A week or so ago, before Seattle decided to play summer for a few days, I grilled dinner in a torrential downpour, and it felt … normal. There was no attempt to prove a point about being a seasoned Northwesterner — there was just a plan in place to grill that night and people needed to eat.

I don’t know, after 21 years in Seattle, whether that anecdote makes me more of a “local,” but it does illustrate, I think, an acceptance of what it means to live here. And it’s a point among many that are raised in a fun new video from our friends over at The Evergrey.

In the 3 1/2-minute Facebook video, The Everygrey asked a mix of Seattle natives and transplants what it takes to become a Seattle local and what it means to be a Seattleite. It’s a relevant exercise given all the talk about tech booms and growth and change and everything else associated with Seattle looking and feeling a lot less like Seattle to a lot of people.

What does it mean to be a Seattleite? What does it take to become a Seattle 'local'? We asked your neighbors, new and old, and included some fascinating stats from Seattle CityClub's new report on #Seattle: http://bit.ly/CivicHealth Now, we want to hear from you. Watch the clip and tell us in the comments below: What do YOU think it means to be a Seattleite? And how do you become one? #sponsoredby Seattle CityClub Posted by The Evergrey on Tuesday, May 23, 2017

The video opens with a few riffs on steadfast stereotypes about the people who live here and what they wear, and how they look like they could be headed off on a hike or about to hit the gym at a moment’s notice. The cars we drive (Subaru, Volvo) and the stuff we drink (coffee) are also measuring sticks for local status, a few folks say.

But famously reserved and distant Seattle isn’t just going to warm up to a transplant just because she hits the espresso drive-thru in her Outback on the way to Tiger Mountain. And the pace with which the city is evolving into something different — attracting thousands of newbies with its tech jobs and progressive politics — is sure to dull the edges a bit when it comes to what it means to be a future local.

“I sort of wonder if you can ever really gain local status,” says a transplant named Dominick. “I know I’ve been chasing it for a while.”

But despite the once-popular refrain that it takes 10 years or more to feel more welcome in Seattle, native Casey says there’s no measure of time when it comes to what Dominick is after. You just have to “have an appreciation of what makes Seattle Seattle.”

I sort of wonder if you can ever really gain local status. I know I’ve been chasing it for a while.

Appreciating the weather is certainly part of that. And, to my point about the wet backyard BBQ session, native Minda says local status is achieved “when you’re willing to do things in the rain that people in other regions would say, put off for another day.”

I sometimes wonder how long that argument will hold up as a point of pride. I’ve heard Seattleites curse the TV during nationally broadcast sporting events, such as a “Monday Night Football” game featuring the Seahawks at home, when beautiful, rainless images of the city show it to be a place that’s not perpetually wet and grey. The fear being that people traditionally put off of Seattle by the weather would suddenly start packing — “8 months of rain be damned, I’m going to Amazon!”

Locals wary of transplants would be best served by a scroll of housing prices being shown on the TV rather than the ubiquitous fish being tossed at Pike Place Market. “That’ll scare ’em!”

In the end, native Knute says the native part is “not as important as just kinda becoming part of the place, learning about the place.”

Here’s to hoping we can all learn to get along and take on the challenges that come with rapid growth, rather than be forever distracted by whether or not our choice of footwear or the use of an umbrella is going to make us feel less at home.