with this slightly lugubrious ballad. Yet the takeover came with a cost: By the end of 1987, the band had entered a hiatus that would last nearly a decade.

17. ‘Still They Ride’ (peaked at No. 19 in July 1982)

Listen to how nimbly Perry maneuvers some very tricky intervals.

16. ‘When You Love a Woman’ (peaked at No. 12 in December 1996)

Journey reunited for 1996’s “Trial by Fire,” which brought the band its only Grammy nomination (and which might feature the ghastliest album cover in music history). If the members knew that rock had changed dramatically while they were away, they didn’t show it in the LP’s romantic lead single: “When You Love a Woman” — a chart-topper for three weeks on Billboard’s adult contemporary tally — clearly sought to pick up where “Open Arms” and “Faithfully” had left off.

15. ‘Girl Can’t Help It’ (peaked at No. 17 in November 1986)

Wonder what Perry and Huey Lewis talked about between takes on “We Are the World.”

14. ‘Be Good to Yourself’ (peaked at No. 9 in May 1986)

“Karate Kid”-core.

13. ‘Only the Young’ (peaked at No. 9 in March 1985)

More “Karate Kid”-core, in this case released first as a song by Patty Smyth’s band Scandal; Journey’s version later wound up alongside Madonna’s “Crazy for You” on the soundtrack to “Vision Quest.”

12. ‘Wheel in the Sky’ (peaked at No. 57 in May 1978)

Before Perry came aboard in 1977, Journey spent a few months with Robert Fleischman as lead singer — long enough for Fleischman to co-write the group’s first Hot 100 entry, not so long that he got to sing it on the record.

11. ‘Any Way You Want It’ (peaked at No. 23 in April 1980)

Ooh, baby, hold tight.

10. ‘Suzanne’ (peaked at No. 17 in August 1986)

Easily Perry’s most unhinged vocal performance.

9. ‘Send Her My Love’ (peaked at No. 23 in November 1983)

A luscious and melancholy white-soul song that I’d bet Phil Collins admired back in the day — and that Justin Bieber would probably flip for now.

8. ‘Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’’ (peaked at No. 16 in October 1979)

Inducting Journey into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2017, Train’s Pat Monahan belted the na-na-na outro of the band’s first Top 40 hit as he made his case for the group’s excellence. “They didn’t even need lyrics — that’s how badass this band is,” he pointed out. Still, let’s not gloss over the appealing perversity of starting a song this horny the way Perry does: “You make me weep and want to die.”

7. ‘Lights’ (peaked at No. 68 in September 1978)

Dodgers fans can delight in the fact that Perry originally wrote this paean to San Francisco — an anthem taken up at one time or another by every Bay Area pro sports team, including the Giants — about the lights going down and the sun shining on … Los Angeles. (Swap out “the bay” for “L.A.”) Maybe that’s why “Lights” has always felt to me like a precursor to the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge.”

6. ‘Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)’ (peaked at No. 8 in March 1983)

[Listens to “Eye of the Tiger” once.]

5. ‘I’ll Be Alright Without You’ (peaked at No. 14 in February 1987)

Shout out to future “American Idol” judge Randy Jackson, who joined Journey for “Raised on Radio” and proceeded to lay down the slinkiest, sultriest, funkiest bass line the band had ever known.

4. ‘Don’t Stop Believin’’ (peaked at No. 9 in December 1981)

Believin’ in what, exactly? The genius of Journey’s most-streamed track on Spotify (with more than 2.9 billion plays) is its use of concrete images to advance a pretty mysterious narrative. We’ve all stood under a streetlight; we all know the smell of wine and cheap perfume. Yet everybody’s midnight train is going to a different anywhere.

3. ‘Open Arms’ (peaked at No. 2 in February 1982)

Famously — and fortuitously — rejected by a former bandmate of Cain’s as “sentimental rubbish,” “Open Arms” was perhaps just waiting to be embraced by Perry, who sings it with the wounded gusto of a man well acquainted with regret. In a poetic twist, Journey’s highest-charting hit was blocked from No. 1 by the J. Geils Band’s “Centerfold,” in which the heartbroken narrator goes laughing all the way to his bed.

2. ‘Who’s Crying Now’ (peaked at No. 4 in October 1981)

The first of three Top 10 singles from 1981’s 10-times-platinum “Escape,” this immaculate R&B jam imagines an alternate dimension where Perry and Cain hear Earth, Wind & Fire’s “After the Love Has Gone” and decide to form a new group with David Foster. Except Perry remembers the song as a high point for Schon: “You know the guitar outro from ‘Who’s Crying Now’?” he asked a New York Times reporter in 2003. “I fought for that because I knew no DJ would cut that song off with Neal’s guitar wailing at the end of it. It was too brilliant.”

1. ‘Faithfully’ (peaked at No. 12 in June 1983)

It wasn’t the first rock ballad about life on the road — and it definitely wasn’t the last — but “Faithfully” might be the most emotionally generous: “Loving a music man ain’t always what it’s supposed to be,” Perry tells his lady, grounding the song in the experience of those who leave and those left behind; later, he envisions their reunion with such tenderness — “I’ll get the joy of rediscovering you” — that you know he’s already decided to take off again.

At the end of a topsy-turvy Saturday that saw the Big Ten’s top contenders tumble, Trent Mosley stood just inside USC’s 15-yard line, looking skyward.

By that point, Ohio State had just blown a 20-point, fourth-quarter lead to Texas, and Oregon had, hours earlier, been stunned by Oklahoma State. The path to the top of the Big Ten suddenly seemed open as ever, just as the Trojans’ tremendous freshman caught the punt and took off in search of an opening himself.

