IF YOU THINK YOU ARE BEATEN, YOU ARE. This is the memoir of Richard Hicks—lawyer, author, activist, volunteer, world traveler, and ardent sailor—written primarily to record, for his grandchildren and their progeny, the salient events of his life. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1937, he moved to San Diego, California in 1949, following the death of his father. After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley, as an undergraduate (1959), and from Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law (1962), he spent three years in the U.S. Army, as an officer in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps, before embarking on a twenty-three year career as a business trial lawyer, in San Francisco and Los Angeles. For twenty years he and his wife, Phyllis—whom he met and married while in college— were actively involved as participants and facilitators with the non-profit educational foundations, Creative Initiative and Beyond War. In retirement he wrote and published seven novels, served as pro-bono executive director of Habitat for Humanity-Los Angeles, and has helped over 2000 victims of domestic violence as a volunteer attorney at the superior court restraining order clinic operated by the San Diego Volunteer Lawyer Program. A passionate sailor, he has sailed extensively, including over thirty-five bareboat charters throughout the Caribbean and Pacific.