A Stalker

Tall, blond and beautiful she took up jijitsu again when she started driving cab. The day shift was safer but she drove nights because the money was better. She could break a wrist with one quick move and throw a man three times her weight. She carried a taser but only used it once.

Her best protection was her personality. Open and friendly, she had a talent for turning men into guys. She knew how to deflect a pass without hurting a man or making him angry. Almost all her friends were guys who had started out by trying to be lovers.

As a rule she didn't date customers. One exception turned out to be a case in point. She usually didn't go for men shorter than she was either but he was cute, sexy and very funny. She slept with him on the second date. It was a mistake. The sex was great but he acted as if they were an instant couple. He called every day and starting making plans for them without even asking her.

She didn't want an intense relationship. She didn't have time for it. She'd discovered that she had a talent for computers and was taking courses. Her two girls were still in high school.

He had some little clerical job that paid him even less than she made. Besides - he had needs. He needed to be nurtured. He needed love. She had two kids already. She didn't have time for another.

She stopped sleeping with him but he wouldn't go away. He kept calling. She made subtle hints but he ignored them. She started hanging up on him. Then he started stalking her - following her everywhere. Finally, she got a male friend of hers to come over and spent the night.

The next morning when they went out, the little man was standing there, angry and agitated. He obviously hadn't slept. He was almost crying as he shouted,

"I love you and you treat me like this? You'll never find anybody who loves you like I do! I cared for you! I would've done anything for you! I would've made you happy! You'll never see me again!"

He was so pathetic that she almost apologized. It was a low trick but it worked. He never called again but she did see him once a year later.

She was cruising in her cab on Columbus looking for a fare when she spotted him.

He was walking with a plain women his own height. They were holding hands and staring into each other's eyes, lost to the world, in love, happy.

Overnight

"I used to be beautiful." She said with a light laugh. "You don't believe it, huh?"

I turned around and glanced at her in the back seat. She looked middle-fifties and dumpy. If you studied her face, you could see that she might once have been beautiful.

"You're a fine looking woman," I told her.

She broke out laughing.

"You're a lousy liar," she said.

"Other women have told me that."

"No - I was drop-dead gorgeous," she said, as if stating an obvious fact. "And I have Asian genes - when I was 60 I looked 35 - and I was fine. A Body an 18 year old would kill for. I would've had you eating out of my hand."

"It my case that wouldn't be hard."

She laughed and continued.

"I had a beautiful twenty-five year old boyfriend. Hard body. Filipino like me. It was the greatest passion of my life."

"I mean, it was crazy. I couldn't get enough of him. If he didn't call, I went insanely jealous. I couldn't eat. I'd walk around in agony - I mean physical pain. I never felt nothin' like it before. I couldn't sleep if he wasn't with me. I'd just stay up worryin', imagining him with other women."

"It turned out he was sleepin' around. Maybe my jealousy started it. I mean I accused him so much maybe he thought,

'Fuck it! I might as well get some.'"

"I started sleeping around for revenge. I screwed his best friend and let him know it."

"We fought all the time. Hysterical fights. I threw a knife at him."

"It got crazier and crazier. We'd break up and when we got back together it would be hotter than it was before. Then we'd fight again and break up again. It was like an addiction."

"I came in one afternoon and found him doing my niece on my bed - ON MY BED - they didn't see me. They were really goin' at it. I mean, they were really fucking!"

"So I went and got the gun and came back and they were still at it. They had so much energy. I suddenly thought,

'Yeah they belong together' and I said to myself, 'what the hell are you doin' Marcie? You're 60 years old.'''

"That was it. From that moment, I just let myself go. That was last year."

She laughed again.

"You don't believe me but it's true. I turned old overnight ..."

I stopped the cab and she paid me.

"Thanks for getting me home so fast. I'm just in time for the Surviver final. I'm really lookin' forward to it. It should really be exciting."

A Rear Ender

The pick-up truck zoomed backward out of a Chinatown alley. No way the driver looked.

Luckily I have rapid reflexes. I hit the horn and the brakes at the same time. Then, the instant I stopped - just as the truck started to hit me - I threw it in reverse. There was a little contact but no damage.

"Why don't you look where you're going," I told the driver, a twenty something American born Chinese.

"Fuck you. Any moron could see me backing up - asshole!"

"You're the asshole!"

"You white mother fucker!"

"Ni bu shi donxi," I responded in Mandarin. It translates to: "you're not even a thing."

"You speak Chinese?"