With his stunning start to the season, no one player at USC — and perhaps in all the nation — had manufactured more hope through two games. While the conference’s other top teams spent the day licking their wounds, here, once again, was Mosley weaving joyfully through the open field and conjuring the very same magic from thin air. He shook off one tackle, then another. Soon enough, he was gone for an 86-yard punt return, and the No. 14 Trojans were rolling, comfortably on their way to a 49-30 win over Louisiana.

The second half didn’t feel quite as hopeful, as the Trojans let up and let Louisiana linger around through a victory that coach Lincoln Riley deemed “up and down.”

Still, the win was USC’s 10th straight at home, going back to the 2024 season, and gives the Trojans’ a spotless nonconference slate in 2026 — not that anyone would confuse their early-season schedule for a murderer’s row. There won’t be any easy home wins from here, though, with USC’s next three games against Oregon, Washington and Ohio State.

“It’s been good getting adjusted to this,” Mosley said. “But now we go on the road, so that’ll be a new adjustment.”

USC has, in glimpses this season, looked like a team that belongs among those Big Ten behemoths. And the most encouraging of those moments have largely come from the Trojans’ talented freshman class.

Mosley, who also had an acrobatic receiving touchdown Saturday, wasn’t the only one who made his presence felt. Tight end Mark Bowman had his eagerly anticipated breakout game, as he exploded for six catches, one of which he capped by hurdling two defenders. He finished with 83 yards and two touchdowns, all in the first half. Defensive tackle Luke Wafle, meanwhile, continued his streak of early dominance by tallying a team-leading seven tackles.

USC tight end Mark Bowman hurdles over Louisiana safety Kody Jackson during the first half Saturday.

(Kevin Terrell / Getty Images)

“I feel like our peak, our trajectory should be even higher because of how many young guys are playing,” Riley said.

The win wasn’t nearly as dominant an effort for the rest of USC’s defense, which was coming off of a shutout of Fresno State. Louisiana averaged 7.6 yards per play and scored 20 points in the second half, led by dual threat quarterback Lunch Winfield, who scampered to 91 rushing yards.

“We’re just gonna take this as a learning moment,” defensive tackle Jide Abasiri said. “I just feel like sometimes we’ll get comfortable or complacent, then that’s something we need to, going forward, fix when adversity hits.”

It wasn’t the sharpest night for the Trojans’ offense, either. Though, you wouldn’t know it from the box score. While USC rushed for 214 yards, nearly 100 came in the fourth quarter, with the game well in hand. Quarterback Jayden Maiava put up numbers once again, as well, completing 19 of 29 passes for 261 yards and five touchdowns.

USC receiver Trent Mosley makes a touchdown catch under pressure from Louisiana safety Maurion Eleam Saturday at the Coliseum.

(Mark J. Terrill / Ap Photo/mark J. Terrill)

The five passing scores tied a career high. But Maiava said after the game that it “definitely didn’t feel like” that strong of a performance.

Through two games, Maiava had accounted for as many touchdowns (six) as he had incomplete passes entering Saturday’s game. But on Saturday, he missed his first three passes, the third of which went directly to a Louisiana defensive back.

The interception was Maiava’s first of the season, and it led to a Louisiana field goal, giving the Ragin’ Cajuns (1-1) an early lead. It was also the first time the Trojans trailed this season.

USC (3-0) and its quarterback settled down after that. The Trojans mounted a 12-play scoring drive on the ensuing possession, and Maiava found Bowman for a five-yard score. Then, they mounted a 10-play drive, and Maiava found Bowman again.

By that point, USC’s offense had piled up almost 200 yards, while Louisiana had scraped together just 18.

But the Ragin’ Cajuns refused to go away — for the moment, at least. They marched the length of the field and scored, cutting USC’s lead to 14-10.

That was the closest they’d get. The Trojans mounted a third straight drive of 10 plays or more, and this time, Maiava fired a touchdown pass through the hands of a Louisiana defensive back on its way to freshman Kayden Dixon-Wyatt.

The knockout blow came soon after that. After its follow-up drive went nowhere, Louisiana made the mistake of punting to Mosley, who took off sprinting to his right and didn’t stop until he reached paydirt.

The punt return was his fourth score of the season. He added a fifth before the final buzzer sounded.

The rest of the night wouldn’t go nearly as smoothly. The intensity, Riley said, “dipped a little bit.” Louisiana would linger, well into the fourth quarter.

But by then, the Trojans could safely coast their way to a clean non-conference sheet, knowing the trust test of their season – and their stellar true freshmen – is still to come.

As a kid growing up in rural Oklahoma, I feared what lurked beneath the lake water.

I’d listen as my family spun yarns about the massive catfish they’d discovered while noodling. I was terrified that, despite their docile nature that not a single adult told me about, an alligator gar would eat me while I bobbed in the lake. Old timers would recount finding a water moccasin in their boat. And I’ve still never recovered from the concept of a “breeding ball,” which a friend’s cousin’s cousin claimed to have run into while water skiing.

Despite the fact that nothing bad ever happened to me in a lake, my fear stayed with me into adulthood. I’ve met several Californians who hold fears similar to mine, but rather than lakes, their outsized anxieties lie within the ocean. It not only keeps them from swimming at our local beaches but also from venturing beyond the shallow shoreline.

An underwater view near Terranea Resort on the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

In this week’s edition of The Wild, our weekly outdoors newsletter, I will discuss how to safely tackle those fears and start exploring with a snorkeling kit. Get ready to learn about the incredibly diverse and colorful world that lives beneath our local waters — you’re about to feel like Ariel exploring a whole new world! Let’s dive in.

I spoke to Ralph Buck, who founded Barnacle Busters, an L.A.-based LGBTQ scuba club, with two others almost 40 years ago. Buck’s passion for helping others learn how to safely explore the ocean was so infectious that by the time we ended our call, I was seriously considering whether I should get my scuba certification (which is a story for another day).

