Sunday, June 12, 2005

trendsetting

I have never been much of a trendsetter. I never wore a Generra Hypercolor t-shirt in elementary school; never had Guess jeans until they were no longer cool; and I definitely never got to wear British Knight sneakers. In my own way I thought I was awesome in my raspberry colored Converse hi-tops but I was never a "cool kid."

My lack of trendiness carried into High School, College, and beyond. I was way behind the curve on getting a cell phone. again, I thought I was hip for holding out but... in reality I was just out of touch and hard to reach.

Now, I am considering purchasing an i-pod. Until thursday, I thought that _perhaps_ I had hit a trend somewhere near its inception, i.e., early enough to be halfway edgy and noticable. Unfortunately (?), on Thursday I was heading home from work on the BART and sat down in one of those groups of four seats across from a woman with an i-pod. During my recent commutes I have discovered two species of i-pod owners. First, there are the indie kids who are probably rocking out to the Postal Service on their way to a consulting or tech job. Then, there are the older (usually) male professionals who I imagine listen to the Boss or jazz on their way to bank or litigate. My fellow commuter on Thursday was of a whole new breed. She was middle-aged, matronly and carried a cheap knockoff purse. Unlike my "Prado" it was lumpy, brown and relatively un-cute. To my great surprise, in her purse were two "Pink" CDs. She had her i-pod cranked up and was totally dancing along to that terrible music. It was awe-inspiring and ridiculous. It also defeated all of my hopes of breaking into the i-pod trend on the early side. Alas, I am not meant to be cool.

[Sidenote: Who thought it was a good idea to _carpet_ BART? Public transportation naturally tends to the smelly. Carpet retains odors. Together, carpet and trains make one nasty combination. I miss the in-your-face dirt of the CTA and the unmasked dirt on those linoleum floors. CTA definitely smells more often than not but the smells aren't as stale as the ones on the BART.]

[Endnote: Maybe I wasn't allowed to wear British Knight shoes because of their reputed gang connections? That's about as unlikely as the rationale for prohibiting my burning desire to have a golden front tooth... Also, anyone know what size 4.5 (British) is in American shoes? There's a sweet pair of BK trainers on eBay...]

3 comments:

dirteens said...

great suggestion! i had no idea that happened only two weeks into the relationship. why haven't i dated republicans before?

YDubL said...

Dearest Dirteens - I've been enjoying your blog lots since discovering it! Thanks for introducing me to Arts & Letters Daily.

As for being trendy, I commend you for not falling into fads. There's actually nothing worse than picking up on a fad just as it's fading out (as I found out with slap bracelets, Troll dolls, and Hypercolor shirts -- my mother finally relented and bought them for me when they were on sale. If only I knew better than to be such a poseur when I was 10 years old). I would highly recommend getting an IPod, though -- it will change your life!!! Of course, from your unfortunate experience on the BART, you might argue that the IPod trend is on its last legs. Boo!

YDubL said...
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