Picture it & write just keeps landing on the perfect days of this holiday! I hope everyone is having a great start to 2012 and what better way than to kick it off than with Picture it & write. Let this be one of your first writing exercises of the year with many more to come! Let this be your year for writing (for the writers), for painting (for the painters), for eating (for the eaters, definitely me!) and whatever else you wish to achieve this year. 
2012 is ours. Check the post below for what we accomplished and what we’ve got planned for next year.
I urge people to join in, comment with your paragraph of fiction to accompany the image. It doesn’t have to follow my story or reflect the same themes. It can be a poem or in a different language (provide a translation please 
). Anyone who wants to join in, is welcome. This photograph has been reblogged under Ermisenda on tumblr.
My mother jumped up on the table and started wiggling her hips. The crowd was throwing their arms up in the air, cheering her on. I couldn’t watch. I hid behind my fingers but I could hear my name. She was shouting for me to join her. This was the most embarrassing New Years party I had ever attended. I moved towards my mother and tried to coax her to come down. She didn’t. She stayed up there, she shook her skirt and called out to the crowd. I could see my mother’s body jiggling like jelly. Skin folded and rippled. I cringed. A couple of others joined her on the table with drinks in their hands. I left with my cheeks feathered rouge from the heat of embarrassment.
- Ermisenda Alvarez
Everyone is welcome to use the button, just link them back to the Picture it & write category or Ermiliablog! Share your love for Picture it & write on your blog with the image below. Be proud, and stylish 
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I like the description of hiding behind his hands and folded skin on your mother.
Fast asleep, David slept until… Suddenly he sat up in bed. “Oh, that must have been a dream.” He robbed his tired eyes. He sighed loudly and laid back down. The room was dark except for a window that had moonlight shining in. He watched the shadow of the window on the wall. He continued to roll around all night. He felt like tonight was an eternity.
When it was time to get up, he yawned and got up. He rubbed his tired red eyes and hoped into the shower. Let’s see. Rent needs to be payed today. He said “Good bye” to his wife and went to work.
After work, Julie asked him, “What’s wrong honey? You didn’t seem to sleep to well last night.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean to wake you.” He sat down at the dinner table. “Mmm. Left over ham with scalloped potatoes.”
“That’s what’s great about having ham for Christmas.” She sat down with her plate. “Honey, what’s bothering you?”
“It’s the bills. I don’t know how we are going to pay the rent today.” He rubbed his eyes with his hands. He seemed to stop moving as if he couldn’t move anymore. His hands remained at his eyes with his fingers parted to reveal his worried eyes. “I don’t know what we are going to do.”
Julie opened her mouth to respond but nothing came out. She reached out and grabbed his hands from his face. “Look at me, I love you no matter what.”
“Even if we end up homeless?”
Hey, rainbowheart love. Your contribution fits the image so well. I too thought someone who was stressed. I liked the idea that he ‘seemed to stop moving as if he couldn’t move anymore’ – sometimes stress can do that, immobilise you. I hope you’re having a great new year!
@Ermisenda – I liked the horrifying images of mom dancing on the table. …so much I was stuck dreaming about your story and the picture.
@rainbowheartlove – I loved that yours had nothing to do with New Year’s or parties and how you painted a look of futility.
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Hope you like it ladies!! peace, love, joy, laughter and many blessings to you in the new year, Terri
A great rhyme! I thought this stanza was funny – ‘With her “celebrations”
I hope you all the best for the new year, Terri!
of New Year days?’. I loved how celebrations was put into quotation marks. I thankfully don’t have embarrasing parents, well they’re not always embarrasing.
Happy new year everyone!!
Hell… where am I? What happened?
When I woke up this morning I found myself in the streets in front of my house. Beer cans were scattered all around me. The air smelt like smoke. I was totally covered with snow; fortunately I was wearing several layers of clothes to protect myself from the cold. I rubbed my palms together then place them on my face. I then tried to remember…
The only thing I knew was that it was the first day of the new year, and that I blacked out just in middle of the most awesome party I ever went to.
So lame. I missed the firecrakers.
Great.
And it’s only the beginning…
Haha I liked how your contribution started with ‘Hell…’ I think for a lot of party people their mornings started like that. A story with a funny edge, I liked it. I hope you enjoyed the turn of the new year whereever you were, evilnymphstuff.
Thanks for writing for Picture it & write today!
I like mention the firecrackers, too. They really hit the hangover hard!
