TOO COOL FOR THIS PLANET / by emily costa

I was thinking about the banning of Bart Simpson t-shirts while I folded the one I’d saved for my kid, the one I had when I was four. My mom had given me the herculean task of cleaning out our childhood home’s attic, and since packratting runs deep in our family, I saved what I could of my childhood, which was too much; a few checks made out to long-gone department stores, half-empty gel pens, things like that. But sometimes I’d find gems I could pass on to my son, like a stuffed Kyle Broflovski I’d gotten in 1998, or this rad shirt with Bart skateboarding, especially knowing at one point in its existence it was contraband.

The t-shirt freak-out exemplified the show’s cultural impact, but the innovation seemed to wane after the first decade. To be fair, I haven’t really watched new episodes of The Simpsons since FX ran their last marathon and I viewed anything post-early-millennium, finding it exactly as I’d expected it to be—the animation different, clearer, the jokes sometimes cringe-inducing. But those first hours of the marathon, man. Hit after hit.

I thought about this while folding the t-shirt, and then I started thinking about my son’s other shirts, a ’90s bootleg Bart-meets-the-Ninja-Turtles-for-some-reason, a Roger Rabbit sweatshirt, my old Ren & Stimpy pajamas. And the non-vintage shirts, too. Nirvana, the Ramones. He knows the bands, sure—he sings “Heart-Shaped Box” as “hey, wait, I got a Kurt Cobain”–but there’s still the awkward idea that I’m going, look at me, a cool parent. I’m cool, right? Look at the shit my kid knows. And then there’s the other idea of fuck, he’s gonna grow up and rebel and actually hate this stuff, support fascists or something. I will eventually fade into the uncool, and make attempt after attempt to fall back under the cool umbrella.

The Simpsons was cool. And maybe it still is; who am I to deem it un-? There’s plenty of disagreement already, the idea that you could point to here, here, or here as the point you should jump ship, the point where they jumped the shark. But still, despite its continued existence, it’s rightly heralded as one of the most important, influential TV shows of all-time. It’s a defining show of the ’90s, its irreverence and its early derision by conservatives endearing it to those coming of age in the decade. And even those younger than that—I remember my dad watching The Tracey Ullman Show and introducing me to the shorts as a toddler, remember watching those early episodes as a family. Introduced early and repeatedly, the show weasels into your brain, even influences your language. For some reason, my husband and I do a lot from the Poochie episode (“yeah, hi Roy,” or “I’m fired aren’t I?”). Bits and pieces of the soliloquy Homer gives right before bees attack his giant pile of sugar come up every so often, too, but then there are classics like “everything’s coming up Milhouse,” or Lisa’s own attempt to be cool: “like, y’know, whatever.”

Because the show was cool, and because it was subversive, it’s inevitable there would be some overlap with the decade’s biggest musical acts, especially in alternative rock. In 1996 we get “Homerpalooza,” a meditation on the elusive nature and maintainability of coolness. From the start, it’s clear “Homerpalooza” deals largely with warped self-identity. The episode begins with Otto receiving an award for Safest Bus Driver only to be pulled out of the dream by the screams of the kids he’s chauffeuring. He crashes through the Auto Wrecking Yard, and everyone looks on as the bus gets cubed. Because of this, parents are forced to carpool, and Homer’s up for the job. The scene where he drives the kids to school and tries desperately to relate to them by asserting the merits of Grand Funk is perfect in its depiction of the pathetic adult grappling with an unexpected reality: I am no longer cool. I am no longer relevant. I am completely washed. But we get more through flashback. Homer was never actually cool.

I wasn’t either. There were times, yeah, when I felt on the precipice, but then I look at old pictures and it’s clear. Those times I was nearest happened in early adolescence, back when it felt like anything was possible, when I had years to look forward to. Who would I be? Someone in a band, maybe? Someone living in a loft, someone with a lip ring? Who knew? My main measure of coolness back then was my dad’s girlfriend’s son. Ryan (I changed his name for this essay) was only a year older than me, but that gap stretched wide. His parents had been divorced for a year or two by the time he moved into the house where I’d spend every Friday night watching movies and playing board games with his mom and brother, Ryan noticeably absent. He was out with friends, or sometimes the friends came over. I’d glimpse them as they emerged from the basement, boys in their early teens existing effortlessly, something I couldn’t fathom doing.

