Language: en
Meaning: (idiomatic)Tosurviveorendure, especially in a situation in which one isstrugglingto avoid beingoverwhelmedbyadversefinancial circumstances.1650, Edward Marbury,A Commentarie, or Exposition upon the Prophecie of Habakkuk, London,page195:Blessed be God that ministreth ever some comfort to sweeten the calamities of life, and to keep the soul from fainting, tokeep the head above water, that the deep waters swallow us not up.1764, M. C., A Lady of Quality,Each Sex in their Humour or, The Histories of the Families of Brightley, Finch, Fortescue, Shelburne and Stevens, London,p. 20:I endeavoured to obtain a mitigation of this severe sentence, by offering myself to engage for the payment of the remaining sum, to preserve my mother's small salary unencumbered; but he interrupted me with the utmost cruelty, by saying . . . it would be pretty well if, for some years, I couldkeep my own head above water.1863, James Robert Gilmore (writing as Edmund Kirke),My Southern Friends, Tribune Assoc., ch. 17[1]:Besides, I have had to borrow ten thousand dollars of him tokeep my head above water.1932Aug. 15, "The Press: Broken Mirror,"Time(quoting farewell editorial in DetroitMirror):The capitalist system being one under which a profit must be made by any enterprise that is tokeep its head above water, we are forced to call off the fight in this case.2008March 24, Ruthie Ackerman, “Tiffany Goes International”, inForbes, retrieved19 October 2009:Strong sales in Europe and Asia are helping Tiffanykeep its head above waterat a time when US consumers are holding onto their wallets.
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