Hipsters

Hipster (abbreviated version from UrbanDictionary.com)
Listens to bands that you have never heard of. Has hairstyle that can only be described as "complicated." (Most likely achieved by a minimum of one week not washing it.) Probably tattooed. Maybe gay. Definitely cooler than you. Reads Black Book, Nylon, and the Styles section of the New York Times. Drinks Pabst Blue Ribbon. Often. Complains. Always denies being a hipster. Hates the word. Probably living off parents money - and spends a great deal of it to look like they don't have any. Has friends and/or self cut hair. Dyes it frequently (black, white-blonde, etc. and until scalp bleeds). Has a closet full of clothing but usually wears same three things OVER AND OVER (most likely very tight black pants, scarf, and ironic tee-shirt). Sleeps with everyone and talks about it at great volume in crowded coffee shops. Addicted to coffee, cigarettes (Parliaments, Kamel Reds, Lucky Strikes, etc.), and possibly cocaine. Claims to be in a band. Rehearsals consist of choosing outfits for next show and drinking PBR. Always on the list. Majors or majored in art, writing, or queer studies. Name-drops. May go by "Penny Lane," "Eleanor Rigby," etc. when drunk.

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I just spent a weekend with pple who would generally fit the above description. I was quite perturbed and fascinated at the difference in the type of discipline, areas of interest, and ambition that I am used to. I don't even know how I ended up in Chicago's hipster centrale, Wicker Park, since I was meeting up with some long lost high school friends who turned from righteous nerds to too cool hipsters over the past 7 years since I've seen them.

Well, Wicker Park was now their home and they were bonafide hipsters. We ended up drinking and toasting to jobs such as copy editors for indie magazines, bartending, being salesmen at the "right" hipster clothing stores, abstract documetary making on public channels, T-shirt printing (and selling out of trucks), and some more bartending.

I ended up being ashamed I was a a PhD student and started to mumble my replies to the rare question of, "What do you do?" When any of the hipsters actually understood my reply, I'd be greeted with a look that mixed incredulity, disgust, admiration, and pity. It was a weird struggle, usually with the disgust and pity winning out. That's an important lesson I learned. Unlike the usual high-end parties where pple subtly (or not so subtly) brag about graduating from a top 15 school, and now being in law school, med school, grad school, or whatever, very rarely did people greet you with "What do you do?" or "Where do you work?" or "Where did you go?" Instead, the education and career was bypassed entirely. Interesting. To be honest, I did have a queer sense of abandon of not having to have that same stupid conversation about my educational credentials to a bunch of dressed-up meat-marker folks (usually at an apartment with a cityscape view with the parents having bought them their lovely condo) over and over again. But then again, I didn't feel like I had much to say otherwise. Makes me sound a bit pathetic, huh?

Of course, once I started probing into how much a person could make printing T-shirts with slogans like "Too cool for school," I had rather red-faced admissions of Mummy and Daddy having bought the fabulous condo where the party was being held. I also had admissions of said T-shirts not ACTUALLY having being printed-- the work now was in getting the idea and concept down. This, I was told emphatically, takes quite a bit of time. Again, interesting. The difference between people, whether high rolling lawyers, or too cool hipsters, may not be as large as I thought.

Much reefer was smoked this wknds, many beers consumed, many indie records played (the more obscure the band, the better. I had one person tell me with pride that the music the DJ was playing hadn't even been signed to a label yet, it was THAT underground). And of course, I saw the exact same shaggy haircut on every hipster woman at the parties. As well as the exact same style of shabilicious dresses, i.e., dresses meant to look shabby but oh-so-hot-now. Some were shabby by choice (i.e. shredding old dresses to fit the new fashion), and some were tailormade shabby (i.e. picture the $199 pricetag of a gray jumper that looks like you wore it for about 15 years).

So all in all, an interesting weekend.