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The TaXi Driver
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a second, I thought about
ramming the car into the
guardrail, but I wasn’t sure it
would really injure him. So I
didn’t. But I knew I couldn’t
just keep quiet.What the hell
was I going to say though?
Honestly, I was completely
stumped for the first time in
my life. As you can see, I like
to chat with my passengers.
With the women, I talk about
the weather. With men, I
talk about politics, about
a horrible accident, or the
latest game scores. If it’s not
a blockhead who only nods
his head and answers
yes
or
no,
then the conversation
can go somewhere. Once I
had a passenger who was
going a long way, out to the
countryside. We started
talking about the bad roads,
then halfway through the
trip we discussed whether
cell phones caused cancer,
and by the end of it, we were
wondering out loud about
the afterlife. But, what can
I say? With this guy, I was
speechless.
I wanted to pull over and say
to the criminal
, get out of
my cab
. I sat there quiet as a
mouse. I kept looking in my
rear view mirror to see what
he was doing. There he was,
in my rear view mirror, just
staring out the window.
You know, when my son was
little, he told me he wanted
to be a taxi driver, just like
me. Now, my wife keeps
watching thosedementedTV
shows about the paraplegics
who go to China and get
some magic operation done
that fixes themup. She keeps
nagging me to go down to
the TV station and tell our
story to the producers so