"A little."

"Well - fuck you!"

A typical exchange. You get a chance to blow off a little steam. It's all part of the job.

"What an asshole!" My customer said from the back seat. He was about 55 and in the middle of a middle-aged spread.

"However," his wife, a statuesque blond of 35, added in a slight Swedish accent, "our driver was at fault."

"What? The guy blew out of that alley."

"Our driver should have been paying more attention."

"Attention! If he didn't back up, we could'a been killed."

"If he wasn't looking at China girl's asses, he would've seen the truck earlier."

"What the hell do you know about it?" he said starting to shout. "You don't even drive!"

"I don't have to be a driver," she shouted back, "to know a bad one!"

"Stop shouting!" He shouted.

"You stop shouting." She screamed.

"If don't mellow out, you're gonna be alone with your dildo tonight."

"I finish with the dildo every night anyway."

"What? With your love master here?"

"The only thing you've mastered is premature ejaculation."

"I hate to interrupt," I said interrupting, "but which one of you is paying?"

"Who do think is paying?" he asked sarcastically.

"You mean, you're going to give this asshole money?" she asked incredulously. "He nearly killed us."

"Of course I'm paying him - he saved out lives."

She got out behind me, slammed the door and walked around the cab while her husband counted out my money. Then he she opened the front door on the passenger side and stuck her head inside.

"You boys take all the time you want," she said looking at me with a suggestive smile, "he just loves being rear-ended."

She slammed the front door and started walking up the street.

"Sorry about that," I said.

"Forget it," he said. "Of course I'll apologize. ... They never give in. ... She's my fifth wife. ... Can you believe it?"

144 Athens

I was in love with love. Everything Jessica did - every move, every gesture - struck me as marvelous and filled me with joy. I loved her lithe tom-boy walk. I loved her open joyfull smile, her long blond hair, her dark blue eyes, her light brown skin, her Brazilian accent - the way her elegant fingers magically moved as they rapidly counted money through the dispatcher's window.

I couldn't understand how she could have married a snark like Maurice. She was not only twenty years younger than he was but she was vibrant and, I thought, passionate. I could see no possibility of him satisfying a woman like that.

Jessica hung out with the guys at the Ha Ra after work before going home or heading out to dance. She was just one of the boys and, although Maurice didn't drink and never joined her, nobody was about to make passes at the boss's wife. Except for Gill who made passes at all women and, well, me.

I tried to be quiet about it. When no one else was looking I might tell her that I loved her smile or her blue eyes. But, whenever I did so, she froze me out and snubbed me the next day. But, the day after that she'd not only be friendly but flirtatious ... or was it in my mind? If I flirted back, she'd turn cold.

I finally asked her out. She suggested that we meet for drinks and dancing. Clearly a date. However, she not only showed up with Gill but an entourage and she made eye passes at every guy in the place.

A few days later, the taxi dispatcher told me to pick up an order at 144 Athens. This was highly unusual. Normally all radio calls go out on a bid.

"They asked for you," the dispatcher told me when I questioned him. "If you don't want the order let me know - I'll get it myself."

Strange comment. Satyric tone of voice. Now I was intrigued.

"I'll take it - why not?"

144 Athens was a tiny cottage set back from the street behind a picket fence and couple of dwarf palm trees.

Jessica answered the door wearing only a terrycloth bathrobe.

"All women confuse me," I told her, "but you're in a class by yourself."

"Do you find this confusing?" she asked as she opened her robe.

"No," I told her as I walked over and finished removing it.

She put an arm around my waist and led me into a bedroom with a panoramic view of downtown San Francisco and the Bay Bridge. The bed took up half the room.

Afterwards I asked her, "Was that some sort of game were you playing at the nightclub?"

"I was punishing you," she said with a devilish giggle. "How dare you ask me out! I'm a married woman. What do you think I am?"

There was certain bend to her logic but I thought it best not to comment.

We saw each other two or three times a week after that - always at the cabin. We couldn't safely go out because every cab driver in the city knew both of us. We'd just watch movies, eat take out ... and fuck.

In between we'd talk about our childhoods. Her Amazon adventures, my trips on the lakes of Minnesota. She was a great listener. I talked for hours at a time about canoeing on the headwaters of the Mississippi.

Maurice didn't know about 144 Athens. Like most owners of cab companies, he took a percentage of the tips that the dispatchers extorted from his drivers. Unlike most of them, he took 20% instead of the usual ten. His mistake was in letting Jessica count the money. She saved enough to buy the cottage in less than three years.

