“So, what music have you been listening to this week?”
Oh fuck. Oh god. Oh no. I frantically scan my brain for an answer that isn’t going to sound the alarm in my date’s rat-tail-clad head. It’s our first, after all, and I have to make a good impression (regardless of the tiny plait he has dangling from the back of his skull).
My music taste is arguably one of the least “cool” things about me. I overindulge in hyper-pop (Kim Petras), indie-sleaze (Arctic Monkeys), and trashy noughties tunes. Mambo No. 5 was in my top ten songs for 2022. It’s why I’ll never get Spotify. I’d never shag again.
I panic and say “Better Joy” – a (very) new band I’ve (very) recently discovered. He hasn’t heard of them. Score? “The Rhythm Method”, I offer, as conciliation. He hasn’t heard of them either. Fuck.
***
Like Gillian Flynn’s “Cool Girl”, I do my absolute best to always be only “hot and understanding”, I “never get angry”, and I “like every fucking thing he likes and never complain.” I’ll bend over backward (or whichever way they want me), posturing as the woman of their dreams, until my back fucking breaks.
Of course, the specifics of the cool girl have evolved with the times. Gillian Flynn’s millennial Cool Girl “adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex.”
In my mind – or within my local London borough and algorithmically assigned digital echo chamber – the cool girl loves day raves, has stick-and-poke tattoos, is adept in the art of rolling cigarettes. She’s creative and artsy, but in a quietly confident way (she would never bid for attention online via personal essays). Her Instagram feed consists of concrete buildings and gallery openings – there’s not a frappe or selfie in sight. There are few images of her online, but those that have made it to the grid are effortlessly candid.
In essence, the modern-day cool girl is someone who doesn’t try too hard. They’re effortless, ironic, and bored.
So I do my best to occupy a blasé nonchalance — someone who bounces from fling to fling, cushioned by the comfortable distance I wedge between sex and romance. I float, aimlessly, through situationships, weightless, ungrounded, detached.
No one has ever told me that I’m “too much.” That’s because I do everything in my power to be just the right amount.
I wholeheartedly embrace “casual”, expecting nothing in the way of commitment, transparency or – god forbid – seriousness. I keep it light. I keep it easy.
Because, ultimately, the cool girl wants for nothing, asks for nothing, expects nothing in return for her time, energy, and body. She panders to the male gaze, but never in an obvious – or desperate – way.
Note: the male gaze I refer to has less to do with visual aesthetics and more to do with the idealised characteristics and persona of the ideal woman. Of course, women’s bodies are still prisoners to the male gaze, but I’m more interested in the ways our personalities and – even more pertinently – interests are held hostage by the trappings of a “cool girl” persona.
Men complain about women “looking fake”, about all the plastic we have pumped into our bodies. But they’ll never complain about the ways I’ve augmented my interests, lipo-suctioned the less desirable parts of my personality, especially for them. I’ve chipped and chiseled away at myself — not to make myself “smaller”, but to make myself perfect. For them. Whoever they are.
It’s why I always have fun on dates. It’s why I’m such a great shag (or so I’ve been told). I make it so. It’s all entirely deliberate.
I work in marketing, for gods sake. It’s my fucking job to say what people want to hear, to conjure up desirability and to downplay any unsavoury details that my target audience (men, in their mid-late twenties, who smoke rollies) would find off-putting.
Any time I start speaking to some graphic designer from Hackney, or an aspiring DJ from Peckham, I must confront my inner cool girl. She desperately tries to break free, feigning interest in The Smiths, psychedelics, anal sex, or Christian Baile’s portrayal of Pat Bateman in Mary Harron’s cinematic adaptation of American Psycho (2000).
I’ll suddenly find myself thinking twice before posting an obvious thirst trap on my Instagram story. What if they think it’s gauche? What if it looks like I’m trying too hard?
Similarly, I’ll comb through my aggressively pastel wardrobe, in search of something that simply says, not screams, “feminine”. I’ll forego my kitsch, brightly coloured cardigans in favour of loose-fitting graphic tees and swap my pink doc martens for black boots. I’ll worry about taking them home to a room that’s – to be honest – a bit much.
But I’m getting better at winning the ongoing battle against my inner cool girl. These days I catch myself whenever I’m about to pretend I like some niche DJ, or that I’m familiar with Nietzschien philosophy. “I’m more of a Kesha kind of girl”, I admit, or “actually, I never read any Nietzsche.” I admit it when I don’t know or haven’t heard of someone. Then I get to indulge them in their lengthy explanations, listening attentively, whilst I hungrily watch them roll a cigarette.
Because if it’s meant to be it’s meant to fucking be. Me pretending to be someone I’m not will only set future me up for failure — for a relationship that’s built on something inauthentic. What if one day we get married and the whole wedding feels like a sham because I’ve been too embarrassed to request we add Mambo No. 5 to the after-party playlist?
With each passing year (and date), I’m nurturing my own shamelessness. I try not to curate outfits to cater specifically to the appetites of East London boys (whose wardrobe staples mostly consist of Carhart, anyway). I give myself permission to express enthusiasm for the things I’m truly passionate about. I talk about my writing. I introduce them to the cardboard cut-out we have of Britney Spears in our kitchen – if they’re lucky enough to make it that far…
Further reading
If you’re looking to feel better about your music taste (and to stop performing an interest in “edgy” music that you think boys like), I’d recommend giving Sophie Parke (@sophie.c.parke)’s article, ‘britney is punk af’ a read.