Drowning Slowly

Crowded into a lunchbox that has fleas, maggots, and the occasional smoke alarm detector not going off with smoke filling your room, filling your throat, filling your lungs, while you are taking a nap and trying not to think about your problems. This is my apartment.

Sometimes it is best to pay a little extra for quality. That would be a good idea for Wal-Mart shoppers to remember as their purchase puts out another mom and pop shop and pushes more of the American dollar's overseas. I am laughing. Laughing at the cheapest price point. I'm a slave to the cheapest price point. How can one really pay more when you are living paycheck to paycheck, and your baby girl has fleas on her face that have snuck inside from wild dogs that run around in the backyard alley?

We woke up today with our kitchen sink overflowed from the upstairs neighbor's mop bucket being dumped into the sink above. Maggots were all in the water, and they began to crawl up the kitchen wall. However, our lunchbox is covered in vinyl and has wonderful character. It' a Spanish lunch box with red trim on a really interesting street. We wake up some nights and can't breathe due to mold being pumped from the walls after years of growth. It's a feeling like drowning. Breathing liquid. Breathing water. Breathe in your life. It is all around you.