As a New Yorker in my twenties I frequent many cool places. This is because I, myself, am very cool. I blip in and out of laid-back coffee shops like the Burg’s very own “Verb” and always find myself in interesting situations. Especially when I have free time on my hands. Like this one time when I landed front and center on the shoot for Moby’s Lift Me Up music video.

No, I’m not an aspiring actor-singer-songwriter-model-music-maker-montage. What I am is a girl who finds it fun to do the random. And then after that, I analyze. I’m an aspiring thinker-hipster; a thoughtster, if you will. The Moby shoot lasted more than twelve hours, which meant twelve hours of jumping up and down listening to Moby sing the same lyric over and over: “Lift Me Up!” While the words worked to motivate us extras, who were lined up like gushing fans akin to the crowd in the Smells Like Teen Spirit video, I began to wonder what exactly Moby meant. “Lift Me Up,” a simple mantra repeated over and over, offers very little back-story. As listeners we are offered no reason for Moby’s longing to be lifted, and are given carte blanche to appropriate any meaning we want. Does Moby want to be lifted metaphorically or literally? Does he long to reach spiritual enlightenment or get stoned? Though the simplicity of the statement can probably mean any of these things, the experience of being applicable to anyone and anything almost leaves me feeling a little bit empty. It makes me long to know the truth of its origin, even if it leaves my personal interpretation in the dust.

Unfortunately, Moby is not the only one in the media who chooses short and simple instead of long and winded. It seems like almost everyone nowadays goes out of their way to shave off the un-necessaries. Terms like “terrorist” and “axis of evil” are some examples of the negative effects of the current simplicity trend. In light of repercussions, why do we say less to mean more? Because there’s so much out there that we inevitably want to know, hear, see, taste, and do it all. Our desire to be exposed to everything means that what we see, when we see it, is condensed and pasteurized. All so we won’t get sickened by reality’s true components. Here’s where I turn to Melville.

While killing time at the Verb yesterday, I perchanced upon a fellow thoughtster who was also reading Moby-Dick, my most favorite current read. Our conversation covered many topics, but was initiated by a reference to the painting that hung at the story’s Spouter-Inn. Though the book was in front of neither of us, we were able to converse over the minute details of this painting. The way it was “thoroughly besmoked” and “every way defaced”; how it was “A boggy, soggy, squitchy picture truly, enough to drive a nervous man distracted.”

Upon leaving, I began to think of Melville’s ability throughout the book to unabashedly pin-point the normally “unconveyables” of life. He does not go out of his way to reduce, to thin, to lessen, or dilute. In fact, he goes out of his way to do the opposite. Every inch of every motive and motion is included and proposed as if truth. He writes: “To truly enjoy bodily warmth, some small part of you must be cold, for there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself.” And he’s right! He writes: “No man can ever feel his own identity aright except his eyes be closed; as if darkness were indeed the proper element of our essences, though light be more congenial to our clayey part.” And he’s right!! It’s no wonder Melville is considered one of America’s greatest if not most influential novelists.

As a creator of style, his works became blueprints. Speaking of style, today it is definitely passé to be wordy and definitive. It’s far cooler to be open and all-inclusive. To be free and accepting. To fit everyone and everything in, even if it means labeling innocent people as our enemies. It’s because of our social evolution that I encourage you to read Mr. Melville’s book. It’s a throw-back to a different time, a different mode of thought, and a different method of conveyance. I’m even gonna go out on a limb and say that Melville wins the coolness cake over our Modern Moby. Why? On top of my stylistic preference for the “Ville,” he also wins points for having written the best sentence ever: “Queequeg was George Washington cannibalistically developed. “Now, really. How cool is that sentence!? Don’t get it? Read the book!