I DONT HAVE HEALTH INSURANCE

i don't have health insurance

a couple winters ago i fell and hurt my elbow.

it hurt really bad at first and then it kind of went away but it still comes back sometimes.

like, i'll wake up and try to extend my arm and the pain makes me close my eyes and bite down and push my face into the pillow.

i don't have health insurance

i just thought of myself making a fist with both hands and then raising my eyebrows and saying, "i got health insurance, here's my two forms of i.d. bitch" while lifting each fist.

my landlord doesn't give a shit about me.

the old man who lives down the hall always wears the same shirt, the one with the huge vomit streak down the front.

one of the things i have to do at work is tie big wires around crushed squares of cardboard boxes.

after i wrap the boxes with wire and tie the wire up by bending it a lot, my hands are always covered in metal dust (or whatever) from the wires.

i always think, "gorilla hands"

"you are gorilla hands."

and then i forget to wash my hands when i have gorilla hands and then i'll touch my eye by accident and it is the worst burning eye feeling i've experienced yet.

i look forward to finding out new types of eye burning feelings.

i know it will be time for me to die when there are no more burning eye feelings to discover

the floor of my room is cold.

the wind comes in through the walls and the floor.

if i sleep with the blanket up to my chin, then i wake up with my head feeling sick and if i sleep with the entire blanket over me i feel too trapped to be able to relax and sleep.

when you find a shirt you forgot about, at the bottom of a bunch of other shit, it feels more like hope than anything else.

i've always wondered if i had what it takes to successfully join a hate group or be an extremist of some kind--not because i have any ideals, but just because i wonder if i could.

i was at the store the other day and i bent down to get something off a low shelf and when i looked up there was a two year old boy standing in front of me and he held his hand up to me like to say, "you can't go any further, stop." and then when i stood up straight again, he gave me the thumbs up and i walked past him.

right now, i'm 27, using a chair as a desk and a milkcrate as my chair and i live in uptown chicago and it's december 9, 2010.