Explaining The Seattle Chill

By Elissa Rosenthal

It has been a while since I have heard of the term The Seattle Chill. The first time I ever heard of the term was from a friend I had at the time who was from Phoenix, Arizona. Though today, while on a bus watching the quiet raindrops drip down the window, I thought of the term once again.

You do not truly realize how captivated it appears Seattleites- including myself- are to our phones and our own little bubbles of safety until you put the phone down and look around. Truly look around.

The Seattle Chill, also known as The Seattle Freeze is a term I never knew until that friend of mine told me about it. So, in case you are like me when I first heard the term, where you do not know a clue of what I am talking about, I will give you the description that, that friend of mine told me those years ago.

The Seattle Chill is a term some people outside of Seattle use to describe how unfriendly or welcoming Seattle is to newcomers or outsiders. Now, I do not deny that, that statement is true. I have come across this chill myself and I am sure other people who have grown up here have as well. It is just, until I heard the term did I start to question if the rest of the country is different when it comes to conversing with one another.

My bus trip was a good example of The Seattle Chill. No one was talking to one another, even people who clearly knew each other, and there was so little sound on the bus you could hear the leg of the guy sitting behind you wiggling. Plus, everyone was either on their phone or looking off somewhere in the distance to do their best not to look at someone else by accident.

With the way I grew up, I know why this happens and I really do wonder how it would be if it was different here.

When I was younger, one of the main points we learned early on is you did not talk on the bus, no matter how urgent the matter was. This unspoken rule was drilled into my head so many times by my peers that now I feel extremely awkward talking to someone while on the bus for any reason. The point, when I was younger, was enforced by the glares we would get, as growing kids, from the adults around us. These glances would clearly tell us that we needed to shut up. These glares told us how we were disturbing the others on the bus by saying anything at all, even whispers. At least that is the reason I put toward how people in Seattle act on the bus. The bus is quiet until you get on the bus: you are the loud one, therefore you are the other, so therefore you are bad.

It is a way of trying not to be an outsider I guess in this, mostly cloudy, city. Part of which is part of The Seattle Chill as well.

The associating certain people as outsiders is part of the Seattle culture for some people. Like how in particular conversations, one may ask you if you grew up here, or if you are a transplant. A transplant is a term to describe those who have moved here from somewhere else. The term has negative connotations for inadvertently saying that you are one of the reason the prices for everything from housing to soda has gone up. This is because the majority of people who refer to transplants are referring to those who came from California for cheaper house prices, bringing in a lot more money, and then, therefore, making it where retailers can ask for higher prices.

The Seattle Chill, from an insiders perspective, is a way Seattleites are trying stay together and try to be part of a common whole, while slowly welcoming others, since so many more people are rushing in from different countries and states. It is a way of trying to preserve the culture of Seattle being a comfy city where anyone can find a place, while seeing everything change so quickly around you all of the time.

It is like the child in the corner crossing their hands over their chest, looking down with a grumpy face, because their teacher told them to share their toy with the child next to them. They let the other child barrow their toy, carefully looking here and there to see if the toy is still okay, hoping that nothing happens to it. This is mostly because the child does not know what the other child's plans are with their toy.

It is truly hard to exactly describe what it is like coming from an inside perspective when describing The Seattle Chill, and I wish I could iron it out more into strong reasons why, but from my own experiences I cannot. I grew up hearing stories from my parents on how the city used to be before the Seattle World's Fair, and when there was a reason for the counterbalance to be called the counterbalance. I grew up when there was still a train along the waterfront. One that I now have to once in a while tell tourists does not exist anymore.

So many things change in Seattle all of the time, it is sort of hard to keep track.

If any of you have questions for me please feel free to ask them in the comments or to tweet me @TheElissaPost on twitter! I will be glad to iron out anything that seems unclear since I know this topic is pretty abstract and has, in my perspective, to do more with building stress than solid facts.

If you do like this article please share with the buttons provided on the page!

Please follow me on Twitter https://twitter.com/TheElissaPost !

I also have a link for my Facebook fan page here : https://www.facebook.com/Elissa-Rosenthal-1775925416023781/

Thank you for reading my blog! Let us have a conversation!