Okay so we all have the desire to want to look good and more importantly the desire for others to think that we look good, but with the fashion trends constantly changin and few things remaining constant, this can be a completely daunting task. These are the quick reflections of a young stylish adult.

Being a 22 year old soon-to-be college graduate I am often placed in a weird place in the world of fashion trends, the middle ground.  You don’t want to seem too old with your attire while at the same time you are well past the days of big name brands molesting the clothing you adorn. The best policy is to keep it clean and keep it simple.

With this hot and humid weather, a nice fitted pair of jeans and a classic sneaker is an option you can never lose with. Most of the time this is what I choose. Its clean classic and timeless.  Sperry’s (a brand of boat shoe) are also a must have in every closet for the summer season.

One of the most important things about clothing is that it must match your personality.  Before you are even given an opportunity to express yourself verbally, your appearance speaks volumes.  This is a very dangerous and powerful fact.  This allows a person to give off whatever impression they wish to simply by what they choose to wear.

The next is to make sure that your clothes are appropriate for you.  There is nothing worse than seeing someone who is wearing something that is completely too small for their body.  Smaller is not nessicarily sexier (women tend to violate this rule the most).  I love women with all my being but when I see a women who is a XL trying to fit into a Medium, the next thing i see is four people slyly TwitPic’ing her.

Lastly I greatly dislike this “skinny jeans” movement.  It’s a personal choice of course which is what I talked about earlier but I would be remiss if I didn’t sound off on this nonsense.  The worst part about this whole movement is that  I’ve never seen a guy wearing these ’super skinny jeans’ walking with a girlfriend.  Bottom line, your jeans should not be as tight as the ones your girlfriend is wearing.

Just some kick reflections of a young stylish adult.

-Nate Jones

Nate is a dancer and MC with Cutting Edge Entertainment.  To learn a bit more about him, check out some of these posts on our blog.

Nate on Cutting Edge

Nate on Hip Hop

Nate Style

Photo courtesy of Erin Duffy

www.cuttingedgedjs.com

One evening this past summer I’d been working late at the office and found myself driving home at a time when there were very few cars on the road.  It was one of those nights where I found myself following the same vehicle almost all of the way home, not on purpose of course,  just mere coincidence.  Fairly early on in the drive, we both came to a stoplight, where I was first able to get a close look at the bumper sticker on the back of the car, which read:

“It’s OK to say Merry Christmas”

For whatever reason it struck a nerve.  Not a bad one mind you, but the type that makes you ponder something perhaps more than the message was intended… or perhaps not.

I think it’s important to make clear that I’m not a Christian, and in fact I was raised Jewish.  Being born and raised in the United States, I’m no stranger to Christmas and it’s traditions.  As a youth my parents would take me to their friends homes on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, where we would exchange gifts, pick candy canes off the tree, drink egg nog and listen to popular Christmas songs around the warm hearth.  For me, these are fond memories, and still to this day – although I do not observe Christmas in my own home – I still enjoy the ’spirit’ of Christmas, which is a big part of American culture, which brings me back to my original thought.

So here I am, driving home behind this car and every so often catching another traffic signal that allows me to read the words, and all I keep thinking to myself (with enthusiasm), “Yeah… It IS ok to say Merry Christmas!!”

Now perhaps I’ve got far too much time on my hands to give so much thought to this, still the longer I followed this car and processed the message on the bumper sticker, the more resolute I became on the matter.  My mind began to wander, trying to pinpoint when exactly I was first informed that it was no longer acceptable to say the words Merry Christmas, and instead I was to re-program and use the generic “Happy Holidays” as my standard greeting.  Even as I write this I ask myself  “Was this some memo I received, or just one of those things that creeps up on us as a society, like choosing to medicate our children as a method of behavior modification?”

Of course, if I’m offending someone here with my stream of consciousness, I assure you that isn’t my intention.  It’s just that I can’t understand what is offensive about ‘Merry Christmas’, or Christmas in general.  It’s not as if by simply saying the words I’m somehow swearing my allegiance to the Christian faith, or even Christ himself.  It’s a salutation, not an affirmation.

As a non-Christian, I take no offense when someone wishes me a Merry Christmas, and as a sort of experiment I’ve been making a point of wishing a Merry Christmas to people I meet.  So far, I haven’t gotten a punch in the nose, or even a sour face.  Instead, Ive been greeted with smiles and returned salutations.

So in closing, I’d just like to say… “Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.”

-Craig Sumsky

Illustration by Sean Gallo Designs

I read someplace that endings are only the beginnings of something else.  This is very true, but often times endings are opportunities.

When I’m not a DJ (when I leave work for example), I’m also a lot of other things.  I’m a video gamer, a fairly good cook, a world traveler and a collector of many things… particularly books. Ok, so maybe I’m not being completely honest, I’m a total bibliophile (a book collector).  I’ve been a voracious reader for as long as I can remember.  My reading evolution began someplace with Dr. Seuss, then A.A. Milne, then Judy Blume, then C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Richard Adams, Vladimir Nabokov, Stephen King, Anne Rice, Anais Nin, Alexandre Dumas (Can I stop yet?), and the list goes ever on.  Unlike music, I can’t recite from memory the books I’ve read like I can with lyrics, but I certainly am just as methodical in how I organize and catalog them, perhaps even more so than my music library.  And although I use the word ‘library’ to describe my music collection, I wouldn’t dare use that word to describe by book collection… I’m just not there yet.

