Team Hipster and the Kickball Philosophy
by Opal Peachey

At a bar, Brouwer’s, with boys and Belgians. A friend brings his new girlfriend: nineteen, a faux-hawk with blue tips, desk girl at Laughing Buddha Tattoo, Sailor Jerry swallows on her neck, arms still bare. I raise my eyebrow and giggle,

“What a hipster.”

Monochromatic with a twist of kitsch; socks with tiny prints of dinosaurs on them; those little brimmed cycling caps; tattoos; yellow keds to match the rims of your fixie: the hipster is unabashedly modern, yet embraces “unattractive” styles of the past. A molest-ache, mullets – she and he alike – those awful eighties plastic framed glasses.  Tight, black pants, but not the pants of ’04, mind you. Think of it as Punk meets pastel.

I had a bit of a generation revelation about the hipster thing at work last week. A customer was commenting on the unseasonable Seattle heat wave:

“Everyone was outside until so late—around midnight a group of hipsters in the house next door started a street kickball game.”

Nod, smile. I know those kids. I’ll be playing catcher on Coel’s team, “Meanwhile at the Hall of Doom,” this season because…why not? You don’t have to be an athlete to play decently and everyone wears a costume and drinks beer from little red cups.

When I asked Coel if he thought any of our friends were hipsters he laughed “Yeah, and they’re all dudes.” What about Katie, I say, she’s the definition of hipster. “That may be, but she could just as easily wear a poodle skirt tomorrow and no one would blink an eye. You won’t see Mark taking up a ‘new look’ anytime soon.”

I had been marking the hipster generation as pure style, drawn in by the groupthink overtones of similar shopping habits. You can only spot the same American Apparel hoodie so many times before you gift it with meaning! Look closer, though, and you will notice an implicit attitude, a cock of the walk, disdain for authority, and a potent sense of physicality: burps, farts, sweat…all hipster.

A few beers into that night at Brouwer’s, I thought about the defining traits of the hipster and felt a bit suffocated. Looking at myself: My Edward Gorey tattoo sleeve and suspenders, my bearded boyfriend in shants. Looking down on our generation from the bar’s oak balcony, Dogfish IPA in hand, we all seemed to be wearing costumes, and more apparently – looking for the other players on our team. The like-minded people and those who are anything but, all scanning the room for a friend, a lover, a memory in an outfit.

“Memory in an outfit” really…

Because folded into the hipster style is a sort of nostalgia – again I am thinking of those awful plastic peepers, the same ones my mother wore, ducking her layered bangs to kiss the head of her new baby as the Kodak went snap. Well, anyway. Here’s how to make sure you’re not diving headlong into a regrettable trend: You wake up, put on what feels right, and go on with your day.

photo by joel bedford

american apparel, edward gorey, faux hawk, generation, hipster, kickball, punk, tattoo