The Road Between Anonymity and Impressions

If you look at the amount of empty space on this side of the continent you will realize that almost the entire west coast area is full of absolutely nothing.  It can take up to 8 hours to get from one city to another easily, this fact will of course spark your imagination.  I've heard from several people that regularly go on long road trips that when it is late at night in the middle of nowhere your imagination can make you paranoid very quickly.  Los Angeles is also in the middle of nowhere if you think about it cause it is surrounded by desert and is so large that cops can't effectively control the whole city so it makes newcomers a little apprehensive.  This large city atmosphere mixed with the isolation of the city itself has probably sparked the imaginations of the more morbid of the directors at Hollywood making this area one of the prime pulp fiction hotspots.  Both the anonymity of the big city and the vast nothingness are the breeding grounds for movies of this type.

The Big Apple

I have thought about whether "hipness" is something that starts in the city and moves outward toward the rural and suburb areas.  I am planning on having several paragraphs dedicated to it in my essay on my cousin's "hipness".  Since this is not that forum I will sum it up in one sentence.  In my opinion I think that "hipness" is definetely an urban phenome, otherwise it would have also manifested at least a little in some of the richer rural countries where survival is not the only concern.  From what I have observed, "hipness" seems to manifest in the cities, usually bigger cities, then move outward and become cool as it moves.  I have three examples of things that began in urban areas and moved outward: Yoga, Rap and Technology of any kind.  Yoga especially was a big city phenome and then it became nationally recognized.  Rap was almost literally born in the big cities from places like New York and this supposed "hood".  As for technology, the people who are inventing new, hip, technology usually live near a lot of people to get inspiration and most big companies are based in urban areas.  Basically to sum it up, the idea of "hip" is born in cities then moves to the people outside of them.

About Our Essays...

As most people reading this post know, we were asked to write an essay on a "hip" person we know.  I found this both difficult and ironic in the end as the person I picked is someone I greatly admire as well as being "hip".  As my views on "hipness" are less than exemplarary I was a little suprised, not much but a little, that I thought of this person as being "hip" as well.  The person I am going to write and am already writing about is my cousin, David Darby.  David is one of the coolest people I know and he's also one of the people I get alot of clothing ideas to integrate into my own style.  While I don't copy him I do use his style to come up with ideas of my own.  The disconcerting part is that this role-model is a supposedely "hip" person, but I can deal with it.

A Little Self-Loving I Know

This is what you shall do:  live with others and participate in their more sensible ideas while guiding them away from their less sensible ones, integrate ideas from others into your beleifs when they benefit you, cultivate connections that lead to your own flourishing and cut connections that lead to your own withering, value property, knowledge and your important people, scorn rude and those who are generally unpleasant, act by your own personal standards and beleifs, and even if others tell you to follow the norm and try to fit in with the majority you will ignore them and will question everything...