Not so long ago, in a galaxy not so far away . . .
It all started one cold winter's evening, after Christmas, but not yet New
Year, 2001. Vickie and I, talking for the first time in quite awhile, were
lamenting the state of the X-Files fanfic we both know and love. So many of
the writers we both knew and loved had lost heart. And those that hadn't
were floundering for subject matter.
Somehow, Vickie, being the queen of "The Rest of the Story" fanfiction, and
me, being one of the biggest fans of it, got on the subject of missing-scene
stories. To be honest, I couldn't tell you now who proposed the topic
first, who came up with the idea for the list (probably Vickie) or anything
else, but soon we were talking about our own list. A list where writers
would be encouraged and challenged. And, best yet, a list where the readers
and writers would be encouraged to not just write or read, but watch old
tapes and DVD's of episodes.
Before we knew it, we were the proud parents (okay, Vickie was the parent,
and I was the weird spinster aunt ) of a brand new mailing list. We based
it on all the things we loved in fanfic, and thought others might as well.
Missing-scene, post-ep stories on a challenge basis, with an open door to MSR
and UST. An episode would be announced on Sunday, and stories would be
posted for that episode during the week, with any story able to be posted if
it took a little longer than the week assigned. But would anybody be
interested? Would it take off? Would we have more than a dozen subscribers?
Vickie assigned me the task of alerting the lists, since I'm on a few <g>,
and I did my best to write an introductory description that would tell people
what the new list was all about. On December 27, 2001, the invitation went
out over the lists while we waited with bated breath. Imagine our
excitement when we looked the next morning and already had 22 members! Now,
we're at over 130, and we're even more excited than ever!
We figured if we were going to be parents of the list, we should send our own
stories first. Those two were quickly followed by some great fic based on
the pilot from the other writers on list. Not long after the list
officially opened, Deb (aka dtg) was wonderful enough to volunteer to be web mom,
keeping an archive available of all the stories for each episode - a rather
daunting task, believe me! But she jumped in with both feet, creating a
beautiful web page and officially joining us as co-moderator on the list
itself.
So that's the story of our little mailing list. Our acorn has grown into
quite a nice sapling, and we hope to watch as it grows into the mightiest of
oaks.
Thank you to everybody out there who helped make this possible. The
incredible writers who took on the challenge we proposed, the readers who
created a market for it, and all those who have been there as support. We
wish you all the best . . . now what are you sitting here reading this for?
GET WRITING! <G>
Mary Kleinsmith
Vickie Moseley
January 3, 2002
Webmistress: dtg