Here’s what Buck advised regarding snorkeling.

The Wild writer Jaclyn Cosgrove snorkels among what appear to be grunion or topsmelt near the coastline of the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

1. Get the right gear

Generally you will need the following gear to get started:

• A correctly sized mask and snorkel.
• A wetsuit (with booties, as a bonus, to protect your feet): Generally, 7 mm is a great thickness for Southern California, although our water is warmer because of our El Niño season (and climate change).
• A life jacket or flotation device: This is considered optional, as the wetsuit will help you float, but there’s absolutely no shame in being extra safe! (And if you don’t have a wetsuit, please do wear a life jacket.)
• Fins: It might be too strong to suggest they’re “optional,” but they can be awkward for those new to snorkeling and not necessary if you’re in calm enough waters or an overall strong swimmer.
• Camera: Very, very optional. While out at Santa Cruz Island two weeks ago, I took some terrible underwater photos with my iPhone and wished I’d just left it on the shore.
• Weight belt: If you want to dive, you might need a weight belt to help you go under. That said, this is a more advanced tool, and it’s good to just focus on the basics as you get more comfortable in the water.

One thing new snorkelers might not realize is the level of buoyancy that a wetsuit gives you. Both times I’ve been in the past month, I wore a 7-mm suit and loved how easy it was to float above the eel grass at Santa Cruz Island and the kelp on the coast of Palos Verdes. I love a sport that includes just lying around.

Kelp, sea grass and various algae grow beneath the water at Terranea Beach Cove in Rancho Palos Verdes.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

2. Plan for getting your wetsuit on

For anyone on the shore of Prisoners Harbor two weeks ago, they got the pleasure of watching me groan (and curse) as I maneuvered into a thick wetsuit without anything but my swimsuit on. I told my friend I knew what sausage felt like as it’s shoved into its casing.

Zach Cantrell, owner of Ventura Dive and Sport, gave me a tip I will be eternally grateful for: Bring a plastic bag or something else that will help you slide into your wetsuit, as it helps reduce the friction between your body and the wetsuit. I brought one with me when my colleague, Allen J. Schaben, and I went out last week, and getting my wetsuit on was a breeze. No human sausage vibes (or cursing).

Buck suggested other options might be pantyhose or a long-sleeved unitard. Anything to help you slide into your wetsuit!

3. Before going out, practice in a pool

“I would suggest before hitting the open water, go hop in a pool and maybe find an experienced snorkeler to go with you simply because there are some subtle little pieces to the puzzle, which are” easy to miss for a new snorkeler, Buck said.

That includes the direction to point your snorkel. If it’s pointing too far forward, you will likely find yourself breathing straight saltwater as the waves hit you. But if you point it straight up or tilt it a bit backward, it’ll help your breathing apparatus stay clear.

A variety of marine life living around the rocky bottom of Terranea Beach Cove in Rancho Palos Verdes.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

4. Never snorkel alone

You look out at the ocean and see calm waters. You hear the siren’s call. You are alone. Resist.

Despite looking like a fairly chill activity, snorkeling still comes with significant risks that will be exacerbated if swimming alone. While out with my colleague off the coast of Rancho Palos Verdes, he pointed out a massive rock that I thought I could maneuver around. I timed my movements wrong and whacked right into it. I was fine, but also glad someone had my back if I wasn’t.

5. Assess the day’s conditions

• Check the weather. If it is a particularly windy day, it’s likely not a good day for snorkeling, not only for safety reasons but also visibility.
• Check the surf. There are several websites that pull data about the height of the surf, including the L.A. County Department of Beaches & Harbors.
• Before entering, scan the shore to assess the movement of the water.
• Learn how to spot rip currents. Rip currents “most commonly form at low spots or breaks in sandbars and near structures such as groins, jetties, and piers,” according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“If you’re a beginner, and the waves are higher than knee high, I would just go to brunch,” Buck said. “If the surf’s too big, your visibility is going to suck anyway.”

I do love any excuse to have waffles.

The Wild writer Jaclyn Cosgrove carefully enters the water at Terranea Cove Beach in Rancho Palos Verdes.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

6. Choose an area that’s easy to enter and exit

This includes sandy beaches, where you can easily wade into the water without losing your balance. At Prisoners Harbor, I fell over several times because the shore is covered in various fist-sized rocks. (I need to work on my balance.) Snorkeling off the Palos Verdes Peninsula, I took my time, watched the waves and slowly moved into the water as the waves allowed. I found that, when there are rocks around, walking into the water like I’m navigating a balance beam is a good approach.

Also, in terms of looking for the best spots to snorkel, look for kelp forests and rock reefs. And because you’re newer, I would stick to spots known for snorkeling.

7. Plan for fog

Buck said before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Barnacle Busters, like most diver clubs, would recommend a simple solution to fog in your goggles: Spit. They still recommend using your spit in bodies of water where your germs won’t immediately affect other swimmers like in the ocean.

You can also buy an anti-fogging agent for your goggles. If you take your goggles off at any point as you snorkel, you’ll need to reapply either spit or anti-fog spray.

While I was out snorkeling, I was amazed at how well spit worked. (And if you want to understand the science behind why this works, check out this blog post from Scuba.com.)

A garibaldi, California’s state fish, at Casino Point Dive Park on Catalina Island in 2016.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

8. Check in with yourself and your partner

You should check in with your partner every 30 seconds. That might feel like it’s way too frequent, but you’ll be amazed at how far apart you can float from your friend in that time frame. It can be as simple as making sure you see them and they see you.

9. Keep an eye out for hazards

When entering the water, you’ll want to do the “stingray shuffle” to ensure you alert any nearby rays of your presence. Around L.A. County, you’ll also want to watch out for sea urchins because their spines can prick your skin, which will require treatment if you bump into them.

