I am back home with my mainstream family. I feel so displaced coming back to suburbia. It’s like I don’t even have a home n e more, and I can finally relate to the theme of most indie movies made from 2000-2005.
I look across the dinner table, and wonder who these people are, and how they have forged my independent spirit. They have no knowledge of what I know and what I have seen, but some how, they made me into the person I am today. While I am thankful for my parents’ support, I wish I could prove to them that I can make it on my own. I wish I could prove to them that there is a reason that I live my life the way that I do.
This will happen one day.
They see me, and they don’t quite ‘get’ me. Perhaps they are just relieved that I am pursuing a degree. Perhaps they are relieved that I am not a ‘ghey’ like they probably thought I would end up being during high school. Sometimes I wish I could authentically communicate with them in the same manner that I communicate with a group of my closest friends when I am buzzed. But that will probably never happen.
Part of me longs to get this table of people who I am related to [via blood] to ‘get’ me, but the alternative part of me wants to stop honoring mainstream concepts like bloodlines and family.
*****
I look around my childhood room, and I take a moment–a moment to think about how far I’ve come. I used to be so disillusioned/impressionable/out-of-touch-with-reality. Now I know who I am. I know what I will become. I take solace in this fact.
What am I thankful for?
I am not sure.
I am sure.
I know.
I know what I am thankful for.
//// What I am thankful for.
////// by Carles
I am thankful for social networks, a place that helps me express myself and connect with friends.
I am thankful for blogs, a form of media where I can truly express myself without the constraints and excess noise of social networks.
I am thankful for my friends because they help me to feel better about myself after I find out how sad/alone they are bc they have parents who didn’t love them as authentically as mine love me.
I am thankful for Napster for creating the mp3.
I am thankful for Mark Zuckerburg and Tom for being my friend.
I am thankful for vegan bc it made my family make me a ’special lil meal’ at the Thanksgiving table.
I am thankful for computers for making electro too accessible.
I am thankful for Apple for creating the iPhone so that I can do lines of blow off it.
I am thankful for Macbooks and iMacs for giving me the opportunity to ‘connect’ and ‘create’ to build my weblog website thingy.
I am thankful for Fiji water for giving me the opportunity to differentiate.
I am thankful for frozen yogurt for giving me an alt+healthy ’smart treat.’
I am thankful for Justice for being a meme that can be blogged about until they make a new album and inauthentic people will ’say it is good’ but they will just be holding on to how the world used to be/who they used to be.
I am thankful for party photographers for ‘going out’ so that we don’t have to.
I am thankful for girls who show their breasts in party pix for coming from fractured families.
I am thankful for child predators who made child predator glasses possible.
I am thankful for Anthony Volodkin for creating the Hype Machine and adding value to the long tail of meaningless, crappy, terrible, unjustified, poorly written music blogs.
I am thankful for the man who invented the remix.
I am thankful for cool dads who drive Priuses.
I am thankful for free spirited moms who drive Lexus SUV hybrids.
I am thankful for free spirited moms who make 28K per year and dress like they just came out of a dumpster.
I am thankful for my blog bffs for posting a few good songs per week so that I don’t have to listen to the crappy mp3s that entry level producers send me [via email].
I am thankful for street fashion bloggers for being the kind of people who ’still carry a camera around with them every where they go’ (this is what people did when digital cameras came out, but now with camphones, it’s a whole new landscape).
I am thankful for tumblr for taking the meme economy to a place we never thought it could.
I am thankful for people who hang out on message boards who ‘have opinions.’
I am thankful for people who are trying to take their alternative personal brand to the next level.
I am thankful for Sparks for keeping me awake when I am abt 2 fall asleep at 1 p.m. every day.
I am thankful for my boss at my ‘real job’ not knowing what Sparks is, so that I can drink it at my desk at work.
I am thankful for blow.
I am thankful for sluts in bathrooms.
I am thankful for God, for creating people of all colours.
I am thankful for AZNs.
I am thankful for blipsters.
I am thankful for Obama.
I am thankful for MexicAlts/Altinos.
I am thankful for white people for oppressing s00 many people, enabling some of the most ‘bad ass’ art which has inspired college dorm room art for mnstrm bros.
I am thankful for my brother who doesn’t ‘get’ me.
I am thankful for my sister for ‘trying to understand me.’
I am thankful for airlines so that I can fly abroad to find myself.
I am thankful for Australia, France, the UK, and other altCountries for passing laws which legalize study-abroad programs.
I am thankful for HIPSTER RUNOFF.
I am thankful for Carles.
I am thankful for ‘meaning.’
I am thankful for authenticity.
I am thankful for finding a place where people who ’see the world the way I do’ go to talk about life.
I am thankful that Carles ‘gets’ me.
I am thankful for me.
I am thankful for my personal brand.
I am thankful for American Apparel for creating a simple, yet [highly branded] way for me to express myself.
I am thankful for Barry Obama.
I am thankful for the War in Iraq for helping our economy through tough times.
I am thankful for the Financial Crisis for giving us something 2 blog about.