Okay now the expression reminds me of the time we set fireworks off in my friend’s pool. XD
-Elia
~Eliabeth’s contribution~
“Why did I wake up duct-taped to the roof?”
“It was easier than explaining you couldn’t fly.”
LOL! Good one
I saw something similar last New Year’s on texts-from-last-night.
Yay! Duct tape solves everything!
Have you seen the Red Green show? You would like it. A large portion of the plot revolves around duct tape being able to solve everything,
In reply to Ermilia’s comment:
I love the Red Green Show! So quirky and yet so funny and hilarious at the same time!
Isn’t it brilliant! Have you seen the episode where they have to break into the emergency duct tape because they run out?
Yes!! I can’t remember which episode it was now, its been so long since I have seen this show! They used to show it late on Saturday nights here on my local PBS station. It was so good! I used to really enjoy watching it every week, it was really nice to sit down and watch it along with some other good PBS shows such as various Britcom series that were imported from the BBC, such as Keeping Up Appearances, As Time Goes By, and Are You Being Served. There were many other excellent ones too! Glad to find a fellow Red Green lover, I have never yet and probably will never again meet any other living person who likes, let alone even actually KNOWS about this undiscovered gem of a show!
By far my favorite episode. We have the first two seasons (possibly more) on DVD. I’m surprised (and grateful) that my younger brother hasn’t tried any of the fixes/inventions from the show. Ah Red Green… now those are some memories.
So wonderful to find another fan.
One of my favorite things about Picture it & Write is how that picture leads to a discussion about the Red Green show… actually it kinda reminds me of a game I got for Christmas. I’ll have to write a post about it as soon as I get a scanner.
Haha, there better not be a promise of cake!
We form a triangle, irregular, unintentional; I can’t take my eyes off the young man. The apex of the triangle is his mother, drunk, dancing, but I am ignoring her like my mind is saying ‘move on, nothing to see here’. I am looking at the two deep furrows in his forehead with the shallower shadow beneath them, a graze of the plough-blade; the low, Romanesque arch of his eyebrows over the tautened, almond, Egyptian eyes still as a painting of Horus, pulled by the spread of his fingers; the almost-symmetry of those fingers; in shadow his full lips caught in the ‘oh’ of ‘oh my god’; the tattooed cross on the back of his right hand; his unkempt hedge of hair.
‘Yeah, I saw you outside sucking at a joint,’ I mutter. My girlfriend tugs my sleeve and tells me it’s time we weren’t there. I look away from him, meet her eyes, and when I look back he has mingled with the crowd, the moment belongs to another time, to somewhere else.
Wow, that description was fantastic. I liked it, fragments of imagery. I could imagine that scene at a party. This was great ‘the moment belongs to another time, to somewhere else’. Thanks for writing for us today, kvennarad, and I hope you have a great year!
Thank you, and the same to you.
Awesome! He was out getting plowed.
This reply popped up out of context and my mind went to a very different place.
-Elia
Hehe! I won’t be bad…
Mijn handen gingen langzaam voor mijn ogen
Ik stapte op de schaal en werd gewogen.
Waarom is de tijd van kerst en nieuwjaar
altijd één die altijd valt, erg zwaar.
Min handen gingen langzaam weg en met een zucht,
Mijn goede voornemen voor 2012 vloog weg in de lucht.
My hands slowly went infront of my eyes
i stepped on the scale to measure my weight.
Why is the time between christmas and new year
always a time that falls so heavily.
My hand slowly went away and with a sigh
I said my new years resolution goodbye.
For clarification: the sentence: always a time that falls so heavily is a dutch saying, the literal meaning is the weight, but the figure of speech is that it’s also a difficult time to go through,
Gelukkig nieuwjaar, bueno nuevo año!
Yay, we get both translations. I really liked this concept, I hadn’t even considered it when I looked at the photograph. Even though the saying didn’t work as well in English as it does in Dutch I think it was a really smart choice to add it. I know how it feels to kiss new years resolutions goodbye, aka my nail biting. Gelukkig niewjaar, Otheus!
Oh that’s cool, two different ways of being afraid of weight.
A bit late this week but here’s mine: http://masochisticqueen.wordpress.com/2012/01/01/facing-the-future/
Wow! That was suspenseful. Great way to write it, with the counting down interrupted with his thoughts. It gave it that extra edge. I thought the description of the music as ‘dented’ was brilliant. I have to agree a lot of music for dancing today could be described as ‘dented’ – it brings the image of broken or damaged music. I hope you had a great new year Eliza and I hope to repeat that phrase to you in a year from now.