As our county lifeguards point out, L.A. beaches aren’t typically places you’ll find the most dangerous jellyfish. “Jellyfish in Southern California are usually smaller in scale and have a more mild sting than other species found around the world,” according to the agency’s website.

(And don’t worry. Electric eels don’t live in the ocean.)

I asked Buck how often he and his fellow divers check for hazards like sharks.

He told me that outside of rocks, high surf and going out too deep for one’s skill level, he and his diving partners don’t think too much about hazards in our local waters.

Purple sea urchins grow on a rock near the shore of Prisoners Harbor on Santa Cruz Island in the Channel Islands National Park.

(Jaclyn Cosgrove / Los Angeles Times)

“Well, we don’t consider sharks to be a hazard at all. My husband and I blame Steven Spielberg for the irrational fear of sharks,” Buck said, referencing Spielberg’s 1975 film “Jaws” and the adverse effects the film had on white sharks.

Buck said he and his husband rarely see sharks. He does give some weight to the argument that divers in wetsuits can resemble seals and sea lions when floating on the surface.

“But in areas where you’ll probably be snorkeling, you’ll probably be snorkeling on shallow rocky reefs or shallow kelp. It’s not even a consideration for us,” he said.

Lastly, if you or your partner start to shiver, get out.

The Wild writer Jaclyn Cosgrove snorkels at Terranea Cove Beach in Rancho Palos Verdes.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

10. Don’t touch anything

Practice Leave No Trace in the ocean too. “That’s our philosophy for diving too,” Buck said. “Look, but don’t touch.”

And never feed the marine life.

11. Have fun!

Since learning to snorkel, I’ve already found two friends who also enjoy it, and I plan to ping them to go out soon. If you don’t have anyone in your circle who snorkels yet, consider joining a local club.

In a world that feels hard right now, I felt like I had a two-hour vacation as I floated above the bright green sea grass and golden yellow kelp, watching garibaldi and what appeared to be grunion or topsmelt bob and dive around me. I came out refreshed and grateful to live here.

3 things to do

The hike to Eaton Canyon Falls in the San Gabriel Mountains before the 2025 Eaton fire.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

1. Learn about Eaton Canyon’s future in Arcadia
L.A. County Parks and Recreation will host From Ashes to Action: Reimagining Eaton Canyon from 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday at the L.A. County Arboretum’s Ayres Hall (301 N. Baldwin Ave. in Arcadia). Attendees will learn about design concepts for the next Eaton Canyon nature center along with the latest work completed in the natural area. The event is free, but registration is required. Register at arboretum.org.

2. Service sage in San Pedro
Cabrillo Marine Aquarium (3720 Stephen M. White Drive) needs volunteers from 9 to 10:30 a.m. Saturday to work on its native plant garden. Participants will learn about plants as they work. All ages welcome. Learn more at cma.recreation.parks.lacity.gov.

3. Launch into Latino Conservation Week in L.A.
The Audubon Center at Debs Park will kick off Latino Conservation Week from noon to 6 p.m. Sunday at Metabolic Studio (1745 N. Spring St.). Activities include a bachata class, panel discussion and guided nature hike. Learn more at act.aubudon.org.

The must-read

Burn damage to the Torrey pine grove at Santa Rosa Island, as seen from a ferry on June 8.

(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)

Last week, the National Park Service announced that up to 80% of the rare Torrey pines on Santa Rosa Island in the Channel Islands National Park could die after being harmed by a wildfire in May. Times staff writer Corinne Purtill wrote that initially park officials were hopeful that because the fire, which charred through 40% of the 18,000-acre island, burned at low intensity through the grove, the trees could recover. Research found the fire hurt the mature trees’ exposed root systems. However, I am holding onto hope — for a few reasons. “Park staff have also collected more than 14,000 seeds released from the pine cones. Viable seeds will be planted and raised in a nursery until the seedlings can be planted in the grove,” Purtill wrote.

Another reason is that volunteers are already actively working to save these trees. You can help with that. The California Institute of Environmental Studies needs volunteers to help with recovery as well as with Channel Islands Restoration. You can also donate to the Channel Islands Park Foundation’s Santa Rosa fire resilience fund.

Now more than ever, it’s on us to protect our public lands.

Happy adventuring,

P.S.

While out kayaking off the coast of Santa Cruz Island last month, I yanked a plastic wrapper out of the ocean. I frequently pick up plastic snack wrappers and corners of wrappers that people have accidentally dropped on the trail. And not infrequently have I found thick plastic bags — those said to be reusable — floating in shallow water near the beach. In recent years, California lawmakers have passed laws to address our state’s plastic consumption, including the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act, or Senate Bill 54. Starting in 2027, the state will receive $500 million every year for 10 years to address plastic pollution, and state leaders want to hear from you how to best spend that money. You can submit your thoughts through Sept. 30 using this form or send your message using the email listed on the form’s webpage. Times staff writer Susanne Rust recently wrote about how there’s a secretive multimillion-dollar campaign to crush California’s landmark plastics law. If the battle over single-use plastic in California is something you’re passionate about, consider subscribing to Boiling Point, where my Times colleagues explore what’s happening to our climate-changed world. They’ll definitely keep you posted!

For more insider tips on Southern California’s beaches, trails and parks, check out past editions of The Wild. And to view this newsletter in your browser, click here.

Throughout his 40 years in Los Angeles, one piece of advice on where to live still rings true for Jimmy Smits, known for starring in “L.A. Law,” “NYPD Blue” and “Sons of Anarchy.” Long ago, producer Steven Bochco, who helped launch Smits’ TV career, encouraged the native New Yorker to stick around.

“He said, ‘I think you’re going to be working at Fox or around here for a while,’” Smits recalls. “‘Don’t be a schmuck. Stay near, so you can get to work on time. Get the s— house in the best ZIP Code you can.’”

