We love the weirdos!

My wife, Sarah and I opened BLAST (an art gallery and store) on Cedar Lane almost five months ago. So far, as first-time business owners, it has proved to be an invigorating and challenging adventure. It has also been surprisingly rewarding on a daily basis. I'm not talking about the rewards we expected—being our own boss, no longer commuting to the city, surrounding ourselves with interesting art. The unexpected reward has been the steady flow of creative and inspiring people we've met coming through our doors each day.

The reason we opened BLAST was that we love the artist-filled neighborhoods of downtown New York City and Brooklyn (we moved to Teaneck from the West Village twelve years ago). We craved that the main streets of Teaneck had a bit of this flavor. And we suspected that there were plenty of others in town that feel the same way.

So here we are. Every day we're surprised by the people who come through our doors. One minute I'm thinking "oh this person looks like they're just looking for the taxi place that used to be in our building," and the next minute they're telling me about the experimental poetry group they created in Portland, and we're hatching plans for future collaborations. Artists, poets, musicians, and rappers. Home brewers, graffiti writers, bloggers, and meditators. This town has it all (even spiritual healers and dancing trombonists)!

We've really been able to see the beautiful diversity of this town. We like to think that we cater to the "artsy outsider weirdoes and the people who love them." And what we've learned is that every race, religion, age, and sex has their version of the artsy outsider weirdo. And we love them all!