Dear Readers

Every year we brainstorm for that perfect theme for aYomTovsupplement. This year — our tenth anniversary — the theme was obvious: a celebration of our decade in business. But the content was murky.

So we sat around our conference table and traded different ideas: highlight the projects we pulled off the connections we made the campaigns we implemented. Nothing seemed right; no one seemed comfortable shining the spotlight solely on the magazine.

But as we kept groping for clarity a theme emerged. The main message that we found ourselves repeating was: we’ve grown. As individuals as a community as a magazine– and in the interplay between our community’s experiences and the way they’re reflected and refracted in this publication that links us all. We decided to craft a supplement that would relive this decade with that sub-theme of change and growth.

I know that over these past ten years I’ve learned so much. So many mentors and teachers shared their know-how and knowledge. The men and women who were courageous enough to launch this magazine to plug away week after week gave us hopeful staffers the gumption to offer our own small contributions. They told us what worked what didn’t and why — and they risked giving us more responsibility. They gave us the chance to learn and to grow.

Working with so many bright thinking people with such vast life experience and knowledge we learned that our world is big and complex that pithy little slogans may be cute but aren’t usually accurate.

Hearing about people’s secrets and dark stories we had to swallow hard. We learned that the key to survival is to be critical without becoming cynical.

In these ten years at the magazine we learned to celebrate the high moments to thrill with joy and meaning in a rebbish bar mitzvah or a spontaneous dance at a mass gathering.

We warmed ourselves in the glow of luminous men and women who dedicated their lives to others and as we edited and trimmed and designed their tributes we tried to lock in the inspiration.

We learned that if we rewrite trim and polish that piece 10 times it will keep getting better — but the eleventh round may not make much difference.

We learned to savor the compliments the woman who thanked us for serving as her virtual “mother sister best friend and therapist ” and to carefully consider the criticism the “how could you how dare you we expected better.”

We learned to look for guidance to seek out other opinions to talk things over and collect feedback and then pray hard to make the right decisions.

We learned to trust readers as discerning people who don’t appreciate preaching but who delight in new ideas.

We learned to work as a team to marvel at the talents and innovations of others to revel at a final product that is so much more than the sum of its parts (and not to look too closely because then we’d see the mistakes).

And when things went wrong when horrific headlines glued us to our screens at the craziest hours and we had to rush to react to get the quote to capture the story and nail that eyewitness report and still get it to the printer on time — then we learned that there comes a moment when you close the door to your office shut your eyes and picture that little girl with her blond ponytail who is no more. You feel it in your fingertips and in the crevices of your soul and then you take a breath and get back to work because it’s your job to ensure everyone else can feel it too.

This supplement has three elements: The Medium The Messages and Behind the Scenes.

The Medium retraces the genesis of this unique industry the English-language chareidi press. It’s our tribute to the pioneers who paved the way and an honest discussion of the challenges and dilemma that punctuate our work.

The Messages relives the events of the last decade — the high notes the tragedies the moments of unity and the melodies that we hummed throughout. In the margins of these pages you’ll find “quotes to live by” — insightful statements culled from our own pages all worth revisiting and repeating.

And Behind-the-Scenes is a birthday treat a lively collection of insider trivia. It’s a fun glimpse at the inner workings near-fiascoes and quirky encounters that go into making a magazine. We’ve sprinkled these “ten on ten” offerings throughout the pages of the supplement to lighten the more classic coverage with sunny diversions for all of our faithful fans.

We hope you enjoy the trip down memory lane and more importantly — that you agree with those two words that echoed throughout our planning session: “we’ve grown.”

May we keep growing together.

Have a beautiful YomTov
ShoshanaFriedman