Ryan had extreme divorced-parents energy: detached enough to remain mysterious, slightly rebellious. He never really talked to me. He left his impact by not doing so, by showing not telling. I remember seeing Red Hot Chili Peppers CDs in his room. I remember how, when his mom would drive us to his baseball games, he’d change the dial from easy listening to the alternative rock station. It was the same decades-old struggle that happens in Homer’s car. I remember Ryan singing lyrics to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as we ate candy at my dad’s video store. I sat there eating a Fun Dip, mulling over the words, running them through my head, wondering at libido.

Little did I know that the coolest thing about me was probably my access to free candy and movies and video games, as well as unlimited plays on the crane machine. The way I viewed my parents back then was how everyone views their parents. They were very uncool. How could my dad’s favorite band be Chicago? He was around for punk! He wasn’t too old for grunge! But I didn’t fully appreciate the little ways he was helping me form an identity through his store, through film, showing me black-and-white classics, letting me stay up to watch slasher and zombie movies. I still rebelled. I had to. It’s just a feeling in your gut, this need to separate.

Solely because of Ryan’s influence, I quit radio pop top-40; I stopped playing my mom’s Beatles CDs, started stealing from my parents’ stash of Memorex 90s to tape songs off the alternative station. I started watching MTV, which soon became something religious, some holy text to follow, as it did for most kids nearing puberty. I’d educate myself by watching their decade-ending countdowns. I’d put a piece of Scotch tape over the square hole of a VHS screener from my dad’s huge collection, and set the VCR to record “Closer” and “1979,” “Jeremy” and “Fake Plastic Trees.” There was only one other girl in my grade who liked alternative music, and we were bonded irrevocably, something deep cemented through twin ball-chain necklaces, wide pants, and jelly bracelets. And it was right there: I felt cool, for a moment, when I was reading SPIN and discovering new (to me) bands, covering my walls in Absolut Vodka ads, making lists of albums I had to buy at Record Town.

I’m Homer now with my kid (“I’m teaching you about rock music!”), but I was Homer then, too, never reaching the apex I hoped for. I’ve always felt particularly seen in the moment Homer walks up to the van during his flashback. In a scene inspired by Dazed and Confused, Homer approaches the cool teens in the pulse of ’70s strobe light, only to be met with leers, and he recedes back into his lonely existence listening to Leo Sayer with Barney. But he still remembers it fondly. This is also the scene where Abe Simpson succinctly lays out the circle of life: “I used to be with ‘it,’ but then they changed what ‘it’ was. Now what I’m with isn’t ‘it’ anymore, and what’s ‘it’ seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to you!”

Despite the space I carved for myself, I didn’t feel cool. I never felt accepted within the alternative rock scene because, well, I wasn’t in it. There was no ‘scene,’ at least anymore, at least not one I could find, especially in Waterbury, Connecticut, especially at twelve years old. Even if there were one, my parents would’ve never let me do anything more independent than roam freely at the mall for a few hours on a Saturday afternoon. The bands that got me through early adolescence, mainly Nirvana, were disbanded or weren’t big anymore, and already I was seeking out the next “it,” which was nü-metal. Kurt had been gone for a solid five years before I plastered my bedroom walls with his face, before I memorized Incesticide’s liner notes. I’d done my seventh grade biography book report on Dave Thompson’s Never Fade Away: The Kurt Cobain Story and gotten a warning from my ancient teacher that this man’s life was nothing to be celebrated, that his values were not consistent with the Catholic education I was receiving. I think my grade suffered, but her slight reprimand did give me a jolt of satisfaction.