I didn't think too much about where the affair was leading. I was only making $500 a week. I didn't see how I could ask her to leave Maurice's millions on that kind of salary. We did plan a few trips: one to Mendocino and another to Yucatan but something always came up before we could leave.

She went back home to Brazil for a month and then I went to spend the Christmas holidays in St. Paul. When I came back I had trouble getting hold of her. I saw her at work but she wasn't returning my calls.

I tracked her down at the Ha Ra. She was sitting at the bar talking and laughing with the bartender.

"Haven't seen you for awhile," she said when I went over and sat next to her.

"I went home," I said puzzled, "don't you remember?"

"Oh yeah," she said brightly, "Iowa."

A few night later, I was driving my taxi when the dispatcher told Cab #268 to pick up at 144 Athens.

Who the fuck is 268?

Maurice

His real name was Mike but he started calling himself Maurice when he returned from studying art in Paris. Maybe he thought the name would help him sell his painting. If so, he was wrong but he never went back to Mike.

He held court with the other owners at a coffee house across the street from the cab lot. He was there every morning and every morning I'd come in for coffee before I started work. Every morning I'd say hello to Maurice and the gang and every morning they'd scowl and snub me.

But when I started political organizing, he took an interest. Maybe he thought I had guts. I was a so-called Independent Contractor. He could have eliminated me with the stroke of his pen. It wasn't courage. I was single and didn't give a flying fuck. Getting in the face of pricks like Maurice was my idea of fun. On the whole he seemed amused by my provocative yet ultimately impotent actions.

He started including me in his court. He apparently had done a background check and spoke to me as a fellow artist cast adrift by the storm. He regaled me with tales of his painting days. He'd grown up with the poet Harold Morse and they shared an apartment in Paris.

"I don't know about my own art, " he told me, "but I knew lots of geniuses - lots of them."

I don't know know about his geniuses but his "art" explained why he owned a cab company.

When my political group began getting notice, Maurice pulled me aside and gave me a lengthy talk about how bad conditions had been for workers back at the turn of the 20th century. You know: 18 hour work days, company stores, sleeping on the job site etc etc. His point of course was that he wasn't all that bad.

Certainly, Maurice could be charming.

There was a veteran driver who was one of the last to belong to the dying union. Maurice made the driver a member of his coffee klatch and told him that he could keep all his benefits if he quit the union. Maurice would personally guarantee that the driver would still have his wage rate, his paid vacations, his retirement and his medical benefits.

"Why pay those damn union dues?" Maurice asked.

The driver took him up on the deal and went on vacation. When he came back, he discovered that he no longer had a job.

"But what about our agreement?" the man pathetically asked as he stood at the door of the Maurice's office.

Maurice got up and walked over to the driver.

"What agreement?" he snarled as he closed the door in the man's face.

Safety First

The young woman climbed in the back looking at the the floor, the roof, the the seats - everywhere but at me. Anorexic and ugly with a nose ring, crack pimples and tattoos, she ignored my friendly greeting and went into a manic, self-important rant directed to a man standing outside the car. She lay down with her legs stretched across the seat and kept rattling words at the guy she repeatedly called "dude."

They had a high-decibel spat about whether or not he should ride in the front or the back. It went on and on.

I politely asked her three times where they wanted to go. Three time the woman/girl acted as if I hadn't spoken. Three is my limit.

• "Can you hear me?" I finally screamed.
• "Yeah," she replied without looking at me and went immediately back to her chatter.
• "Then get in or get out!" I screamed again. "Now!"
• "Well - you don't have to be rude!" Dude told me as he climbed in front, slamming the door. He looked just like the girl: tattoos, nose ring, anorexic, ugly. "Monclair!" he snapped.
  
• "So what?" I asked satirically.
  
• "So you're taking me there."
• "Do you mean, 'will I please take you there?'"

Dude looked back at his girl friend with his mouth agape then said,

• "Did you hear that Babe?"
• "Let it go," Babe snapped, "he's just a cabbie."
  
• "P-L-E-A-S-E," he said his voice dripping with sarcasm.

I started driving - noting, as I often have, that ugly people are ruder than beautiful people. You'd think it would be the other way around. Maybe it's a pre-emptive strike. Or maybe too much cab driving is warping my perceptions.

I drove a few blocks before I noticed that Dude wasn't wearing a seat belt.

