Part 1: A New Beginning

You know that thing where you write the beginning of a story, and mail it to someone, and they write the next bit of the story, and mail it back to you, and it goes on and on like that? One of my friends and I are going to do that, so here is the bit I'm sending her tomorrow.

Part 1: A New Beginning

By: Shansie Sherazi

Different shades of yellow silk and chiffon cascaded from her dress down over the leather. A young woman was poised side-saddle atop a large dark bay stallion with high white socks up to his knees, His coat shone with such health that it dappled in the sunlight and very nearly had a yellow undertone.

She held her reins in one hand, her delicate long fingers wrapped around the leather, as she ran a hand along the light flowing sundress.  At her command, the stallion stepped forward, relaxing into the long strides of a walk.

As they traveled down the side of the old dirt road, she saw a young girl ahead. The girl was sitting on the ground in tears with several boys around her. They taunted her rudely. The woman atop the horse narrowed her hazel eyes at the boys before making a decision. She urged the stallion into a trot, and he strode gracefully toward the group. He stopped right before the young boys; his neck curved elegantly as he looked sternly down at them.

“That is quite enough.” Her silky voice rang out to them. “Leave her be.”

The young boys gawked at her. “Y-yes ma’am.” They backed a few steps away. As her horse stamped a hoof lightly, they turned and fled.

The woman reached out her hand to the young girl and helped her up onto the horse in front of her. The girl had dirt on her pale face, and her blonde hair fell over her shoulders in soft ringlets while her tears left clear rivers on her cheeks. “Come on now, dear. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

So, that was my bit of a story. As always, constructive criticism is welcome. Hopefully she'll write back soon, and I'll get her part of the story! I love just writing for fun and not having to worry about specifics or anything.

Also, I've been trying to think of a plot line for the story I'm working on currently, involving a girl - Indigo Mai Verity - who absolutely loves to take pictures, and is fairly quiet. She is the one all her friends turn to when they need some advice or just someone to talk to. Even though the drama doesn't usually happen to her directly, the drama from her friends tends to involve her indirectly in some way.

Her roommate is a very strong-willed, colorful personality who isn't afraid to be herself. Her name is Symóne Accardi. She is going to be pure Italian. One of Indigo's closest friends is a black girl named Esperanza Verena Ardovini. Esperanza isn't completely black, but a motley of several cultures, black being the most prominent to show in her appearance.

Those are the only characters I have worked on so far, and I don't really want to create too many more before I have an idea of what should happen. I know what's going to happen with Esperanza, but it isn't large enough to write the entire book over. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!

Letter writing,
Shansie

Reminiscing in my Old Writing

You know what hurts? When there's nothing  you can say, when there's nothing you can do, and you just have to watch this person who you care so much about as they hurt - that sucks. Have you ever been in that moment when you realize that they're hurting worse than you are? Except, you don't know how they feel. The thing is, you've never felt that. You can't sympathize. You can't give them any advice and you can't tell them you know what they mean. It makes you feel completely and utterly helpless.

There is a picture at this link. It isn't my picture, but I found it just surfing through Google Images. I thought I'd share it with you. And with this, I'll move away from depressing topics.

I guess today would be a good day to share one of my random hobbies with you. I love to write. I love words. So, in my spare time, I often write a little bit. Usually just snippets that turn into a part of a story that ends up being tossed into a folder and ignored when I decide I no longer like it. One such story began with but a single paragraph, written only because I was bored. I wrote 6 and a half chapters off of it, and decided it wasn't going to work in the way I had thought originally. I don't like the rest of the story, but I suppose I could share that first paragraph with you. Let me know what you think; constructive criticism is always welcome.

I open the curtains in my room and the sunshine pours through the glass, illuminating my room.  I push open the window to let in the crisp autumn air.  A soft morning breeze ruffles my damp hair and sends a chill over my skin. My dog stretches and yawns on the rug.  I breathe in the taste of fall with a calm appreciation.  This is my heaven.
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Please keep in mind, I wrote this two years ago. I also didn't edit it before posting this. I'm not completely happy with it, but I'm not sure if I want to do anything with it yet, so I left it the way it was. Thus, it isn't really my best writing.


Remembering,
Shansie

Bonding Time with my Digital Camera

So, I got a digital camera from my parents for Christmas. I've been wanting one for a while, but I've been making do with my cell phone camera. Not exactly the best quality pictures, let me tell you. Besides, when I accidentally broke my phone in half(Good thing it had a warranty.), I had to get a new phone. Same type, only this one wasn't broken in half, and it had a factory defect. Gotta love those, right? So, the camera likes to be silly. You know what it really really likes to do? It likes to take alien pictures. Or monster pictures, really, it isn't all that picky. What I mean is that the pictures show up green and fuzzy. Don't believe me?

How about now?

Yeah. It's pretty bad. So you can guess how excited I was about my new camera. I was ecstatic. So I've been playing around with photography lately. I learned today that I love the fog, but it's so hard to take pictures in! When you get a cool picture, it's so exciting! However, I didn't really like any of my foggy pictures enough to show you. Sorry! However, I thought you might enjoy a non-foggy picture that I took today. So, here it is, in all of it's amateur glory. Or lack of glory. I'm not really sure which it is.

You see that there? That's a squirrel.

So yeah, after taking several pictures of this squirrel, I felt like I had really accomplished something in my photo-session. It made me pretty happy, to be quite honest. I think I'm just easily amused. 

Anyways, on other topics, I would love to post some sappy Valentine's Day blog post about how wonderful my boyfriend is. However, that's way too cliche. So, rather than an entire blog post, here is my Valentine's Day in a nutshell:

For Valentine's day, he gave me a bag of Lindor Truffles, a Teddy bear that was holding a "Happy Valentine's Day" heart, and a Goo Goo Dolls CD. Best. Valentine's. Presents. Ever. Not only do I collect Teddy bears, but he's gotten me addicted to the Goo Goo Doll's music, and we're going to a concert of theirs in April. Somehow, Valentine's day seems a lot less pointless now.

Not hating on Val--SQUIRREL!

Shansie

P.S. I really want to watch the movie UP now. Thanks, Mr. Squirrel.