a newspaper - quotes and descriptions to inspire creative writing

The newspaper lies on the table, curled and with teeth marks from the dog. Jasper looks down at it like it's week old pasta, his mouth scrunched and eyebrows arched. Then with a “pock, pock” noise that he makes with his lips, he moves on to the kitchen to brew coffee. There was nothing right with chewed up news, just thinking about it made his fingers curl. Now the spit was on the table too, he winced until the familiar aroma met his nostrils. Now that was more like it, perfect Arabica bean and cream. One oven heated danish and he was ready to start his day. But perhaps he'd go out the back way, just seeing what was left of his paper would set him on edge again and that would never do. Not at all.

On the days of fearful headlines, when there was doom and gloom right next to pictures of perfect cakes and elicit gossip, everyone in the supermarket looked as if they were under a grey cloud. There were few smiles, less emotional generosity to children, more casual fights between the couples as they walked the chilled aisles.

On the days of good news, of anything to celebrate, it was different and the whoever the folks were that wandered about, the effect was the same... more smiles, more casual caring and emotional attentiveness to others. It was as if a monster that had lurked had gone away and instead a fairy had come to grant them an inner rainbow.

I would wonder if those inch high words of fear or love, coming and going as some chaotic pendulum might, were giving a sort of pseudo-bipolar to us all. I saw those strongly emotive words hitting our brains, stimulating regions that cause hormones to be produced, changing our moods and altering our brains without the bother of a doctor's prescription, consent or anything so mundane as all that.