• "Dude," I told him, "you have to put your seat belt on."
• "I never wear one," he replied in a bitchy voice.
• "If you don't put it on - no Montclair," I told him as I pulled in toward the curb.
• "Oh, all right!" he whined.

I pulled back onto the street. It was starting to rain for the first time in six months. I concentrated on the slippery streets and the horrible driving that San Franciscans indulge in whenever the see a hint of wet.

• "I can't get it on," Dude said.
• "20 other people managed to put it on today," I said while keeping my eyes on the road, "I've got faith in you."

I drove on for a bit.

• "Got it," Dude finally said.

The rain began falling harder and harder. The traffic began to bunch up. The driving became phantasmagorical: cars going 13 mph, other cars going 70 on the same street, guys backing across intersections, woman making suicidal moves while texting, other women j-walking with babies.

I didn't look at Dude until we were on the bridge. Instead of clicking the seat belt into the holder, he had tied it around his body into three or four knots. I opened my mouth to speak but no words came out. What was the use?

• "Can't you drive any faster?" Babe bitched.
• "It's raining. It's slippery when it rains. Driving fast can be dangerous when it's slippery," I replied with pedantic sarcasm.
• "Oh! Yeah! Right!" Babe exclaimed. "Like I was born yesterday."

I finally got them to their address in Monclair, a mansion on a hill obviously belonging to one of their daddies. The fare was $40 which sounds good but it took me almost an hour to get there and it would take me at least that long to get back. I'd be lucky to turn the cab in on time and not be hit with a fine and a diatribe from Steele the company manager. Steele loved nothing better than humiliating cab drivers over stuff like that.

Babe paid me and even gave me a one dollar tip. Dude sat there staring into space.

• "You've got to take your seat belt off, Dude."
• "It won't come off."

He was right. I wasted five minutes trying to undo the knots. Both of them sat staring into space while I worked. Finally, I politely and slowly asked Babe.

• "Do you think you could go upstairs, find a knife and bring it back here?"
• "Yeah, sure," she replied in sulky voice, "why not?"

She sauntered slowly up the stairs - and disappeared. I waited five minutes, ten minutes imaging what Steele would do when he saw me. Would he start screaming right away or would sadistically let me twist in the wind for awhile before firing me? I decided to find Babe.

The front door was open and I could hear Neil Diamond of all people blasting from the back of the house. I walked through several rooms to find Babe tweaking in the kitchen. I don't know what drug she was using but I never want to try it. She was jerking around the room like a zombie being zapped with a cattle prod.

I found the stereo and pulled the plug. Babe turned to me and started to scream. She didn't know who I was. She never looked at me before. I pushed by her and opened the drawers until I found a butcher knife. Babe screamed louder as I headed back toward her.

• "Okay," she pleaded taking off her clothes, "just don't kill me."
• "Don't worry," I told her glancing at her bony, drug-addict, tattoo riddled body. I couldn't image doing her but then I'm not a necrophiliac.

The rain kept pouring down and I was soaked through and freezing by the time I got back to the cab. Dude looked at me with extreme annoyance when I opened the door.

• "Well - you took your sweet time," he snapped. "What's your badge number? Your company is going to hear about this.!"

I sat next to him with the knife in my hand thinking that any objective juror would see this as a clear case of justifiable homicide. My mind froze. I couldn't think. There was something I needed to remember. Oh, yes. Gandhi. Would killing Dude help lead to world peace? Clearly not. Besides I'll still have to cut him loose to get rid of the body. I cut the belt.

I didn't even bring cab back to the garage. I was going to be fired anyway so I figured I'd hang on to the gate. I just parked the taxi outside and called the dispatcher when I got home. I'm only sorry that I missed seeing Steele froth at the mouth when he discovered that I'd beat him out of $100.

Star

Star was Liverpool Irish and talked just like the Beatles whom he idolized. He could sing every word to every Beatle song that I knew as well as every word to just about every rock song that anybody else ever heard of. He could do the entire repertoire of Spooky Tooth for god's sake.

He played with almost every rock band in town and, although he was only 5'4," his base guitar resonated like a cello. He drove cab on the grave yard shift because he could play a gig and still go to work.

Star was one of the friendliest guys I've ever met and one of the sweetest. A non-stop talker, he never had bad word to say about anybody.

He always started at midnight with change for a twenty in his pocket.

By 1:15 one Saturday morning, he was already dead - shot by junkie, a former taxi driver, who wouldn't believe that Star hadn't tucked away a couple of hundred on a Friday night.

