Synopsis of Vignettes Project 


For well over thirty years I have been writing articles, essays and various treatises for publications of various descriptions – mostly newspapers, but magazines and independent one-offs as well. 

I have managed to save most of everything in one format or another. Some of the stuff that was written long before word processing is still on hard copy – some still typed manually on an IBM Selectric, and
more on yellowing newsprint in my file cabinet, quietly waiting in my storage unit.

A year or so ago, my agent in NY challenged me to resurrect some of these and publish them as a “collection” of vignettes – much like a collection of poems would be done. A vignette is a catch-all term for a short story or a glance at some event or experience. It is more commonly associated with film. A film vignette is usually about ten minutes long, and tells a simple story, of an event, or explains something that the viewer might not know about. 

Most written vignettes begin with something like: “You won't believe what happened to me today”, or, 
“Did you know that?”. Some recount a specific incident, and others point out something that the author has discovered, learned or experienced. 

So, I began digging through old files, both on paper, and on ancient disks so old that some cannot even be opened any more. Fortunately I always backed everything up on paper anyway, so despite the need to re-type into a more up-to-date format, nothing really has been lost. Well, some of the features that I wrote for the Territorial Enterprise (weekly) are nowhere to be found, but all are on file at the County clerk's office in Virginia City, Nevada. They have the files of the TE going back to 1858. Actually I have more than I need already, so likely will not go down and sit for hours in some dusty archive.