In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.

And so, from West Los Angeles to Santa Monica to Brentwood, Smits and his wife, actor Wanda De Jesus, have made the Westside their home base.

“Even when I lived in Brooklyn, we were near water,” Smits says. “It’s not Coney Island, but it’s the Santa Monica Pier. We have this New York-L.A. thing.”

When he’s not working, Smits prioritizes relaxation and his spiritual life. Most Saturday evenings, there’s a Mass to attend. All physical activities are done near water.

Beyond acting, the Emmy and Golden Globe winner is an advocate for education and the arts. This year is the 30th anniversary of the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, which he co-founded to support emerging talent in the performing arts.

Here’s a look at his ideal Sunday, with a bit of a New York-L.A. state of mind.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

6:30 a.m.: First, the news

I still love reading the newspaper, tactile-wise. I keep the entertainment sections for weeks at a time for both the L.A. Times and New York Times. I recently had to go digital with the New York Times because my wife was like, “we can’t have all these newspapers around here!”

8 a.m.: People watching over breakfast

We’re not real foodies. Food is more like fuel for me. I love to experiment with different types of cuisines, but going to restaurants is more about the atmosphere. For breakfast, we’ll go to the Brentwood Farmers Market off San Vicente or the Coast Beach Café at Shutters on the Beach. You can people watch there. Or, they have an enclosure in the back that’s more chill. You can feel the ocean breeze on the water. If I’m really hungry, I’ll have the brioche French toast with some scrambled eggs and turkey bacon. But most of the time, it’s a pressed juice, English breakfast tea with warm milk and honey and a blueberry muffin.

9:30 a.m.: Beachside workouts

Part of the day will always have some kind of physical thing, and it’ll always relate to the water. Biking, brisk walking or wogging on the beach is ideal. If we’re biking, we’ll go up to where Will Rogers State Park is. It’s much quieter around there. We’ll start there and go towards the Santa Monica Pier and do laps back and forth. We’ll make stops along the way, at the Annenberg Community Beach House in Santa Monica or the bluffs at Palisades Park in Santa Monica, where they have a rose garden, [the California Incline roadway] and a lot of ways to get physical activity.

11:30 a.m.: What’s for lunch? Pasta

For lunch, it’s Divino, which is an Italian place in Brentwood. I’d order a light pasta and salad.

1 p.m.: Head to the playhouse for a matinee

My main go-to theaters are the Geffen Playhouse, which is close to us on the Westside; the Center Theatre Group, with the Ahmanson Theatre or the Mark Taper Forum, the Pasadena Playhouse or the Latino Theater Company Center at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, which specializes in Latino and multicultural productions. I get my New York theater fix by going to see plays at one of those places.

4 p.m.: Family time

At some point in the day, there would always be an East Coast call that winds up lasting way too long. With FaceTime, wherever we’re at, we can talk with the family, who are mostly in New York.

6 p.m.: Longtime faves for dinner

One of our favorite restaurants is Carlitos Gardel Argentine Steakhouse on Melrose Avenue, which has been around since the ‘90s. Italy plays big in Argentinian food, so you can get wonderful pastas there. I’ll usually have the entraña, which is a wood-grilled skirt steak, and the gnocchi is off the hook. The place reminds me of my college buddy-celebrity chef Michael Lomonaco, and his [former] restaurant Porter House in New York, where we’d go after the theater.

If not there, we’ll go to the restaurant we’ve been going to since I first got here. One of my first jobs was at then-MGM, which is now Sony, in Culver City. In ’86, I was working on “L.A. Law” and had a lunch break. I just wanted to walk around and found a Cuban restaurant called Versailles. I thought it was the closest I was going to get to the way Mom cooked. I developed a great relationship with the owners, the Garcia family. They have great Cuban food. I’ll have their arroz con pollo, which is chicken and rice.

8:30 p.m.: TV catch-up time

After dinner, we’d go home and get ready for the week. Depending on whether we go to a matinee or evening play, we would DVR stuff, like whatever sports that were on during the day that I missed. We’d definitely watch “60 Minutes,” “John Oliver” and pop in a movie or watch a stand-up comedy show. If we’re shooting something, I have to study for the next day. If not, we just relax, watch TV and go to bed between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m.

If Matthew Fine, a 5-foot-8, 165-pound senior running back and lacrosse star for Loyola High, needs a walk-up song, he can go back to 1969 when Frank Sinatra’s hit “My Way” came on the radio with the lyrics, “I did it my way.”

Fine, who lives in Manhattan Beach, declined to be interviewed last week before the Cubs’ game against the public school he lives five minutes from, Mira Costa. He didn’t want to give friends he grew up with any bulletin board material. Then he went out and rushed for 105 yards in a 14-7 Loyola victory.

It was fun for him to catch up with neighborhood kids he used to play with starting at age 5.

“I traded jerseys and traded photos,” he said. “It was nice talking to them.”

Asked if he walked home from the game, Fine said, “I actually considered it.”

Fine, with his speed and strength from lacrosse training, could be the comeback player of the year in football. He quit football after his sophomore year to focus on lacrosse. Loyola has one of the best lacrosse programs in the state, winning last season’s Southern Section championship. He’s earned a lacrosse scholarship to Utah.

Football coach Drew Casani had lobbied Fine to return to football before his junior year with no success. Last school year, after the lacrosse season ended, Casani sent him a text inviting him to return.

“I’m in,” Fine responded.

“I love football,” Fine said. “There was a lot of uncertainty. My junior year is where you get recruited for lacrosse. After sitting out a year and watching all the guys playing football, I got really jealous and wanted to jump back in.”

He rejoined the team this year starting at the bottom of the depth chart. Now he’s had back-to-back games rushing for more than 100 yards. This will be his first and only year playing on varsity.

