Happ-enings

It pained me to do it, but earlier this fall, I let my subscription to Sports Illustrated lapse.

I had been a subscriber to the legendary sports magazine for almost five years, having purchased a subscription after a friend of mine suggested that I check it out.

Instantly, I was drawn into the publication by its great photography, interesting feature stories, and unique layout. I have noted on many occasions that I am always searching out unique stories to read and interesting subjects to learn about, and Sports Illustrated delivered in both regards.

In fact, Sports Illustrated continued to deliver, month after month, year after year. And, for a long time, I looked forward to getting the publication in my mailbox. Unlike the plethora of newspapers that I skim through each week, Sports Illustrated was unique and it offered me a different perspective on sports I love and sports I just learned about.

However, like a lot of things, life got in the way, I got busy, and my editions of the popular magazine started spending less time in my hands and more time in the garbage bin.

To be honest, after I deleted the email reminding me to resubscribe, I felt some pangs of remorse. After all, I loved the content, but I just didn’t have time to get to read it all.

In the weeks since I let my subscription lapse, I have missed the opportunity to get to read the magazine’s content. I know from many years of being a subscriber that the reporters at Sports Illustrated do a great job with their storytelling and, more important to me anyway, their photography. While I don’t know if I will resubscribe in the future, I hope that magazine remains a cornerstone of sports journalism for years to come.

Magazines like Sports Illustrated were a topic of conversation in our office on multiple occasions last week, as a unique confluence of events caused my team and I to go down an internet rabbit hole looking for information on one of America’s most iconic publications: Life.

This week, in one of my newspapers’ “Days Gone By” section, there is a blurb about a local student being pictured in

Life as a part of one of the photo essays about college students joining the armed forces. While the topic was interesting in and of itself, the existence of the magazine was the focus of my staff and I’s conversation.

As one of my reporters wondered aloud, “Is it even still a in publication?”

Turns out, it’s not.

Life, the magazine, ceased publication in 2000 and, while the brand still manages several social media accounts, its time as a household name has faded far into the abyss.

However, even considering the state of the brand today, it did have its moment.

After a quick Google search, which was conducted to see if the magazine was still published, I learned that during its heyday, Life magazine reached almost a quarter of the American population. That is a crazy circulation, especially for the 1960s and 70s.

With awe, I stuffed that little gem into my back pocket and forgot all about Life magazine. Then, something strange happened.

After discussing the publication on Tuesday, on Wednesday morning I woke up to discover an email from history.com. Turns out, on that morning eighty-six years earlier, November 23, 1936,

Life magazine, in its most recognizable format as a “pictorial” publication was first published.

The coincidence of a defunct publication that had only existed for the first eight years of my life coming up in conversation one day and then popping into my email seemed to almost be too much for me to handle.

I had never subscribed to Life. I had never read a story published in Life. However, that magazine continued to be interjected into my life.

Normally, I would have considered that coincidence as a sign of something bigger, like maybe I should start living life to the fullest; however, the more and more that I thought about it, I imagined that maybe the serendipitous nature of that publication being broached twice in two days in two different ways was the universe’s way of telling me that I should rethink my decision to let my Sports Illustrated subscription lapse.

After all, as we preach in the newspaper business, if you don’t use it, you will lose it.

While I haven’t written that check yet – I am still weighing the possible genesis of such a unique sign – the thought is still on my mind.