cool

Clockwise from top left: Imogen Heap, Disney Concert Hall, Bloc Party, Sofia Coppola,
The XIVth Dalai Lama, Geometry Wars, Maurice Sendak.

'Cool' is a state of mind, a distillation of one's own essence worn like a one-of-a-kind fragrance. 'Cool' can be shared, but never shown off. 'Cool' is zen, thus zen is 'cool'.

'Cool' has nothing to do with following an ideal, but it has a lot to do with ideas. 'Cool' inspires and transpires, but unlike trends it never expires. 'Cool' does not have a shelf life.

To proclaim that you are 'cool' is a dead giveaway that you are not. To flaunt to others that you belong to the 'cool' crowd betrays that that crowd is anything but 'cool'. The fashionable are not 'cool', they are merely fashionable. You'll not impress anyone if you attempt to be 'cool'. That is not what 'cool' is.

'Cool' may often exude an atmosphere of dissonance, but the dissonance itself does not equate 'cool', it is merely an effect of it. 'Cool' operates above, below, and off to the side of the primary frequency.

'Cool' can be elusive, but you know 'cool' when you see, hear, touch, taste, or smell it. When 'cool' walks into a room it transforms the space and wafts around us. When 'cool' leaves a room it lingers with us.

At its most heightened, 'cool' is unaware, free, expansive, yet still private and contained. That it is so expressive is just incidental. 'Cool' can be contradictory - it is a public intimation.

'Cool' is of you, me, him, and her.....unhindered.