Tribute: To All the Mags I’ve Loved Before

The winds of change are always blowin’…but that doesn’t mean they don’t make me Thelma-and-Louise-style-mad when they take my favorite magazines with them.

On the rare occasion that I’m being honest with myself, magazines, it turns out, are actually my preferred reading form. Though it might be lowbrow, I’ve learned to embrace it and not fight it. I love the paper, I love the ads, I love the bulleted, bite-sized info. Having said that, I’m actually sort of picky about content. Anything that even hints at sports, fitness, cars, being weekly, “pleasing your man,” losing 40 lbs. by eating pineapple, etc. is instantly out, as is anything that is only fashion-oriented (I like a few pages of that, but not a whole magazine). That pretty much leaves me with home decor, cooking, specialty cheese, money-and-economy and parenting. (Hmmm. Notice what my blog topics tend to cover? Not for nothing.)

Still, even with my current favorites (hello, Martha, you saucy home-makin’ maven), I still find myself pining for those I lost along the way, specifically:

Blueprint. This is probably my all-time favorite mag. That, I might add, lasted all of 8 issues, so who knows, maybe I’d have grown to dislike it, like I now intensely dislike fish sticks. I was so mad at myself when I found out it was folding because I had been carelessly ripping out some articles for my big ol’ binder and recycling the rest of each issue. “Why didn’t I save them?” I cried out to the heavens, and then, more fruitfully, to the Interwebs. Luckily, the goddess of tech answered me, and lo, I found out I could order the entire collection online and have them shipped to me for a paltry $20 (that included shipping!). Done and done. They are now sitting side by side in a small magazine file that will be with me in the retirement home, since we all know I can’t play PingPong for shit and it’s likely that I’ll enjoy reading them anew each day even more as my mind goes.

GeorgeThis magazine has the distinction of being the first, outside of Highlights, that I actually had a subscription to (followed by Technology Today). I paid for it with my babysitting money in high school, and I adored the political glamor that oozed out of every page, as well as the “Onion”-style satirical ads that appeared for things like “Feed the Waifs,” featuring a call to send in money to buy miso soup to nourish Kate Moss and other models of that era. When I realized it was John Kennedy Jr.’s magazine, it’s stock when up even further in my mind. Unfortunately, it shuttered after JFK Jr.’s death.

Martha Stewart Baby. Notice a pattern? Why, Martha??? WHY??? This one, to be fair, I didn’t know about this mag’s existence until after I got knocked up with Benjamin and by then it had been long gone. But like all wonderful things, I came across a back-issue at a garage sale and fell.in.mama.crafter.love. It was an amazing magazine with plenty of ways to pass a long ten months. Being a novice, I didn’t ask for a discount when I bought this series from the nice Martha phone people (this was before Blueprint). But it’s worth a shot to see if you could get a Blueprint-like deal for the 7-issue series. Apparently, if a magazine even whiffs of going south, Mrs. Stewart doesn’t mess around…there will be no issue #9.

Domino. I really liked Domino. I feel especially guilty about that because, for whatever reason, they sent me a letter some years ago saying they’d like to send it to me for free, and was that okay? and I said, um, yes. So, I enjoyed my free magazine for years. It was a bit odd, but I assumed I got on some marketing list and they wanted to get their circulation up. Which, I guess, they did. I enjoyed their magazine and never actually paid for it, and that does make me a bit sad. I guess I should have been more proactive about supporting it if I was getting it for free; what did I do for my end of the bargain? RIP, Domino, and I hope you forgive me for being an ungrateful cur. Update: they’re back in the game, folks, as quarterly publication!

YM (Young & Modern). If you remember the 80s, you probably remember YM’s “Say Anything” column and monthly quiz. I never subscribed, and yet I read a ton of them. How did this happen? They couldn’t have all been in doctor’s waiting rooms, could they have? (Maybe the Orthodontist…that would explain about 40 issues, anyhow.) It was a great magazine while it, and my teenage years, lasted–perfect for a nerdy teenager who had plenty of ideas but none of Cosmo’s actual experience.

What magazines do you wish had lasted longer?

Nostalgically yours,
Freckles

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4 Comments

  1. Ease your conscience, Petal; I paid for your Domino via gift subscription… I guess they forgot the card. Happy Birthday 2007.

    1. OMG! Lori, that’s awful!! I can’t believe I didn’t know that was you! Sweetpea, thank you! As you can see (three years later), I did love it.

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