Class Warfare: The Tarvia Battle

I drove an attractive French woman from SFO to an exclusive neighborhood in San Anselmo. I went into my "the smartest cab driver in the world" act and discussed Sartre, Proust and Gide with her as if I knew what I was talking about. She was pleasant and down to earth; humoring me by seeming to enjoy the conversation.

She lived in a private circle with only a single entrance from the street. When we arrived, a rope had been strung across the street with a sign tied to it saying, "KEEP OUT." There were a couple of adults with three or four teenage kids watching us from a nearby porch.

I leaned out the window and shouted,

• "Can you let me in? This woman needs to get home."
• "We're paving the street," a kid shouted back. "Can't you read?"

The all looked at me with unpleasant, sarcastic expressions.

I asked the woman where she lived and she said it was about a block away. This was a problem. She'd been living in Paris for 6 months and we had about 250 pounds of luggage in the cab. The trunk was full and there was a huge closet-case in the back seat.

Just when I about to get out and start lugging the stuff, the guys on the porch dropped the rope. This didn't jibe with previous nastiness but I wasn't about to argue. I quickly drove into the circle and took my customer to her home.

As I unloaded the luggage, I got an idea of why they've roped off the entrance. A special kind of tarvia had been poured on their street and my wheels had sunk down about a foot into it, leaving deep ruts where I had driven.

When I drove back to the entrance, the nasties had stretched the rope back across the entrance with five of them standing evenly spaced across the street to make sure that I didn't break through.

• "You broke in!" One of them shouted. "You broke in!"
• "You let me in," I shouted back.
• "You're lying! You're lying!" a few of them shouted.
• "We've got you! We've got you!" a couple of more shouted.
• "The cops are on their way!" another one yelled.

The cab was sinking deep and deeper into the tarvia during the exchange. I started laughing, stepped out of the car and walked toward the men. They scattered and ran as if they were being confronted by a crazed axe-murderer.

I loosened the rope, went back to the car and drove out.

• "The cops'll get you! The cops'll get you!" They screamed.

Actually, I only talked to one cop and I drove to the police station to see him on the advice of my company. A nice young guy who had yet to be done in by donuts.

• "They say you crashed though their barrier," he told me.
• "No - they put it down," I told him. "At first I thought they'd let me in but I guess they were really being sarcastic - as in 'can't you read you stupid cabbie!'"

The cop didn't say anything but he nodded as if what I'd said made sense.

• "Kind of serves 'em right doesn't it?" I added.

He smiled and said he'd check it out.

Last I heard of it. From time to time I enjoy images of the nasties driving over my ruts to get to their homes - cursing me all the way.

Refined Women

"He asked her out for a date! ... Can you believe it! A date!"

Mohammed to looked at me shaking his head in disbelief.

"A Date!" he repeated throwing up his hands in exasperation. "Well - I can tell you, Hortense didn't like it one bit. She didn't say anything but I could tell - one more fuck up like that and I lose the account."

He circled the room, combing back his medium black hair with his right hand while his left punctuated his speech.

"These woman aren't sluts or whores ... they're refined, elegant ladies. Like gishas or concubines ... And, no full-timers - Hortense is adamant about that. These woman are housewives and college students, single mothers. MBAs and lawyers laid off by the recession. They have husbands and lovers - fiancees ... and Nick the dick asks one out for a date."

"Hard to believe," I said shaking my head.

Mohammed was interviewing me. He was looking me over to see if I had enough class to handle the job. He was looking for three or four good men to take care of the business he couldn't deal with himself.

"And the cliental," he said with an air of disbelief, "the creme de la creme. These men are movers and shakers, computer geniuses, CEOs - the princes of Silicon Valley ... I mean these are 50, 100, 200 dollar rides - and he wants a date!"

I shook my head again as Mohammed stared intently at me, searching into my soul.

"The smuc just didn't know his place," I said as Mohammed suspiciously eyed me. "I wouldn't dream of taking one of those women out."

Gabriella, my first ride, was everything Mohammed said she was. Elegant, refined, 22, wearing designer clothing by Versace and shoes by that Italian dude - Gucci isn't it? She had classic cheek bones and straight black hair that hung to her shoulders and an ethereal look but with a hard cut.

I figured her for a poetics major from Bryn Mawr who'd gotten real and was going for that Standford MBA.

I didn't lie to Mohammed. I wouldn't dream of asking this woman out. What I asked her instead was, "how much for half and half?"