For the past two and a half years I have kept a large part of my book collection on a borrowed bookshelf (two shelves actually).  A handsome pair of seven foot tall Ethan Allen shelves that someone offered to let me hold for them, with the understanding that one day, someday, they would come to collect them…  Today is that day.

“I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will”
~Sam Cooke

So for the moment, I have over four hundred some books in piles on the floor.  This does nothing for my wanna-be Henry Higgins self image, but those shelves – like so many other things in life – were never permanent, and now the search is on for a replacement.  It is time for a change.

“Turn and face the change”
~David Bowie

So many songs are written about change, and so many books as well, all with the same message in mind.  Change is good; Change for the better.  Sometimes the changes we make in our lives can be disruptive, but how disruptive they are exactly is often times up to us.  I’ve known that I would be saying goodbye to these shelves from the day I brought them home, and although they provided a temporary solution, the thought of now seeking something more permanent is both exciting and exhilarating.

During these past six months I have seen many changes, and a lot of people dealing with change.  Folks changing how (and where) they live, play, eat, work and spend.  I’ve done some changing myself in some of those areas, particularly in the way I do business… I’ve ‘adapted to my environment’ you might say.  In the midst of constantly hearing  ‘recession, recession, recession’ I have seen some clever ideas, some new ways of thinking, and some creative alternatives to the way people ‘used to’ do things.  I’m amazed at how a little ingenuity can sometimes go a long, long way.

“Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, latch on to the affirmative and don’t mess with mister in-between.”
~Johnny Mercer

I think I can handle finding a place to put a few books.

-Craig Sumsky

www.cuttingedgedjs.com

For the people who have a faith that they adhere to, there are specific periods and rituals of atonement.   The difficult, if not impossible thing about these rituals is that an individual may not be genuinely moved to recollect what needed forgiving that week as they step inside the confessional to receive their penance, or may have to search deep within themselves as they sit in a synagogue on Yom Kippur for what it is they should be saying they are sorry for.  None of these things inspire me to reflect as much as the haphazard emotion I experience when something truly moves my heart unexpectedly.  I did not think to myself yesterday “Oh boy, tomorrow is September Eleventh so I had better prepare for deep and introspective thought.” On the contrary, I woke up this morning and saw what day it was without time to prepare myself.

I see some people talking about loved ones lost on September eleventh, and I see others recalling where they were.  I see many inciting the ever familiar ‘Never Forget.’ while others speak of how it makes them feel or how it effected (and may still effect) them.  It was a day of cancellations on a global scale… everything from airline flights to regularly scheduled programs.  Offices closed and sent employees home and schools let out early and the entire world watched their televisions as we watched them – the media – replay again and again what took so long for us to truly digest, as we stood aghast at the horror and tried to find some sanity in the madness.

For me, it took a while to really process anything.  I remember watching the planes fly into the buildings, replayed again and again.  I remember the buildings collapsing as I sat silent and motionless (I still wonder if I was in disbelief or shock or both) not knowing how to feel, how to react.  I remember the anger as I screamed at the inanimate television demanding answers from the non-interactive interface, and although I remember so many things, it is more likely that I remember very little… even as I write this the chorus of the Temptations ‘Ball Of Confusion’ plays in my head, knowing the virtual impossibility of getting all of my thoughts and memories of that day into text as I write this blog.

The days following, or better said perhaps would be the aftermath was not much better.  Facts came out but scattered.  Information was speculative at best and that was long before the conspiracy theorists ever even got any attention.  Families mourned, and mourned, and mourned… and it was like the whole world cried in agony.  This was when my mind first wandered to another place…

What about that guy (or gal) on the office floor above the part of the building where the plane hit?  Did they realize it was the end?  What did they think about?  What would I have thought about?  Is it wrong for me to internalize? Were they scared?

What does it feel like to be that scared?  I honestly don’t know.  I suppose if I might be scared out of my wits and panicking and screaming out at the top of my lungs or thinking irrational thoughts about breaking a window and perhaps taking my chances jumping from one of the worlds tallest buildings.  Perhaps I would crack a joke to myself to keep calm.  Maybe I would say to myself “Today would be a good day to find out that Superman is real and he is going to come here right now and save me.”  Maybe I would sit calmly and look at a photograph of my loved ones and smile and wonder what it would be like to see my children grow up.

It takes a memory like September eleventh to reflect on my own life, and that – so far – it looks like I am going to stick around for a bit longer, and smile a few more times, and hug and kiss and love and laugh…

and be grateful for life.

Take a moment to call the people you love, and tell them that you love them.  Hug them if you can, and if you can’t, then tell them how much you wish you could.  Take a deep breath and think about how good it is to be alive.  Do it for yourself and for the people who are important to you… Do it simply because you can.

-Craig

www.cuttingedgedjs.com