1000 and Counting

A few months ago, when we realized we were approaching Issue 1000, we stopped short. It’s a big number, a significant achievement. And like most significant achievements, it is due to the efforts of many people.

Only one person currently working at Mishpacha on a daily basis has been here since the beginning (it’s not me). It’s a product that has developed, morphed, and changed, gaining from the ideas, talents, and sheer hard work of so many contributors over the years.

And you, our readers, have contributed too. In many ways, this magazine is a weekly dance between its producers and readers. Sometimes it’s the writers and editors who set the topic of conversation, question a norm, or introduce a hero. And sometimes it’s the readers. That’s true in the most literal sense — many of the people and programs featured on our pages came our way via suggestions from readers. But even in a more figurative sense, the readers’ dialogue on the pages of the magazine and your feedback behind the scenes shape and drive so much of the content.

There are other weekly “dances” that take place, regular dilemmas that we keep trying to navigate. There’s the balance between our ambition for a perfect (or near-perfect) product and our acknowledgment of the people who put it out. Yes, you can ask the writer for a fourth draft, but at what price? You can keep the editing staff at the office for yet another hour on a closing day to perfect every last teaser, but will they show up happily the next morning when you made them crazy over quotation marks the night before?