Haha, I couldn’t get this guy’s picture out of my dreams last night. Here’s how it turned out: In the Loop. I’ll be back to read all these later.
Haha! I loved this. This was so funny, I loved your interpretation. I like the questioning that went through his mind – ´What the hell is picture it and right?´ I also thought this was both a fantastic but revolting description – ´A New Year’s Eve hangover pounded inside his head threatening to erupt on the computer screen like a zit on the bathroom mirror. Questions racked his mush brain.´ This contribution made me smile. Thanks for writing this great story for Picture it & write, I hope you enjoyed your new year and that we´ll continue to see more of your great work this year!
Hahaha, that’d have been hilarious!!!
@Anne *Dies of hysterical laughter*
-Elia
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Here is my entry: http://scriptorwrites.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/las-consecuencias-del-privilegio-the-consequences-of-privilege/
Thank you so much, and Happy New Year to you!
Wow. When I clicked that link I wasn’t expecting the story I received. It was raw, gritty and taut with tension. I felt, well I still feel, so sorry for John. I really like your way of writing. What a ggreat story. Even the funny moment at the eend was so dark, I didn’t know whether to smile or cringe. Fantastic! I hope to read more of your work here at Picture it & write!
He peaked through this fingers as the scene played out inexorably. The car, father’s car, father’s new car. Sank ever deeper into the boggy, wet ground. The liquid mud gurgled with escaping air coming from windows, the bonnet, wheels. It sounded almost organic, almost funny, but this wasn’t funny. “Oh why oh why didn’t I put on the hand brake?” He wailed to himself. The car was almost completely submerged now, peaty water was starting to wash over the roof. There was no way that he was going to get it out on his own. He needed to get help. That meant going back home, at least an hour’s walk. Then ten questions, then a hiding. Not to mention what was going to happen when father got back from the conference. This was unforgivable. And for what? For the little bit of adventure, the freedom, of an early morning joyride.
I like your response, Joe!
Cheers for that. I decided start posting stories on a new blog available here http://joe2stories.wordpress.com/ might be worth a look. Won’t be as prolific as the poetry though.
Me too. “The liquid mud gurgled with escaping air coming from windows…”
Ouch. I love the description of how the mud gurgled and how it almost sounded funny. What a horrible situation, if that had happened to me I would definitely look like the image, probably worse. Great work Joe. I’m eager to read more of your work, I hope you had a great new year!
If I could, I would just like to suggest a possible image for a future Picture it and Write Prompt. I just think that this image is too good not to share with you here, and I think that it will be really great to inspire lots of wonderful writing from everyone!
Here it is:
http://scriptorwrites.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/riseup.jpg
Note: I do not know where this image came from and I did not have anything to do with taking the image myself. I did not take this image and the image is not mine. I found it somewhere on the internet and then after doing a Google search I found that a lot of other blogs were using this same image too, so there you go.
I hope you like it, and I would be so incredibly thrilled if you chose to use it!
Thank you so much!
That’s a fantastic image. I think that’ll be the image for this Sunday. Thanks a lot Scriptor Obscura! It should inspre a lot of great stories.
I love the image! One of my best PIaW inspirations yet! Please see what I found though…
“Oh, shit… I forgot my car keys.”
I could see them lying on the counter in their usual spot. I knew I was going to have to go back in. I looked down at the garbage bags I’d dropped at my feet. Everything I owned was in these two black, plastic bags. If I go back I’ll have to drag these back up to her apartment, knock on that door…hope she answers…then face whatever else she had to yell at me.
“Damn!” Why didn’t I grab those keys?
It taken three hours to break up with her. Time spent detailing every mistake I’d made, detailing every fault I had. The process of breaking up seemed to last longer than the relationship had.
I looked in the car window. How hard is it really to hot wire a car? I look around, hoping to find a homeless man that might have that skill but I was alone on the street.
I look at the door to her building. It was ajar…waiting me to go back inside.
Mocking me.
With my head hanging low, I pick up my garbage bags and climb the steps.
Haha, car keys! I love it! They have to feel heavy like the garbage bags next time. I love this!
Bah! Poor guy. I couldn’t imagine the shame of having to walk back up those steps. I liked this line ‘The process of breaking up seemed to last longer than the relationship had.’ I also liked how he was so desperate that he scanned the area for a homeless man who might be able to jack a car. A great story from you Dena! I hope to read more work from you in the future.
Another great interpretation and contribution.