“I’m doing this for fun,” he said. “I love football. I’ve been doing it longer than any other sport.”

Whenever the season ends, it will be Fine’s final football game.

“I don’t think I’ll have any regrets,” he said. “I’ll just be sad. I don’t want to think about that.”

Incredibly, as much as people believe football gets players in the best shape of their life, Fine once flunked his conditioning test for lacrosse after playing football.

“It’s a different type of conditioning,” he explained.

Casani is thrilled that Fine’s one year off from football has had little effect.

“He picked up seemingly where he left off,” Casani said. “ He’s fast, has vision and is hard to tackle.“

Don’t ask his father, Mickey, what Fine might do next or any day.

“My son does things his own way,” he said. “Sometimes I don’t understand it.”

With a 4.0 grade-point average and terrific lacrosse talent as an attacker, Fine has a bright future. For those who play intramural flag football on Utah’s campus, Fine could be the ringer to deliver a championship next year.

Start the early recruitment, Utes students.

It’s never too late to go back to school. But after years of deferred admission, can a new generation of students at Hillman College score high at delivering a compelling, modern take on the groundbreaking sitcom “A Different World”?

The foundation for an updated version of the popular sitcom set at a historically Black college was set three decades ago. In the 1993 series finale, the show’s central couple — smart, bespeckled math whiz Dwayne Wayne (Kadeem Hardison) and high-maintenance Southern belle Whitley Gilbert-Wayne (Jasmine Guy) — were embarking on their next chapter as newlyweds, relocating to Japan and expecting their first child. Before their departure, a professor jokingly quips to Dwayne: “I can’t wait to have your child in my class in the year 2014.”

The only guide you need for fall entertainment.

But plans for a revival — the original series itself was a spinoff of “The Cosby Show,” centered on the Huxtables’ free-spirited daughter Denise (Lisa Bonet) — to suit that time frame were in limbo for years. Producer and director Debbie Allen, who joined the original series in its second season to help it better reflect the HBCU experience, actively pitched and tried to relaunch “A Different World” in the early 2010s, but those efforts were derailed by the highly publicized sexual assault allegations against the show’s creator, Bill Cosby.

“It’s very difficult,” Allen told The Times. “The biggest difficulty, just being totally transparent, was people’s hesitation to work with Mr. Cosby; to have anything to do with him. [But] we were so independent. He kind of put us on a boat and said, ‘Go.’ And that’s what we did. And he was happy to know that we were going on our way.”

In early 2023, another push began to revive the series while also distancing itself from Cosby. Now, its decades-long gap year finally complete, a new incarnation of “A Different World” is starting up classes this fall at Netflix. And it hopes to carry on the legacy of its predecessor, which was celebrated for its depiction of Black culture and life in a higher education setting during its six-season run on NBC, from 1987 to 1993, bringing HBCUs into the mainstream.

Rashida (Alijah Kai), left, Deborah (Maleah Joi Moon) and Hazel (Kennedi Reece) in Netflix’s “A Different World.” After years of trying to tell the story of a new class at fictional Hillman College, Debbie Allen, who returns as an executive producer and director, says the sequel arrives at the right moment: “If there’s any voice we need to hear from right now, it’s young people.”

(Daniel Delgado Jr. / Netflix)

Billed as a sequel series premiering Sept. 24, a Wayne offspring is our anchor for the freshman class at Hillman College, the show’s fictional historically Black college based in Virginia. Deborah Wayne (Maleah Joi Moon) is an aspiring artist forced to attend her parents’ alma mater on academic probation after her NYU acceptance is rescinded. As the youngest Wayne child, she continues the family’s legacy at the school: her older sister — the child Whitley was pregnant with at the end of the original series — and an older brother are both alums.

She’s joined by a mix of first-gen and legacy students: star quarterback Shaquille Johnson (Cornell Young IV), who is the only child of original character Ron Johnson (Darryl M. Bell); criminal justice major Rashida Duvall (Alijah Kai); psych major Amir Rodale (Jordan Aaron Hall); Ghanaian-Nigerian fashion merchandising student Kojo Achebe (Chibuikem Uche); and small-town pastor’s daughter Hazel Henry (Kennedi Reece).

Some of the show’s original creative team join Allen as executive producers, including Tom Werner, and original series writers Reggie Rock Bythewood and Gina Prince-Bythewood. (Mandy Summers of “That ’90s Show” is also an executive producer.) To shepherd this reimagined version of the sitcom, Allen enlisted her former “Grey’s Anatomy” colleague Felicia Pride, who was most recently part of the writing staff on “Bel-Air,” the dramatic reboot of ’90s comedy “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” It was a dream call for Pride, who as a kid living in Baltimore recorded and rewatched episodes — namely, the one involving a step competition that she obsessively watched after school to learn the routine. But she was reluctant.

“I love the show so much,” Pride said, seated next to Allen inside a Netflix conference room in Los Angeles on a recent day. “I was like, ‘I don’t want to be the one to mess it up.’ But she [Debbie] was so adamant that the time was now to hear from young Black America — and that, I could get with.”

Allen remembers it this way: “I don’t have an ego. I begged her. It’s the truth. To get this show back up, we’ve tried for years. But this is the time that’s right … We had inspired all these kids, not just Black kids, all young people to go to college. This was a peep into college that had never happened before, where you saw young people being responsible and living their lives and being crazy, but still dealing with what is happening in this world. If the young people in the country don’t have a voice, that country is dead. And if there’s any voice we need to hear from right now, it’s young people.”

