I occasionally stay late and see the cleaning crew that comes through here at night. A couple of nights ago I met Sienna, the new woman who’s been assigned to our floor. She’s ridiculously outgoing and friendly, and tonight I learned she’s a certified nursing assistant, she’s going to school to be an LPN, and she works here at night. She takes the bus everywhere, getting on the first one at 6 am, and getting home between 10 and 11pm. She seemed pleased and surprised when I told her that there was no way in hell I could pull off a schedule like that. She gets 4 hours of work here a night at $7 an hour. She has to take the 4:30 bus to start work at 5:30, because the bus at 5 is constantly a few minutes late, and the crew chiefs keep yelling at everyone. They’re not allowed to leave their assigned floor until 9:15. She describes her boss as very cool and laid back because a couple of times she’s left the floor at 9:12 or 9:13, and he’s okay with that. Her friend D’Andre, who works in the other tower here, just graduated from BetaTech. They advertise that they help you find a job, but they didn’t, so now he owes Sallie Mae 23k, and he has no job prospects because he has no experience. Today, his supervisor, who was recently promoted from floor buffer, called him out in front of everyone and asked him why he was breathing so hard from his walk. D’Andre was really hurt, and Sienna’s really angry. She said “I’m not trying to be funny, but that’s what you get from black people.” She’s black. I don’t know how you even begin to get out from all of that and really thrive. So many layers making it hard to survive. I would have suffocated by now.