Midnight Girl in a Sunset App

I live in cool town. I do. We all know it. It's hipsters galore. It's young money galore. It's old trying to be young galore. It's health and fitness and beauty galore. It's Austin. Everyone has heard of it. Everyone knows where it is. Everyone has been here for a weekend at Barton Springs and 6th Street. If you haven't, you want to visit.

In the 16 years (Lord, I'm getting old!) I have lived here (except that year in San Francisco), I have learned that I will never be the coolest in cool town. It's okay. I never expected to be. Sure, I am on the East Side and have a couple of weird dogs and wear my Converse to every occasion and grocery shop with my iPod and watch movies exclusively at the Alamo and write books and and eat too often from trailers and prefer the East 6th bars to the West 6th bars and recycle everything and eat tacos for every meal and have a nose ring still and wear ponytails and edit a magazine and love Wes Anderson and go on picnics and listen to weird music and got a graduate degree in an almost completely useless subject and strum a ukelele and am marrying a professional musician who plays in all kinds of bands. But, I am most certainly not cool. And, I am fine with it. I don't want to be the coolest person in cool town. Hell, I don't want to be the 73822 coolest person in cool town. Too much pressure. I couldn't handle it.

One good things is that I am not so uncool as to not fit in. I fit in just fine. I'm at least enough of a weirdo for that. I mean, in 16 years this town has not chewed me up and spit me out as it has so many.
                 

I have, however, found something that makes me feel like the ladies to the right (and no not like an amazing female writer from SNL)  Yep, I do. I feel like Mom Jeans. And do you know why? It's that damn Instagr.am app for the iPhone. Wow. Nothing in the world makes me feel like a front butt like the Instagram. It's tragic almost how old coot you feel when scrolling through people's pictures. Yes, Instagram makes you feel all Mom Jeans.




Let's see this is action, so you will understand what I mean.

Here are a few of the pictures I have taken and filtered through Instagram (I am not using the period because it makes me feel douchey). 

See.  This is how cool I get.  I have Trav over there to the left at a party with pinata legs.  And to the right I have part of my desk at work which features Schrute (who could really do my job well).  There are some filters on them to make you think I'm rad.  But, they don't make you think that.

Over there to the left is my self portrait.  Yes, I have done that. And, you have, too!  Then to my right we have a picture of a giant lunch suitcase in the break room fridge at work.  That really was the biggest lunch kit I have ever seen.  But, I digress.  You see that I have framed them and tried to make them cool.

Did I succeed?  Not really.  Let's see if others have.

 

 

The party picture to the left seems a lot more "interesting" and artsier than poor Trav up there who is actually interesting and artsy.  Just not when I take the picture.  And, there is no Schrute to the left, but there is a focused/unfocused artsy fartsy Apple/Mac covered desk.  

 

The self portrait to the left here doesn't have me in it, so by definition it is cooler than mine.  But, the mustache in the back takes this one to realms for which I can't even pretend to go.  And, the fridge to the right?  Well, their fridge has eyes on it's stuff.  There is no suitcase in it at all.  And, their filters seem to actually work to enhance them!  

Honestly, many times I am scrolling through I am just saying to my self out loud (because I do that), "Douche.  Douche.  Douche.  Cute.  Douche.  Jeez, you really love yourself.  Awesome.  Oh, I want to do that.  Douche.  That is such a pretty lake.  Douche.  Why don't I look like that in a bathing suit.  Douche.  Douche.  Wow, this girl really thinks she's cool.  Sweet baby.  Douche."  That's usually how it goes.  But, for some reason, I still feel unhip.  

Maybe I'm not ironic enough for Instagram.  I'm just not that hipstamatic.  Maybe it's my double chin that does it.   Or my ratty hair.  Maybe it's that I find it funny that there is a suitcase in my break room fridge and not eyeballs on my mayo.  Could it be that I am completely uncomfortable pretending I am a model doing a photo shoot because really I am just in my backyard and my friend is hold up a phone?  Or is it that I am try my hardest not to be a doucher (yes, a doucher)?  I have no idea.  All I know is that Instagram makes me feel like a grandma who's asking her 20 year old grandkid about how much they are enjoying their Pong game in 2012.  But, I guess I am okay with that because I will still take terrible pictures with unironically-not-working-with-the-subject-or-background filters on them.  So, just call me Mom Jeans because I probably won't even realize you are making fun of me.

(And, just so you know, I use the word fridge because for the life of me I have never been able to spell refridgerator correctly.  I didn't do it back there, either.  I am leaving it, so you can see that I really can't spell that stupid word.  I have no idea why.  Refridgorator.  Refridgerater.  How the fuck do you spell that!?!?  Oh, I checked. No D.  Refrigerator.  Yep, there it is.  I still won't ever be able to spell it right.)

(Parenthetical Expression 2 -sort of like a PS, but not- why is the top half of this centered?  And why can't I make it not be centered?  Wha wha.  Mom Jeans....oh, you!)