Taxi Ordeals

Photo Credit: Alex

Patience was testing my waters today. In retrospect, I realize that I should have taken the subway instead of a taxi, when I realized I was going to be late to work. It would have been the simplest thing to do, yet being the complicated human being that I am, I tried to take the extraordinary chance of making it to work on time.

As soon as I got into the taxi, the driver initiated small talk about the weather, and switching to day-shift for the first time (which I should have taken better note of). I engaged him in a casual conversation for a few minutes and turned to the window as I got bored. When he finally turned onto 57th Street at York, I had a feeling that the taxi ride was about to take, well, a wrong turn. I supressed the urge to say something, thinking he knew where he was going. When we arrived at 5th Avenue, there were no left turns as I had expected. With time catching up to me, I had yet another instinct to walk to work, rather than have the driver turn around several blocks. By the time I realized it, we were several avenues away from my destination, because he thought he would be able to make a left turn eventually.

To top off my wonderful experience, I had completely forgotten about the meter, which the driver did not stop until we got to the destination, ten minutes after he made the initial wrong turn. When I reminded him that the meter had been tarnished, he said there was nothing he could do about it and cursed at me. He was more frustrated than I was, which I didn't understand, because I thought he was at fault. So rather than arguing with him about whose fault it was, and how much I had to pay, I just left him the amount, which I thought was appropriate - nothing.