Word of the Week

COOL

 

Cool is a great word. Nowadays everyone under 100 years old knows what cool is – don’t they?  It is the great clothes and easy style, the way with just the right words. We recognise it, and if we don’t have it we aspire to it. However, dictionaries still give most importance to the meanings which refer to temperature and weather, or to an idea of a person resistant to pressure, unflappable. But these days cool goes much, much further than this.

Cool is a state of mind, not just of style. You cannot carry off the cool look if you are not cool inside. We have all seen the guys and girls going out on a Saturday night, dressed to kill, only to see the same people a few hours later, drunk as skunks, shouting and screaming, fighting and vomiting in the gutters. Believe me, this is not cool! The cool ones got what they came out for, whether that was a quiet drink, or a companion for the night. In a nutshell, the cool ones got laid, the uncool ones got blood, puke and tears, or hospitals and police stations.

Yes, the cool ones got laid. Why? Because cool is sexy, that is the truth that the dictionaries miss.... cool is sexy! It is an internal confidence in yourself that expresses itself subconsciously in everything you do. It is not about good looks, or loads of money; it is that aura of confidence that attracts people. That is true sex-appeal. The reverse is also true - if you have to strive to look cool, then sorry Bud – you aint!

Of course this naturally leads us to think about examples of cool. No article about cool would be complete without mention of the coolest guy ever to walk planet earth, Arthur Herbert Fonzarelli. Who? The Fonz of course, who had cool by the cartload. Just take a look at this clip to see cool in action.

 

As you see, The Fonz was not the best looking guy in the world, and always dressed simply in jeans, T-shirt and leather jacket. But he just radiated cool. OK I know he was a fictional character played by an actor, but whoever wrote his scripts knew what cool was about. In the 70’s everyone aspired to be The Fonz, rather than the lead character, Richie Cunningham. This was the reason that over the eleven seasons the show ran, The Fonz rose from being an occasional bit-part character in the early shows to top billing by the end. Cool worked! And as far as I can tell, cool will continue to work for the foreseeable future. Stay cool.

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