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1. The original “A Different World”: Dwayne (Kadeem Hardison), left, and Ron (Darryl M. Bell). 2. Jaleesa (Dawnn Lewis), left, Freddie (Cree Summer) and Whitley (Jasmine Guy). With Netflix’s modern take, showrunner Felicia Pride wanted the series to be intergenerational: “That’s why I’m so glad that we were able to have the legacy cast in the show — I wanted it to have the heart.” (NBCUniversal via Getty Images)

The show has been credited with boosting enrollment at HBCUs. While overall HBCU enrollment rose by 26% between 1976 and 1994, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, much of that increase occurred during the stretch of the show’s run.

Pride said she rewatched the original series, paying particular attention to the shift that materialized in Season 2 when Allen was brought on to overhaul it, as a starting point. Allen had a document of ideas detailing the types of characters she wanted to see depicted, including a star athlete, the first out queer character in the show’s universe and an African student. One major detail was a nonnegotiable: Allen wanted the show to revolve around Dwayne and Whitley’s daughter. (How they arrived at the character’s name — Deborah (pronounced Deb-OR-ah), which also happens to be Allen’s first name — is fuzzy. Pride remembers the name already being set by Allen; Allen recalls being amused upon seeing it on the page, thinking Pride had chosen the name.)

And just as in college, legacy matters on TV.

“I wanted the show to feel of now,” Pride said. “I also wanted it to be intergenerational. That was important to me, and that’s why I’m so glad that we were able to have the legacy cast in the show — I wanted it to have the heart … These [characters] were like my friends. I felt comfort in them. I felt like I could be them. It was also culture in a way that I hadn’t seen before, represented by people who look like me.”

Several familiar faces from the original make their way into the sequel, some taking on the mentor role of the older characters from the original, others representing how one gives back to the community that shaped them. Hardison and Guy lead the cast from the original series who reprise their characters, along with Bell, Cree Summer as Freddie Brooks, Charnele Brown as Kimberly Reese Boyer, Ajai Sanders as Gina Deveaux, Karen Malina White as Charmaine Brown, Jada Pinkett Smith as Lena James, Jenifer Lewis as Dorothy Dandridge Davenport and Allen as Dr. Langhorne.

Several original “A Different World” cast members reprise their roles in the new version of the series, including Charnele Brown, left, Jasmine Guy, Kadeem Hardison, Darryl M. Bell and Cree Summer.

(Quantrell Colbert / Netflix)

“They were so happy to be back,” Allen said. “There was a day they were all together —”

“That was the day where I felt like, ‘Oh, this is history,’” Pride added.

“In between takes, it was just chaos,” Allen continued. “They just laughed and acted up. It was just wonderful.”

To make the new characters and their stories resonate in a deeper, more contemporary way required as large a commitment to reflecting HBCU life as the original had under Allen’s guidance. The creative team assembled two paid student councils from various HBCUs — one to advise the writers’ room on storylines and campus issues; the other worked on the show’s Atlanta set, with students hired as production assistants that had working schedules tailored to their classes. The background performers filling up scenes in the quads, classrooms and parties feature 59% HBCU students and grads. And some key characters are portrayed by HBCU alumni who bring their lived experience to the screen, including Reece, who went to Howard University.

The freshman season will explore issues that Gen Z is grappling with such as financial insecurity, learning struggles, activism in the age of social media and matters of mental health, as well as bigger systemic issues like uncertainty around funding for HBCUs and immigration enforcement. The series also doesn’t shy away from its real-world backdrop — while it doesn’t explicitly mention President Trump by name, there is reference to the state of affairs under his administration.

Actors Jordan Aaron Hall, left, Cornell Young IV, Chibuikem Uche and Dasan Frazier are part of the new class of students at Hillman College in “A Different World.”

(Eli Joshua Ade / Netflix)

But this version of “A Different World” departs from its source material in its narrative format and tone. The original series was a multi-camera sitcom taped in front of a studio audience — and Allen initially thought any sequel of it would follow that same blueprint. But when the new series found its home at Netflix, it became a 10-episode single-camera dramedy. (Allen directed three episodes in the season, including the premiere, which set the cinematic style of the series.) As if to signal this iteration hasn’t completely deviated from its roots, in the show’s opening moments, Deborah Wayne coolly flicks the iconic flip-up frames made famous by Hardison’s Dwayne. And its memorable theme song that had versions from Phoebe Snow, Aretha Franklin and Boyz II Men hasn’t gone anywhere: Brandy was tapped to give a fresh spin on it that helps straddle the line between generations.

Now, Allen and Pride are on the cusp of seeing how this long-gestating idea will fare in the streaming world.

“You play the cards you’re dealt,” Allen said. “It took a while, but it was right for it not to happen until now. Right now is when we need it. Young people are struggling to find hope and inspiration and guidance, connection …”

Allen’s hope is that the show will have enough seasons to let the characters evolve: “On Netflix, not too many shows go past three, maybe four [seasons],” Allen said. What’s the goal? “At least three.”

Pride isn’t thinking ahead to graduation just yet. She’s still thinking about surviving the first day of school with this different (but familiar) show made for a different world.

“I came to understand we can never re-create the original show, and … even trying to pursue that is just not the thing to do,” Pride said. “It was a different time. It was a different everything, and it should stand on its own. What I wanted to do, personally, was just [focus on]: How can we capture that spirit and hopefully have a show that young people today can see themselves in, and that people [who watched the original] can also enjoy and be proud of?”

It was 1963 and up-and-coming freelance journalist Gloria Steinem had been a working writer in New York City for roughly three years when Show magazine sent her on an undercover assignment that she was uniquely qualified for: to infiltrate Manhattan’s “greatest new showbiz gimmick,” the Playboy Club. She already had the beauty and brains, all she’d need was an alias, a leotard and a notebook. The assignment would change the course of her career, but not in the way that she’d hoped.

“GIRLS:

Do Playboy Club Bunnies Really

Have Glamorous Jobs,

Meet Celebrities, And

Make Top Money?

