There are times at which we really have no choice but to slow down.

Our first years are commonly considered those which should have always been the most innocent and most simple.

Unfortunately, it may not be this way for us all.

7,000 miles away, there is a boy. This boy is eight years old, and he has been hard at work in a dingy, run down, unsanitary workshop for 11 hours; without much break, and without much food.

He is making your shoes, whether you know it or not.

In the United States, decades after the end of child labor, 10 minute history lessons aside, we have brushed aside the pain.

We have forgotten the suffering.

Minimun wage?

Try 2 cents a day.

Try starvation for days.

Try not having a roof under which to sleep.

Try never having time to sleep because the "bad men" promised you'd regret it if you failed to meet your impossible quota.

"First world problems" are a privledge.

Got a scuff on your new shoes? Are you enraged because of the boy and the initial suffering, which went in to making them perfect, or because your shoes are now slightly less aesthetically pleasing?

Remember, he made your shoes. You ******* them up in a way that he could not hardly afford.

The boy scuffs "your" shoes, the ones he made, and yet he is the one who will suffer the consequences.