I love pop music. Now that I’m well into my twenties I’ve come to the conclusion that Avril Lavigne was an awesome teenager with a couple good tunes – and I especially like the singles from her second album, which I discovered on iTunes last month.

Back in high school I did an Avril (whether it was before or after she started the trend I can’t really remember) by adopting a hometown shirt. I believe her notorious t-shirt was for a Napanee hardware store, mine is from someone’s basement and I trimmed it down a bit. It’s Ray‘s favourite shirt of mine, he likes it when I wear it. Maybe because he’s from the same town. Boys =)

Unfortunately the authentic polyester is beginning to wear for the worse and take on odd odors. This shirt is older than I am which just goes to show how long garment garbage can last. For Ray I have agreed to save the graphic to screen print onto a new (100% cotton) shirt, probably from American Apparel.

I think what made Avril’s shirt resonate with me as a trend was the authenticity of it. It is an accessible, inexpensive re-use of clothing created for humble purposes. Rather than hometown pride, it evokes the ironic humour that small town teenagers use as a way to tolerate their small town life, not always without affection. Her suburban clones who created a demand for identical Napanee hardware t-shirts didn’t quite get the point.

I’m all excited because tomorrow I’m having lunch with my current favourite small-town Ontario teenager, Isabel from Hipster Musings. Check out her blog, she makes being a teenager look much more awesome than I remember it. She’s a real punk, she wears an authentic old dad shirt.

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