Yes, it’s true! Attractive young girls can now earn $200-$300 a week at the fabulous New York Playboy Club, enjoy the glamorous and exciting aura of show business, and have the opportunity to travel to other Playboy Clubs throughout the world.”

Armed with the above ad and welcomed by a grinning private guard calling, “Here bunny, bunny, bunny!” Steinem set out to expose the working conditions and interior lives of the bunnies slinging booze to the playboys who patronized the club. She subjected herself to the wardrobe fittings, which included getting her bunny suit stuffed to boost her breast size; she was poked and prodded during an invasive physical exam; she strutted through the club near-naked with sore feet and a suit so tight, she had to wrap gauze around her midsection where her skin had been rubbed raw; and various other indignities she underwent for the sake of journalism.

Documenting a lunch shift at the club, Steinem wrote, “Somehow, the usual tail pullings and propositions and pinching and ogling seemed all the more depressing when, outside this windowless room of perpetual night, the sun was shining.”

Steinem’s article accomplished what it set out to do, and not only were the working conditions at the club exposed, but some were subsequently improved because of her work. In her essay collection “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions,” Steinem wrote that in response to the story, Hugh Hefner wrote her a letter saying that her “beef about the physical given [to] the girls before they start work at the club prompted my eliminating it.”

Also as a result of her piece, she was slapped with a $1-million libel suit, subpoenaed as a witness in a liquor laws case against the Playboy Club, and received “obscene and threatening” calls.

Most notable, of the short-term results of the story, was the immediate impact it had on her career. Sure, in a lot of ways it had put her on the map, but she struggled to land serious journalistic assignments because, as she put it, “I had now become a Bunny — and it didn’t matter why.”

Steinem, a feminist icon and one of the most widely recognized leaders of the second-wave women’s movement, died on Wednesday at 92. Since she shed the bunny suit after her 11-day stint on the job at the Playboy Club, she went on to cofound New York Magazine and Ms. Magazine, which changed the course of the abortion rights movement with its “We Have Had Abortions” petition in which high-profile women admitted to having illegal abortions, Steinem among them. She played a pivotal role in spearheading some of the most influential and successful women’s rights efforts. And in 2013, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her lifetime of work as a journalist and activist.

Still, with all the aforementioned accomplishments, and decades later, Steinem said that her naysayers used her bunny work in an attempt to discredit her. For decades she considered the story a “professional error of gigantic proportions.” But later, she changed her tune.

“I’m not sorry I did it,” she told Ronan Farrow in 2020, when she was 86 years old. “But it is true that as old as I am, when anybody wants to put me down, they say, ‘Well, she was once a bunny.’ ”

In Steinem’s “Famous Last Words” interview, released on Netflix following her death, she closed the segment by addressing the audience. “Please tell your own story,” she said. “This is the most important thing we can do for each other: is to know each other through stories.”

I was hesitant to tell this story, and stewed over the potential risks I would be taking by telling it, but then I thought of the risk Steinem took. She dealt with fallout and she grappled with the ways the article may have hurt her career more than helped. But of the ample wisdom she imparted, its the power of women’s stories to shift culture, change policy and empower other women that feels most resonant.

I didn’t discover Steinem’s “I Was a Playboy Bunny” exposé until I was in college. I was in my late twenties at the time because I’d taken a few detours after I left high school, most of them dead ends.

One such detour led me through the massive hedge-lined gates of the Playboy Mansion. I was 18, and the E! reality series “The Girls Next Door” sparked renewed interest in Playboy bunnies. I wish I could say that I’d arrived at the mansion on an undercover magazine assignment, but the reality was different. I’d been watching a rerun of the E! show from a bedbug-ridden townhome in downtown Los Angeles, and earlier that day I grappled with whether I should pay my parking debt or buy a burrito.

I watched as the girls bounced around the mansion, appearing carefree, bedbug-free and parking ticket-free. Their lives, produced and edited as they were, appeared to be stable and glamorous, and I thought, “Hmm, maybe I should do that.” If Hefner was good at anything, it was creating a facade.

Like Steinem found, applying to be a Playboy bunny was surprisingly simple. I emailed a photo of myself in a swimsuit and shortly afterward, an invitation to a casting call at the mansion arrived.

At the casting call, I was handed a satin robe and pointed toward a small tent where I could change and a large tent with the photo crew inside. Steinem had likened wearing the bunny suit to feeling like meat on a hook. I, too, couldn’t shake the thought of a meat factory and almost instantly, realized I wanted off the conveyor belt.

My trip to the mansion and endeavor to become a bunny was short-lived. I’d driven there feeling like a femme fatale, and left feeling naive and out of my depth. Worse, it was just another humiliating misadventure that I’d carry around for years with shame.

That is until I came across her story in her essay collection “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions.”

Steinem said that she was pigeonholed because of the story. She struggled afterward to be taken seriously and that may be true, but I’d argue an opposite point. Because Steinem was ultimately held in such high regard as a journalist and activist, and because she was an undercover bunny along the way, she helped the bunnies of the world to take themselves a little more seriously, to see that beyond the bunny suit, there is a world of possibilities waiting for them.

In the collection, originally published in 1983 and reprinted several times, Steinem wrote that after a town-hall meeting in New Bedford, Mass., a little girl of 6 or 7 gave her a crayon drawing of her in the bunny costume copied from a photo that had circulated online. “ ‘Even if a girl looks silly,’ she said, ‘boys should know that’s she’s smart.’ ”

“This story may outlast me,” she wrote. “but it’s not going to outlast or outsmart that little girl.”

In the book, Steinem wrote that one longer-term result of the article was “realizing that all women are Bunnies. After feminism arrived in my life, I stopped regretting that I had written the article.”

The line “All women are Bunnies” stands out. But what I imagine she meant is, bunnies are just women.