I wake up with a sudden headache. My body immediately feels malnourished and dirty. I look up to see a woman standing over my bed.

“How you been john. You took a hard hit”, said a woman in pajamas.
“Who are you. Where.. Where am I!”
“ Who am I? I'm your mother. You’re in bed. Do you not remember anything?” Proclaimed the woman..
“ Re-remember what?”
“ Yesterday when you got hit with a baseball playing with your friends”
    The innocence and ease In her voice let's me to believe her. I look around for a brief moment. The room is very bland. The wallpaper is scraped down to sheet rock. The rug is worn down and faded. Suddenly the women feels my forehead.
“Are you sure you are feeling ok? Your temperature Is fine. Get out of bed and I'll fetch you some breakfast”
My body moves instinctively. Like a dog fetching a bone. I walk into a small room and sit down on a wooden chair. A plate is placed in front of me, a piece of cheese in between a sandwich of bread. A glass of milk is next to it. I take a bite of the sandwich. Not much for cooking In this house. I don't dare drink the milk. The thickness and shade of yellow gross me out. Then a little boy comes running into the room.
“Hey john how’s your head?”
This boy must be my little brother. Like me looks skinny and pale. His clothes are exactly like mine. Brown pants with a grey vest. I must have handed them down to him. The look in his eyes lets me sense that he’s been worrying about me.
    “I'm doing fine. Having trouble remembering what happened. I-”
    “Oh John honey I need you to go pick up eggs at the market.” She then reached out of her pocket to hand me fifteen cents. Wait what? Fifteen cents for eggs. I must be In a third world country. You can’t buy eggs for less than two dollars in this age. Hey, maybe they are on sale.
     I then proceed to the door and walk out to to feel the cold breeze of air rush to my face. A walk a couple of blocks until I reach the center of town. The marketplace is the people's stock market. Everyone trading everything for anything. Eggs for potatoes, peaches for milk, and raw meat for onions. Farmers gathering up and hoisting their buckets and wagons of crops ready to strike a deal. All the buildings and houses look run down, like nobody lived there. Only people did live there. Now I think of it the house I was in was no different. There was no heat nor insulation. Only the layers of clothes and blankets kept your body from freezing. I peer into a window to see a family huddled up on a old sofa. Their eyes look scared. The tiredness on the parents face makes me realize how much they are struggling. Not knowing where the future will take them. A sudden wave of emotion overcomes me. I just want to break down the door and lie with the family. Softly reassuring them that it’s going to be ok. I control my inner emotions and back away from the house, ready to resume my day.
  I continue strolling through the street and into the market.  I start walking up to the egg stand where a group of boys intervene .
“Do you want to buy a newspaper. Only five cents. Hear about Babe Ruth’s come from behind win over the Boston Red Sox yesterday. Or the construction of the new Empire State Building. Set to be the tallest building in the world,” said the boy.
   “ Wait. Babe Ruth. What is this. A throwback to the past,” I snickered. I grab for the newspaper and rip it out of the kids hand.
  “ Hey! You have to pay for that, I have to make a living,” shouted the boy.
   “ Yeah whatever,” I said ignorantly.  While glued to the text I toss the boy a nickel. As I scan the page and read I come to a moment of truth. The year is February of 1931. What is happening? Have I been sent back in time? Am I some sort of government experiment. Or wait, is Back to the Future real? Now it all makes sense. This is life in the Great Depression. Young boys scavenging for money to make the smallest contribution to their household. Everybody is standing on one limb inside and won’t complain for the slightest cut. No wonder the market is a zoo. Everyone is unemployed and is doing the only thing they can that will take their mind off of things.
As I look around and realize what is happening, I try and take in every minute detail. Every person is trying to make a gain to make their life an ounce easier. The desperate helplessness in people's eyes makes me want to vomit. I feel so ashamed. The life I was living I thought was hard, try sleeping when you are starving for nights on end. I realize why I'm here. To appreciate the present and remember what happened in the past. This is a living nightmare. Kids smiling and laughing not knowing that they are living in the worst time in present day America.
I finally gather my thoughts and buy a dozen eggs. As I'm strolling down the street where boys are playing baseball, a boy yells out-
“ Hey john catch!” Before I could turn around to react that they were talking to me,  a baseball penetrates into the back of my skull leaving me blacking out.
I awake with a woman yelling my name.
“John wake up before I send you to the office,” shouted the women. This women is my math teacher. Being back makes me consider whether the great depression is better than Geometry class.