She glanced at me with distain and haughtily replied, "If you have to ask you can't afford it."

"Too bad," I said, "I was thinking of splitting the fare with you."

We were heading for San Jose - a $150 ride. She warmed up and leaned her elbows on the top of the passenger seat. "Well" she said, "I guess I could give you the cabbie special - how about half for half? - Only don't tell Hortense."

Way above my ordinary budget but this woman was refined.

It turned out that the computer genius, mover and shaker, CEO, prince asshole was a regular. He opened the door and gave Gabriella a long, passionate kiss; sticking his tongue down the soft, velvet pallet that I'd explored not ten minutes earlier.

The High Way to the Airport

I picked up a newlywed couple at a Noe Valley bar. He was sixty and dressed like Willie Nelson. She was nineteen and looked like a sixties' flower girl. They were high and they lit up everyone around them. The people in the bar come out to see them off as if they'd just been married in a church.

He said he was a cameraman and was having trouble getting work so he had to move back to his hated L.A. . When I later took film courses, I learned that he was one of the half-dozen cinematographers who had created the 70's film "look." She was exited to be with the great man and he was in love.

As soon as they stepped into the cab they invited me to the party. I usually don't indulge when I drive but they were having so much fun I had to join them. It turned out to be awesome weed.

I don't know if I've ever been happier in my work. Everything we said was hilarious. I told cab stories. He told "on the shoot" stories. She told hippie stories. I have no idea what we were talking about. We just laughed and laughed and laughed.

It suddenly seemed to me like we'd been driving for a long time. We should already have been at SFO. I looked up and realized that we were on the Oregon Expressway in Palo Alto. I'd missed the airport by like thirty miles.

I turned around and tried to explain:

"I'm sorry. I musta lost focus. We'll even it up."

They were so into each other they didn't even hear me.

"I'm sorry, man," I repeated, "we'll even it up."

They couldn't have cared less. I could've driven them to L.A. and they wouldn't have known the difference.

They kept up the jokes but I let it wash over me. I had to concentrate. To miss the airport once was bad enough: to miss it twice would have been unprofessional. I was too filled with anxiety to laugh.

Somehow I managed to get them to their airline although I dropped them at "arrivals" instead of "departures." It seemed like too much trouble to drive up hill.

The meter read $80 and change.

"It should only be like $30," I explained, "I made a little mistake."

He gave me a hundred.

"Don't be cheap," she told him. They had a little spat.

"Ask him what he thinks of a twenty-dollar tip," the cameraman told her.

"No ... I lost focus," I said, "it should just be thirty."

"You're right, baby," he said as he handed me another ten.

"No - no," I said as I tried to hand the money back, "I mean the total should just be -"

But they couldn't hear me. They were walking away kissing and making up.

I understood then that I shouldn't be driving. But I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to handle the loop back to the taxicab waiting lot. I didn't want to be busted.

I headed for home ... hoping I could find it.

Inheritance

I first met Roberto in Minnesota when he came to visit along with my three male cousins from Mexico City. They were wealthy, powerful and superbly educated aristocrats. My uncle once thought of running for President until he was told the unfortunate truth that the Mexican people would never vote for a leader with a gringo wife. My cousins all spoke three languages and had read Proust and Joyce by the time they were fifteen.

My cousins were all around twenty when they stopped by. They brought Roberto with them because he was a big, lovable guy who liked to party. On top of that, he was already married and had a mistress set up in an apartment. For Mexicans of their class at that time, this meant that he was already a man.

My cousins were engrossed in advanced studies of one kind or another that would eventually lead to great careers in their chosen fields but Roberto was a former violin prodigy who had stopped practicing and dropped out of college.

At dinner, he told us that we all (by which he meant Western Civilization) had been corrupted by the Protestant Work Ethic "especially Catholics" and had lost our ability to savor life. Roberto told us that he intended to personally correct this imbalance by living always in the moment. He still played the violin but only to express himself, "not to win some stupid competition or other."

My father, a construction contractor who had taken an immediate liking to Roberto, was very upset by his philosophy.

"But what are you going to do?" he asked. "How are you going to live?"

"I'll inherit," Roberto said with a smile.

"But what if you run through your inheritance?"

"Then, I'll inherit again," Roberto said, laughing this time. "I'm worth millions."

He said this in such a good natured and friendly way that all my father could do was throw back his hands in a gesture of exasperation and laugh along with him.

