Tom Johnston, Neighbor

I'm a 35-year-old Rolling Meadows, Ill., resident, a husband and father who is proud to say he's making a living of some sort doing what I've always loved: writing.

Currently I am a managing editor at Marketing & Technology Group, a small publisher in Lincoln Park that prints niche magazines covering the food industry. I specialize in long-form features and in daily spot news for our popular online newsletter, which goes live twice per day. Our team has won several Neal Awards, the trade press's Pulitzers, for news coverage.

My journalism career began in 2001 at Pioneer Press's Barrington Courier-Review, for which I covered local government and wrote business features and human interest stories. In my six years there I won multiple awards, most of them related to feature writing, from the likes of the Suburban Newspapers of America and the Illinois Press Association.

A lifelong soccer player whose skills helped pay tuition at Penn State University, I now also coach youth travel soccer in Arlington Heights.

What other time I have I like to spend with my wife Julie and 19-month-old daughter Madeline.