What is "Cool?"

As I was writing the final blog post for this batch, I got distracted, as I often do. This time, it was the cover story from this week's New Times, entitled "The Cool Index: Ten Years Later, Phoenix Is Still Hot. But Is It Finally Cool?" It's a followup on an article written ten years ago about the then-burgeoning downtown Phoenix arts scene, buoyed by a few hardscrabble creative entrepreneurs. The article aims to reexamine those folks a decade onward, reflecting on whether Phoenix is finally "Cool."

I understand the Creative Class. I understand entrepreneurship. I understand social geography. I understand gentrification. And I understand exactly the kind of capital in which the New Times traffics.

This article, like so many others, aims to cast judgment upon the conservative, podunk town that, oh, I don't know, birthed the New Times itself and allowed it to grow into the national "alt"-weekly conglomerate it is. The one that bought the freaking Village Voice--the grandfather of the alt-weekly medium of journalism.

Yeah, it's pretty much the objective of every major New Times article to exert some sort of holier-than-thou assessment of a given concert, politician, creative movement, et al. But this time, it's different. Lo and behold, it's a positive article about the growth of the city! But here's the thing a hip, creative-class publication will never get about this city: it's not all about the "creativity" of these folks and the dozens of unusual projects they're taking on at any given time.

The things the article neglects to mention in its glossy overview are the exact reasons why I am in Phoenix. The exact reasons why I've connected with the very people being mentioned in the article. We're in Phoenix because it's hard. We're in Phoenix because we're trying to build a better place. For (most of) us, it's not about creating the next Portland or Seattle. It's about creating an inclusive place, one that celebrates its LGBTQIA community, one that celebrates its Latin residents and welcomes future ones, one that has affordable housing options, one that repurposes blight and makes it something beautiful.

I found a glimmer of hope in the words of Beatrice Moore, the so-called "grande dame" of the funky thoroughfare of Grand Avenue. She cringes every time at the use of the word "cool." While ever a believer in hard work and beautification and livability, she doesn't want anyone to feel unwelcome--except those who seek to scrub out the very grubby charm of her neighborhood.

The unglamorous parts that the New Times forgets to mention are the parts that make up the everyday lives of those they champion in the article: the zoning meetings, the protests, the countless dollars and hours, the grants written, the applications, the fundraisers, the painting, the drywall.

It's THAT can-do spirit that keeps me here, and THAT pride that keeps these people believing in Phoenix.