I sit here and wait

Cardboard clenched in my ice cold hands

The wind beating into my face and the snow falling in my hair

I try to shield myself from the cold but it always seems to find me, as if it were a bully trying to steal my lunch money

The only problem is: I have no money.

I have no money, no house, no family, and no phone

I used to have a wife, kids, a degree, and a good job as an accountant but when the economy plummeted so did my life and I turned to the comfort of hard drugs rather than that of my family.

She left me, left me with nothing, which is all I have now: nothing.

The only thing I do have is this tiny piece of cardboard in my hands, a paper thing green blanket with holes all along the bottom as the fibers begin to tear apart one by one, and the clothes on my back.

I used to have my Grandma's diamond ring, passed down to me by my deceased mother but, I sold that for a small sum of money.

Only enough to get me a stay in a hotel room for one night and a hot meal.

I could have gotten more but I guess as the saying goes "desperate time's calls for desperate measures"

All I want is a job of some sort

To work for money to get myself back up on my feet, to get a house or a car or something to provide me with shelter and give me some sort of value

I keep applying everywhere I see a "Now Hiring" sign but the same three questions always prohibit me from making something of myself

"What is your address?"

"What is your phone number?"

"What is your means of transportation?"

Those three questions haunt me at night as if it were a brick wall in the middle of a road

Everyone shouts out at me "get a job loser"

"Why should my tax dollars have to go to scumbags like you?"

I try to get myself cleaned up in the bathrooms of a McDonalds but after a little while even the employees there come in, give me disgusted looks, and tell me that I need to leave.

Now, I sit on the corner of a street, trying to shield myself from the cold with the little I have

Kids and adults alike stare at me as if I am a circus performer

The swift droppings of lose pennies in your pockets into my Dunkin Donuts cup make you feel as though you are a good person

I could get a job, make something of myself, get myself back on my feet and maybe get my family back but I can't because of three questions.