Letters That Speak

T

his week’s LifeLines started out very differently from its current form. It first came to our attention as an inbox letter that described a single episode and ended with a cryptic note: There is more to this story. If you are interested, let me know, and I will tell you.

I asked C. Saphir to find out what that “more” might include, and the result is this week’s rich and emotive story. It’s not the first time we’ve intuited a bigger story from a reader’s letter, and we hope it won’t be the last. But readers’ letters don’t only hold kernels of stories. Sometimes they hold the key that nudges an articulate letter writer through the doorway to become a steady contributor.

My favorite example of a letter-writer-turned-contributor is our nutrition columnist, Shira Isenberg. Years ago, a letter came into the Family First inbox. If I remember correctly, it protested the way fats had been described in a health-related feature. The e-mail was signed “Shira Isenberg.” I remembered that distinct spelling from my year in seminary, so I responded personally and asked if this was the same Shira who’d attended seminary with me. The exchange inevitably led to a quick catch-up, and I realized that she might be a good fit for a new column we were hoping to launch. Years later, we’re all still enjoying her lively, informative column.

To be honest, there’s a virtual club of letter writers — a group of regulars who send us their feedback faithfully. This unofficial club, whose members have never met one another and probably don’t even know they belong, keeps us educated, entertained, and sometimes squirming with their incisive feedback about the magazine. And among its members, I can easily name at least two other steady columnists and another feature writer who followed the same trajectory: sending letters that caught our attention and then being invited to write for the magazine.