Having arrived yesterday, I will be leaving on September 3rd, heading down to West Virginia, then into Kentucky, two states new to me. Driving here I really enjoyed much of what I came across, including parts of South Dakota, Minnesota and Iowa. Northern Iowa can be damn beautiful, lovely terrain along with nice small towns filled with many ornate wooden houses. Viewing the many old downtowns along my travels has also been fun. Contrary to rumor, much of America is alive and well and thriving, yes, doing okay, thank you. And many folks along my route have been downright friendly, even to a counterculture relic like myself. Above all the noice and rhetoric, the majority recognizes that we are all equal citizens of our wonderful country. "This land is your land, this land is my land....." sang Woody Guthrie, and its true, his words, his lyrics ringing genuine and true, a liberty bell minus any cracks.
Now for an essay describing what taxi is really like for me and for the many others driving beneath the toplight. I call it death because, for me, there is no other way to accurately describe what is essentially an inhuman experience. While many jobs and occupations dominate one's life, taxi is a specter haunting body and mind, no fun for those tied to a nightmare never ending.
After leaving the parking garage after my visit to the Art Institute of Chicago, I saw a taxi with a sticker advising "Call 311" to report the awful cabbie. Catching up to the driver at an intersection, I was able to ask him about it. He said, "It's the money. They want my money!" And I said, that's right, I can now call and say you have done anything, running me over, etc and they will make you responsible. "Yes," he laughed, "Yes!"
And there you have it, the ongoing insult that is driving a cab. Think you are gonna see that sticker on the back of Lyft and Uber cars? No way, Mister Jose!
Taxi is Death
Driving taxi is a python, a boa constrictor squeezing the life out of you as ply the streets of any given city. Why is that true? Its due to two foundational elements that is taxi: a stressful work environment and a high overhead---a never ceasing request for your hard earned money, because taxi is all about money, both the money you make and the money everyone wants to take from you. Whether you own or are leasing, you are liable for expenses from the beginning. If you lease, you have your "gate" or "nut" plus all that gasoline to pay for. And it's even worse for the owner, with insurance and dispatch fees hanging over you, along with local government medallion fees and costs, which in NYC can mean, even with the now celebrated "medallion loan" reductions, another $1200. monthly payment on top of gasoline and potential car loan payments. More than just squeezed, it is a heavy weight crushing, pressing you into the ground. These kinds of financial pressures can be overwhelming, destructive, sometimes leading to utter despair and suicide.
Then there's the "human punching bag" working environment that daily pummels the cabbie, the taxi driver never forgetting that he/she is "public property" permitting anyone who wants --passenger, cop, fellow motorist---to abuse and attack and assault you in whatever fashion they wish. Add the stress of working in a congested city dealing with traffic, pollution, unrelenting noice, excessive heat in the summer, icy roads in the winter, all of it tied with having to make the MONEY! lots of MONEY! to keep the taxi wheel turning, you have the living nightmare that is taxi, death on four rotating wheels, keeping you from actually living the peaceful life you deserve. Taxi ain't heaven, it's hell!
What should be clear is that driving taxi is not truly living. If it is, it is life encased in a moving metal box, a yellow coffin with a meter and toplight. Since leaving Seattle August 13th, I saw the rising full moon transition from a glowing orange to yellow to a pure beaming white coloring the night desert sky. In Montana while driving along a forest road, I was forced to stop for a herd of big horn sheep, fifty or more ewes and lambs crossing from one grassy pasture to the next. The next day, also in Montana, I woke up and walked a mile to Upper Potosi Hot Springs, having the pool entirely to myself. What a beautiful, sunny morning it was, treading my way through golden fields. In Iowa, after surviving a night filled with hail and driving rain, the eastern horizon a flashing light show much of the night, in the early dawn I stood next to a meandering river, unknown birds singing. Further miles down the road, I found a trout stream bordered by flowering bushes---both orange and yellow slippers delighting the eye, thrilling the brain, the air clean and fresh. And yesterday, in a kind of punctuation, while waiting at a light on Route Six in Edgerton, Ohio, a ruddy-headed perhaps eight-year old boy crossed in front of me, catching my eye and flexed his right bicep, an unexpected human communication. All of this and more I would have missed if I had instead been in the damn taxi.
Yes, driving the taxi is death. Stepping out is life, and thank goodness for that, stormy weather, big horn sheep and flowering bushes embracing my life. Thank you, thank you very much, drenching me with life!
Poem:
August 21st Lost in Rockford, Illinois
In the night,
my camp rained out,
my hair and clothes wet,
I drive east seeking shelter
upon roads new to me, numerous
construction detours transforming
vague notions into "I have no idea"
except continuing east toward Chicago
and a hopeful theoretical respite through
this infernal Midwestern downpour
reminding me, if I had ever
forgotten, I remain very
much alive.
___________________
This was after yet a second night of torrential rain. I found a motel and was glad of it. Expensive but I was dry and able to dry out my tent.
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