I am thankful for Sarah Palin, the meme of 2k8.
I am thankful for trivial electro producers.
I am thankful for RSS/GoogleReader.
I am thankful for my brain for letting ‘memes’ happen.
I am thankful for ________________.
What are u thankful 4?
Do yall know what the first alts served at the first THNXGVNG?
(miss u)
//wish u were here [via miss u]
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IAmCarles.com
40 Comments
thanks for this. god bless.
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I’m thankful for you!
luv u
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<3 yall
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im so bored at home. my sister has just discovered justice and is obsessed with the cross gimmick thingy. she wants to visit me and ‘partie’ with my friends. i know my bros, and i know they would just take advantage of another entry leveler. so i told her she could never come.
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//////////Reply by glamrockonabudget
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 11:02 pm
@.xXxXanonyXxXx., if alts are part of something bigger than themselves then isn’t your responsibility to bring entryLVLSsiblings into the underworld. ya your bros would make her feel special then like garbage. such is an alt lyfe
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//////////Reply by .xXxXanonyXxXx.
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
@glamrockonabudget,
not my altbros. not my sister.
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//////////Reply by glamrockonabudget
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
@.xXxXanonyXxXx., i see some PHORM of psychological prowess. if you abandon one of your altbros at a party. its cool, he knows it was an accident. ps when cross came out i gave a copy to my 10 yr.old nephew, ya know, give em a head start on understanding authentic living. pps crls should start mrthastwrt type deal. “authentic living with carles the mexicalt.”
I am thankful for how much you make me laugh.
“I am back home with my mainstream family. I feel so displaced coming back to suburbia. It’s like I don’t even have a home n e more, and I can finally relate to the theme of most indie movies made from 2000-2005.
I look across the dinner table, and wonder who these people are, and how they have forged my independent spirit. They have no knowledge of what I know and what I have seen, but some how, they made me into the person I am today.”
HAHAHA that’s just brilliant!
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This post is right on the money. 2 close 2 reality.
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I am thankful that I don’t have to be with my family today. Instead, I’m going to hang around in my pajamas til 1pm, jack off at some point, down a sparks, smoke weed, make food for my friend’s party, smoke more weed, eat like a dumb animal at said party, drink more, smoke more, play guitar at some point, call my family after I get really fucked up, tell my sister what I really think of her, have mom and dad thank me for telling her off because they can’t bring themselves to do it, listen to my brother whine, have my extended family depress me, have dad tell me stories about what fuckups they all are, smoke more weed while I talk to him for an hour while he hides from everyone since he’s the meaningful/authentic parent, drink more.
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how much “mainstream” money, booze, sluts to destroy your alt cred? or will you altyr yourself forever? are you an altyr with or without a cause, clause, conscience? what will make you become an altyr for the cause? how will you altyr yourself? if all you do is saltyrize don’t you run the risk of canceling out, debasing your own altyr(dom) – when and where do you altyrnate between mainstream motions/emotions and altyration fascistnation – how long before we have to begin using characters instead of words to combine words like fascist fashion and fascination – maybe just a swastika is sufficient? is the key to keep alienating/altyrnating those around us until we reach altyrdom or should we keep our enemies as close possible? who are our enememes? mnstrmrs or other altyrs who’ve allowed their personal brand/blood line to mingle with common folk/people? is altyrdom like buddhism in its valuation of detachedness? if i see the Altyr on the road to Altyrdom should i kill it?
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//////////Reply by littlesparrow
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
@alt rings, huh?
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//////////Reply by huh mirror
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
@littlesparrow, let’s get nervous
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h8 yall for makin’ me want to drink sparx nonchalantly in situations that expect a certain level of lucidity
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You really outdid yourself Carles.
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Concerned by the ‘Child Predator’ line – please explain before I call the Cops
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//////////Reply by anonymous
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
WHO ISN’T THANKFUL FOR CHILD PREDATORS?
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//////////Reply by are you kidding me
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
@anonymous,the children
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//////////Reply by lawlcatz
//////////Posted November 28th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
@are you kidding me,
i lost my virginity to a child predator.
//////////Reply by 911
//////////Posted November 28th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
I am thankful for psychotherapists who ply you with drugs to stop you re-offending, you twisted bunch of kiddy-fiddlers
If the poem was meant to be some kind of joke… it isn’t funny – get your heads checked!
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2 much h8 in the w0rld 2day.
come 2gehter for sanxgiver
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<3 this <3 hro <3 altlyfestylez lawlz
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“They see me, and they don’t quite ‘get’ me. Perhaps they are just relieved that I am pursuing a degree. Perhaps they are relieved that I am not a ‘ghey’ like they probably thought I would end up being during high school. Sometimes I wish I could authentically communicate with them in the same manner that I communicate with a group of my closest friends when I am buzzed. But that will probably never happen.”
spot on
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I just love your list of what you’re thankful for.
I’m thankful for electronics :)
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plz leak the animal collectives krlz
no thxgvng in da uk
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//////////Reply by The Man in the Hat
//////////Posted November 28th, 2008 at 12:35 am
@plz,
we’ll, technically the pilgrims were english. So you could celebrate. I mean, it’d kinda be like celebrating the conception of you’re illegitimate/unplanned child.
