Rule one of the Cool Girl Handbook: accept compliments and do not ask questions.
People tell me I’m “cool.” They say it softly, like they’re testing the word in their mouth–cool.
The word itself never stays still, like it can be taken back, letting someone else decide what’s “pleasing” or “glamorous” at the moment. I’ve learned to ignore the questions society claims for itself.
The things I love from the bottom of my heart don’t just fit inside this four letter word–I don’t think it can ever truly be defined with just one word. Those passions have always been off-putting; said softly, with a stare that lingered a second too long. Still, I’ve kept these interests that have been called “too much.” But “too much” is exactly the space I allow for myself. It’s beneath the overflow that cool, the true kind, begins to express itself.
More than I care to count, I have looked at myself through a lens that wasn’t my own. I learned which parts earned glimpses of satisfaction and validation–and which ones made the room 10 times bigger. I memorized the difference, waiting until the rules revealed themselves.
The essence of “being cool” comes from your own self explorations and passions–even when it isn’t socially acceptable. It lives in the things you love so much, society is unsure what to make of them. It’s in the quirks that have a story behind them, in the interests we carry along in life and in our perceptions that others disapprove of. Its essence doesn’t gnaw for approval–it hums distantly, knowing it’s safe in the knowledge that it needs no justification.
Now when I’m called cool, I understand what it means–and why it no longer matters. If we don’t take the time getting to truly know ourselves, we’ll end up absorbing everyone else’s definitions of us.
