I recently drove past a corner that used to contain a very hip and trendy club with an evocative one-word name. It was Deep and then Lush and then I forget what it was, but it’s completely torn down now. I used to drive past it on Friday nights and recall long lines of near-perfect bodies wrapped in apparently expensive apparel waiting to be validated with entrance. I never went to that club or to the half a dozen evocative one-word clubs that preceded it in the exact same location over the last ten years. That’s the way Hollywood works in some circles. If you’re not new you’re dead. I always wanted to go into the club, but I have no patience to stand in line for things that I don’t eventually get to eat. But, I imagined on several occasions going into the club as a fly, or maybe like a robotic fly. Yeah, a robotic fly that has 10x zoom capability in my eyes and super directional hyper hearing. I dreamed of doing this not to listen to inane conversations that subreference fashions and programming that I reject without context or to laugh at the exorbitant amount of real money that a current smelling man would pay for a beverage that could be made at home for one tenth the price. No, it was not for snarkiness or judgment that I wished I could be in there, It was for clues. Clues to anything. I want any information to help me understand why I would never be accepted in that gloriously kempt environment. I wouldn’t even know how to communicate with people who would choose that club as a destination. It is so far and foreign from my desires. And, that, to some extent makes it exotic and fascinating. I’ve learned since middle school that there is no universal cool and that each person and group defines cool for themselves. It ebbs and morphs, but always remains at the core of what truly makes people happy. So, more than culture, politics and religion, I’m beginning to think that the most important thing you can learn about someone is what they find cool. A greater understanding of cool may be the key to a united humanity.
Filed under: Thoughts Tagged: | club, cool, humanity, Los Angeles