Even the bands showcased in “Homerpalooza” are victims of a scene moving on. The episode hammers home the transitory nature of coolness, of what’s “it” at any one moment, by showing a shifting of these scenes, the fickle fluctuation of the cultural zeitgeist, things dying off and being replaced. Erik Adams of the A.V. Club writes about the accuracy of Abe Simpson’s speech, that ever-changing “it”: “‘It’ changed over the course of the episode’s production cycle, in ways that even affected ‘Homerpalooza’’s major point of inspiration: Metallica headlined Lollapalooza in 1996, obliterating the festival’s ‘celebration of the underground’ vibe.” Earlier in the article, he mentions how Eric Stefani, then working as an animator, drew in his sister Gwen and the rest of No Doubt as background characters. By the time the episode aired, they were major stars. Sonic Youth and The Smashing Pumpkins, alternative rock pioneers, were arguably already past their peak years when they appeared on the show. As Adams points out, “‘Homerpalooza’ works better as an articulation of ‘they changed what it was’ than it does as an Alternative Nation time capsule.” Everything moves so quickly.

Homer realizes this too as he steps inside Suicide Notes, the newly renamed record store. After he finds all his favorite records dumped in the Oldies section, he returns home crestfallen. He devises a plan to become cool again, buying tickets to the big music festival coming to Springfield: Hullabalooza. Bart and Lisa are ecstatic, but Homer’s attempts to enjoy himself and regain his coolness go terribly wrong. First they take his homemade Kahlua, and then he’s called a narc. Even his new hat and “Too Cool for This Planet” pin are working against him.

A few years ago, my husband and I saw the Pixies in my hometown during their Lost Cities tour. The show was in an old restored theatre; we sat in crushed velvet fold-up seats. When the band came on, we got up. We stood there, arms crossed, feet tapping along. I felt so fucking old. In reality, we were probably some of the youngest people there, or at least somewhere in the middle of the demographic. But then I think about how prehistoric we’d seem at a club show full of new bands. I’d still be experiencing the timeless struggle of worrying about what I was wearing, if my hair was weird, if I seemed to exist as effortlessly as those alternative boys so many years earlier. I’d probably stay at the back edge of the crowd, the stage barely visible. My husband would probably tell me his back hurt. We’d be Homer in the Rastafarian hat, two uncool people masquerading. The cycle continues.

In the episode, however, Homer is actually able to achieve coolness. After an inflatable pig rockets into Homer’s stomach, he’s hired by the festival’s freak show to replicate the incident with a cannonball and to tour with the show. He finally has his moment of being with “it,” of being in the in-crowd. The bands—incredible cameo work by The Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, Cypress Hill, and Peter Frampton—all hang with him. He’s “finally tapped into that spirit of self- destruction that makes rock ‘n’ roll the king of music.” But during this reign, Gen X still isn’t satisfied: 

Teen 1: Oh, here comes that cannonball guy. He's cool.

Teen 2: Are you being sarcastic, dude?

Teen 1: I don't even know anymore.

It’s soon revealed that the cannonballs are destroying Homer’s body, and that one more hit could kill him. He gives up his coolness, choosing health and family instead. Within this there seems to be the idea that the only way to achieve coolness, to reach that sort of divine acceptance and validation by our peers, is to lose a piece of ourselves. That we should be comfortable within our identities, our bodies, our ages. That that’s what really matters. But perhaps that thesis is reductive. Or maybe it’s just dumb. Untrue. Thinking back to being twelve, thirteen, fourteen—I’d have given up a hell of a lot.

On the car ride back from Homer’s last show, he says he’s realized that family togetherness “is more important than being cool,” to which Lisa replies, “Dad, what you just said was powerfully uncool.” And the discussion goes further, with Marge glad she’s not cool. But not caring about being cool must therefore make her cool. When the kids squash that notion, she asks, “Well, how the hell do you be cool?” And the kids don’t really have an answer, even if here, they’re the cool ones; they’re the ones defining the term, despite Lisa’s series-long arc of being “powerfully uncool” herself. Homer posits that maybe when you’re cool, you don’t need to be told you’re cool. Lisa’s answer sums up the need for validation I’ve experienced all my life, the desire for connection, the question we’d probably all own up to wondering at one time or another: “How else would you know?”

Emily Costa teaches freshmen at Southern Connecticut State University, where she received her MFA. Her work can be found in Hobart, Barrelhouse, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Atticus Review, and elsewhere. You can follow her on twitter @emilylauracosta.