Coolness

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My son is in kindergarten. He is concerned about whether he is cool or not. It seems some of the older kids think they are cool. But he doesn’t think they are. Mostly because the kids who keep going on about being cool aren’t very nice. They think they are superior, and they clearly aren’t. I mean, let’s face it. If you should be in 1^st grade, but you are sitting in a kindergarten class. You aren’t all that cool.

I’ve told my son that cool people are cool because they are calm and cool when upsetting things happen. They don’t get hot, they remain cool. So being who you are, despite pressure to be “cool” is cool. Being obsessed with being cool isn’t cool. Cool people don’t obsess. They are too cool and calm to obsess.

I’ve assured him he is one of the coolest kids I’ve ever met and that pretty much every single adult who has ever met him is impressed with him and thinks he is cool. And a big part of that is because he is genuinely very nice. He seemed pleased by this reassurance.

The other day, he was talking to me about one of his friends. He said, “You know what comes with friendship?  Coolness.” I thought to myself, you couldn’t be more right.