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Welcome to Thinking Out Loud, a blog that contains postings from The Tampa Tribune’s Editorial Board and from various Tribune Community Columnists. Unlike the unsigned editorials that represent the newspaper’s institutional voice, the blog postings offer personal perspectives on the issues, personalities and events of Tampa Bay. We invite you to participate by posting your comments. We’ll do our best to respond.

Contributors:

Joe Guidry

Joe Guidry is the deputy editorial page editor of The Tampa Tribune. He is a Tampa native and a graduate of the University of South Florida. He is married and has an adult son.

Jeff Stidham

Jeff Stidham grew up and lives in Bartow. He has been with the Tribune for nearly 22 years, the last 10 on the editorial board.

William Yelverton

William Yelverton is a Tribune editorial writer who has worked for the paper nearly 22 years. He lives in the Dade City area.

Jim Beamguard

Jim Beamguard is a Tribune editorial writer. He is a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Davidson College. He and his family live in Brandon.

Jackie Papandrew:

Jackie Papandrew is a freelance writer and editor. Her syndicated humor column appears in publications in the United States, Canada and India. She lives in Largo with her husband and children. Visit her website at www.jackiepapandrew.com.

Camille Beredjick

Camille Beredjick is a senior at Chamberlain High School, an avid musician and a scribbler with a quirky sense of humor. In the fall, she will be attending Northwestern University to study journalism, political science and music, and she plans to pursue a career in journalism.

Jim Harnish

Jim Harnish is in his 17th year as Senior Pastor at Hyde Park United Methodist Church in Tampa. He and his wife, Marsha, have two daughters and two grandchildren. He is a graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary and received the honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Bethune-Cookman University. He is the author of six books and numerous articles and studies. He enjoys playing with his grandchildren and cheering for the Florida Gators.

Angela Hunt

Angela Hunt is a novelist living in Pinellas County with her husband and two 220-pound mastiffs.

Sheryl Young

Sheryl Young was a Tampa Tribune Community Columnist in 2005-2006. A freelance writer since 1997, including the Tampa Bay Business Journal, Tampa Style Magazines, St. Pete Times and nationally in Better Nutrition, Today’s Christian Woman and more. She’s received a First Place Amy Foundation national "Roaring Lambs" Writing Award, and has lived in Tampa Bay with her family for over 20 years.

Christie Gold

Christie Gold teaches English and journalism at Freedom High School in Tampa where she advises Revolution, the school newspaper. She has been both the Hillsborough County Teacher of the Year and Florida Journalism Teacher of the Year. She lives on a small farm in Wesley Chapel where she trains as a competitive equestrian.

Natalie D. Preston

Natalie D. Preston is a karaoke singing, only-child pouting, Seminole Tomahawk waving, newlywed bride blushing, 50-state traveling, girlie girl who loves to shop, read, run and jump up and down on her soapbox.

Fernando Figueroa

Fernando Figueroa is a researcher, educator and lives in Riverview.

Gary Beemer

Interests include humor, politics, economics, community and world affairs, finance, people, religion, music, sports, current events, the arts and education.

Nicole Yunger Halpern

Nicole Yunger Halpern is an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, where she studies everything she can get her nerdy little hands on. Desired major: life. No, not necessarily biology. Life.

Kris DiGiovanni

Kris DiGiovanni is a Tribune Community Columnist, Huffington Post contributor, Daily Kos diarist, and teacher, who recently moved from NW Hillsborough to another planet - a small beach community in Pinellas County. She also blogs at www.sandscript.wordpress.com

H. David Braswell Jr.

H. David Braswell Jr. is an Information Systems Professional. He is a native New Yorker and a lifelong NY Giants fan. He attended college in California (Cal State Northridge) and moved to Tampa in 1998.

Sean Marcus

Sean Marcus teaches creative writing, journalism and reading at Chamberlain High School. He has one son and is expecting a daughter in early March. He can be reached at wuizabug@gmail.com

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If you could only read one thing…

Posted Jan 13, 2010 by Gary Beemer

Updated Jan 13, 2010 at 12:00 PM

I grew up in a household of seven people, and one bathroom. It was the only room in our house with a lock, so it took quite a bit of abuse from pounding fists and occasional kicks. That brave piece of battered wood was often the only thing between me and a pack of angry and urgent siblings.

One of the wonderful things about our bathroom was the magazine rack with three things in it – remnants of the daily newspaper, The Upper Room, and a dog-eared copy of the latest Reader’s Digest.

The Digest was filled with short stories, humor, how-to hints, vocabulary words, and plenty of interesting snippets. It was a quick read – which saved me from being beaten to a pulp by my older sister – and never failed to educate and entertain me.

The Digest was founded in 1922 and is the best selling consumer magazine in the US. About 8 million folks subscribe to it and 38 million read it – no doubt in the bathroom. It reaches more households with incomes of $100,000 plus than The Wall Street Journal, Fortune and Business Week combined. Wow!

I credit it with my lifelong love of reading and had subscribed as an adult so my kids could have a copy – in their bathroom of course. Somewhere along the line I didn’t renew, so my heart sunk deeply when I learned in August of 2009 that the publisher of the Digest was filing for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. Part of me went numb.

I began buying the Digest every month at the grocery store thinking that they needed just one more person to believe in them and their mission of “Life Well Shared,” Soon afterwards I received a renewal subscription notice for my daughter. I wrote the check and mailed it the very same day.

Now I’m enjoying the short stories, testing my vocabulary, laughing at the jokes and reuniting with a world that has changed drastically, but underneath, has remained very much the same. Now we have three bathrooms, so the only fighting going on is which powder room is the official home of the Reader’s Digest.

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