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h8 thankzgivin, still no meaning
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thx 4 ‘being in my life’ carles. i was hoping for a really special holiday post today, and you delivered. thx 4 alwayz givin so much <3 luv u.
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I 2 AM THANKFUL FOR CARLES & HIPSTER RUNOFF.
H8 EVERYTHING ELSE.
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Yall, thanks for the times the memories the friendships the great times we had.
IT ISN”T, sit on a cucumber and rotate YALL
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I’m thankful for Dumptruck!
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my family has so many mnstrm ideas crls. i just left all of them downstairs feeling depressed and went to go to hro for some encouragement. ive always been alt, everything my family says seems to piss me off, all their rediculous ideas that fall into the catagory of mainstream politics. i have no connection, im not blood related, im adopted, does that mean anything??? does family really mean anything if they dont get you??
haha my aunt just walked in to try to explain something to me, trying to get “deep” so i “get it”. didnt work. talking about how she never fit in, and she’s over 50 years old and is still trying to. rlly sad. she thinks im somehow like her.
thanks crls for making me feel somewhat normal in this disgustingly mainstream world. <3 u.
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//////////Reply by plastic fang
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
@helphalphelf, HAHAHAHA
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//////////Reply by littlesparrow
//////////Posted November 28th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
@helphalphelf, they prolly love u less, since ur not genetically binded to them.
bummer :/
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YALL CARLES!!! BE THANKFULL FOR YALL
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crls you really ‘get’ all of us it made me a lil bit sad that my life is s0 ENCAPSULATED in oversized helvetica/verdana/other sans-serif font and bright colors. is this all there is? r we less ‘authentic’ and ‘original’ bc of this? is it so ’sincere’ that its ‘ironic’ or so ‘ironic’ that its ’sincere?’ im confused :(
ur job is not alt enough if ur boss doesn’t know what sparks is, i am thankful for my boss giving me sparks at work
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I’ve never had that cranberry stuff you show in the picture above. It sucks.
*thankful
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Yo CRLS…
I”m thankful for…
-The internet(4 making my life feel more complete/like I wasn’t a freak)
-RockBand/Guitar Hero
-Deep Fried Turkey
-Vodka (bcuz it mixes ReaLlY good w/cactus cooler)
-Pie/stuffing/mashedpotatoes/2pac/my crazy family.
-Stupid PPL<3 2 H8 Yall!
-Camera Phones
-The ’sticky icky’
-Life
-It’s beautiful CRLS…<3 ya!
PS- Fuck yall hoes!
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thnkful 2 get hro
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thankful for the new song by the cut copies/that you were compelled to post about it
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thankful 4 tugs
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yo, at first i questioned the authenticity of your blog, but shit grew on me like herpes after blazing a powdery p-funk that was passed around the noses of altfiends in a valencia backroom.
this post gave you soul.
i <3 this SHT
ALTBOI4LYF NGGA
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//////////Reply by mind body and soul
//////////Posted November 27th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
@juno, now crls is a white negro?
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//////////Reply by juno
//////////Posted November 28th, 2008 at 12:01 am
@mind body and soul, why must you ask alt+rhetorical questions?
eat some more tofurky alt+vegan and say HWDY to the SBRBS.
<3
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I heard there’s a reward for revealing Carles’ true identity. Is this true and how much is the reward?
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carles is some kid named aaron that attends pratt
i win
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My Cool Dad thought it would be a good idea to stream our alt-thanksgiving over the internet and not tell anybody. hahaha, Cool Dads.
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+infinity
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Cousin: Yeah, I like all types of music. Rap, underground rap, MNSTRM. What kinda music do u listen to?
Me: Do you listen to electro?
Cousin: Umm, no, but I like MGM and that one song “Electric Eel.”
Me: (cringing on the inside) Oh, I love that song.
Cousin: Yeah, my mom likes it too and she likes “Kids.”
Me: Have you heard of Justice?
Cousin: No, what’s that?
…
Luv u Crls. This def. goes in the mmrbl posts clmn.
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tl;dr
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amen 2 tht.
i am thankful to you and your blog for giving me some alt. in college. 2 much coldplay and king of leon in the mnstrm atm.
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how can i be thankful when hpstr rnff has become approachable enuff for mnstrm-not-even-entry-levelers to read?!?!
i’m going to eat leftover stuffing and carve a cross into my chest
hopefully i’ll die and go to altheaven
fuck you mainstreamers
you’re going to halifax
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WTF NO NEW POSTS.
POST MORE MORE CRLSBRO
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barack obama is still an imperialist yall. if u voted 4 him ur probs n entry-level.
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//////////Reply by regretful
//////////Posted September 14th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
argh! i can’t believe i said that just because i disagreed with someone’s political beliefs. i’m so sorry. the irony is all on me, obviously. feel free to incorporate this into your fodder (i don’t read this blog anymore, i just wanted to add this ridiculous addendum.)
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