A few years later, I witnessed almost the same conversation during a meal in Mexico City. This time a woman who'd grown up with Roberto tried lecturing him in a sisterly manner.

"Roberto," she said, "you have to do something with your life - you have to have a career."

"Why?" he asked laughing.

"If nothing else," she told him, "you have to learn how to invest your money."

"Enrique (his brother) will take care of that for me," Roberto said saluting her with his martini, "he's into boredom."

When you drive cab in San Francisco you soon cease to be surprised by coincidence. I once picked up a woman at the airport who'd grown up across the street from me on Goodrich Ave in St. Paul. Another time, the daughter of one my Mexican cousins flagged me down. I'd never met her before but she recognized me from a photo.

So I wasn't completely blown away when I found Roberto standing in front of me at the dispatcher's window at City Cab. It made instant sense. I've never given my father much credit but he was right about Roberto and I guess (since he'd asked me the same questions and I standing in the same cab line) me.

It turned out that Enrique had indeed taken care of Roberto's money and invested it very wisely after stealing it. To Roberto's credit, he didn't look too upset when he told me the story.

"I wouldn't trade places with my brother for all his money and mine," he said. "He also took my wife. That bitch is my revenge."

Then, he broke out laughing with his good natured, booming voice.

Roberto had very little Spanish blood in him and he had the big head, huge shoulders and hands of his Yaqui indian ancestors. He looked more natural driving a cab than he ever had riding in the back of a limo. He'd developed a nice beer-belly to go along with his new profession. He still lived in the moment.

We went back to his apartment in the Mission, a block away from the projects. It was a small in-law with a seven foot ceiling that he shared with two Argentinian drivers. Apparently none of the them knew what to do without a maid because it was the filthiest place I've seen. We sat smoking joints among the litter and refuse, listening to his collection of rare violin performances by masters like Heifetz and Kreisler - the only remaining vestige of his inheritance.

We'd listened to similar recordings twenty years earlier in the book-lined study of his mansion high on a hill overlooking Mexico City. He'd been sipping cognac with his marijuana then. Now he had a whisky shot with a beer chaser. The enraptured expression on his face as he lost himself in the music was still the same.

We didn't get together after that. I don't really do drugs and I vowed never to re-enter his hovel. But, I did seen him from time to time. He was always quitting drugs or taking up the violin again. Once he was trying out for a local chamber orchestra.

The last time I saw Roberto, he'd just been fired because of a DUI.

"I needed that. It woke me up," he said. "No mas. No mas boracho. No mas la marijuana."

Then, he went home and spend the next six days drinking himself to death.

Checkmate

Glen disappeared in crowds: at parties, in restaurants, even at small get togethers. He was thin and average looking but the main thing was that he had no personality. He seemed only partly there, moving as if he was wondering in a daze. People said that he'd never recovered from Vietnam.

But at a chess board, he was a whole different being. I'm tempted to say that he was a master except that he beat most chess masters who went up against him. He wouldn't complete in tournaments (he got too nervous) but his reputation was such that the best chess players from all over the country stopped by the Meat Market to drink great coffee and play Glen.

Everyone (including me) was stunned when I beat him in our first match. I'd been playing for less than three months and the only reason I took the game up at all was because I was living in a hippie house filled with chess fanatics. The only chess book I'd read was Beginning Chess by Bobby Fischer. Fischer being Fischer started where everyone else ended. The whole book was on how to see checkmates.

I saw one from seven moves out against Glen. Being the great player he was, he managed to stop the mate but I fatally crippled him.

Everyone said I was lucky, especially after seeing me lose to a series of second-rate players, but there really isn't much luck in Chess. You either see the moves or you don't. I never beat him again but I always played Glen well and my greatest chess moment (better even than the victory because he paying more attention) was fighting him to a draw.

This baffled everyone. But they misunderstood. It wasn't me playing over my head. It was Glen raising me up to his level. I have a gift for analytical reasoning and Glen's logic was crystaline and pure. I'd look at the moves of lesser players and see nothing but confusion. With Glen every move was part of a grand design and seeing that design told me what move I should make. I'd have no choice.

Glen's mind was a thing of beauty and it was a joy to watch it unfold. Maybe the real tragedy of his war was that it left him capable of using his intellectual artistry only for the benefit of eccentrics like me at coffee houses.

