You only see them when you’re not looking. Like glimpsing a dorsal fin slicing the shoreline, the endangered species of the beach and pool is the elusive outie belly button.

It entered my line of sight at a beach along the Florida Panhandle’s so-called Redneck Riviera. I saw one at a public swimming pool where I go for laps and at a downtown New Orleans bar. (The bartender cut me off when I tried to discuss the situation: “Perv!”)