It’s appalling to be seventy years old and still not to know what to do with magazines. Not for lack of trying! But no matter what the scheme, it inevitably degenerates into a preposterous stack.

And it’s not as though we subscribe to all that many magazines. The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Harper’s, The Atlantic, and The Nation. Oh, and France-Amérique and Pacific Standard. I’m not including the two Reviews, which look more like newspapers anyway, and are too big to leave lying around. 

The nub of the problem is that, in most cases, one never quite finishes reading a magazine. In a very few cases, there’s a terrific piece that one wants to save. The fact that almost everything is available online has not penetrated one’s skull. In fact, not everything is accessible. The last time I looked at Harper’s Web site, I was so discouraged that years have passed since. It may be entirely different (much better) now. I’d rather hear that it is from you, than have another disappointing peek. 

A new approach occurred to me the other day. It’s very ruthless, or will be if I implement it. Only the latest issue of each of the magazines will be stacked neatly in the living room. The preceding four issues of each will be stored somewhere else. As new issues come in, old issues will be thrown away. Ruthless! 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 13th, 2018 at 6:34 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.