At that time, the press was making a hero out of a crack-junkie who was robbing taxi drivers. One article even called him a "criminal genius." Why? Because he wore a suit and came out of upscale hotels and restaurants to flag down the cabs. Once inside, he'd put the driver in a head lock and steal the money. He was very strong man and seriously injured a few of the drivers. He committed 21 robberies in 19 days. If he'd been half-way smart, he would have quit while he was ahead.

Instead he got into Glen's cab and tried to put a headlock on him. What most people didn't know was that Glen had been in Special Forces. He broke the headlock and tied up the man in his own belt. For me, the awesome thing was he that didn't seriously hurt the guy.

"I've done enough of that," Glen told me, "I just couldn't let him rob anybody else."

Jerks

I was on a negative roll: small tips, radio calls with no one there, other cabs stealing my loads. I'd had about twelve jerks in a row. I'm not being euphemistic. These were jerks, not assholes. Being an asshole takes intent and purpose. The jerks I was dealing with didn't have enough character to be evil. They were simply rude and obnoxious, creeps without a cause.

I try to shake off such petty things but I confess that I was not in a good mood.

A weird little man got in my cab and barked out a destination without looking at me.

"Would it hurt to say 'please?'" I asked him.

"I don't like your attitude," he snapped.

I snapped.

"Your 86'd - get outta here!" I snarled.

"I don't have to be nice to you," he said defiantly, "I'm not leaving!"

I lost it. Completely. I started screaming at him to get out. I was so mad I can't remember what I said.

"I'm not leaving," he kept repeating. "I've got my rights!"

I decided to toss him. I jumped out of the taxi and, slamming my door behind me, came around to his side and pulled on his door. I didn't have a plan in mind. I'm not usually violent but, if I'd needed to stretch a few of his ligaments to get the job done, I could have lived with it.

The door didn't budge. He'd locked it. I reached for my keys. They weren't in my pocket. I looked up and saw that they were still in the ignition. I tried the front door. He'd locked that too. In fact, the little jerk was sitting in the driver's seat.

I had thought that I was raging out of control. But, the instant I understood the situation, I calmed down. Smiling like an insurance salesman I said,

"I guess we got off on the wrong foot." Holding out my hand I added, "Hi. I'm Ed."

He didn't say anything so I gave him my widest smile and said,

"Now, why don't you open the door and get back in your seat. I'll take you anywhere you want to go - free of charge."

"No - No," he said, "you're going to hurt me."

"I'm not going to hurt you," I said soothingly, "I've never hurt anybody. Heck - I'm a follower of Mahatma Ghandi ... sort of."

"You're a liar and a hypocrite," he replied. "You're going to hurt me."

Then, he drove off in my cab. He didn't even have to start it. I'd left it running.

I wasn't eager to inform my company about the incident. There was nothing my manager enjoyed more than firing cab drivers. He'd hold bizarre ceremonies where he'd berate and publicly humiliate them. I couldn't imagine what he'd do to somebody like me who actually deserved to be fired.

Yes. I confess. I was wrong. My temper got the best of me. Having the little man call me  a "hypocrite" cut deep. I had failed the Mahatma. My behavior had done little to promote world peace.

It didn't make sense for the guy to steal the taxi. The address he'd given me was about a mile away. I hoped that he'd simply drive the cab close to his home and leave it.

This turned out to be the case. He'd even been nice enough to take the keys out of the ignition and hide them under the mat. He also put my briefcase, filled with maps and dollar bills, into the trunk. As I walked around the car to check the tires, I heard him call out from a distant window high above me,

"I'm sorry!"

Aoede

Her husband was in international finance. They lived the high life in London and Paris but he was gone most of the time. She had to raise the kids alone. After ten years, she accidentally found out that he was really with the CIA. In college, he'd said that he wanted to experience everything, to "murder and create." At the time, Eliot's phrase sounded like a metaphor but she guessed that he'd found a way to do exactly that in the real world. When he transferred to Southeast Asia, as she put it, to "start another war," she stayed in Paris.

She took the name "Aoede" after the Greek muse for song and opened an interior design firm dedicated to designing, "art to live in." The business did very well and she raised her kids in comfort, sending them on to whatever college or university they wanted. Her only commands were that they should live life to the fullest, do no harm and be as creative as they could. When the last girl graduated, Aoede closed shop and headed to San Francisco to paint and drive a cab.

She often told her customers that taxi driving was so much fun she couldn't imagine why she'd ever done anything else. She didn't have to worry about meeting a payroll or pleasing a picky client. She now had time to travel and "paint for myself."

"Everybody's so interesting," she says about the people she meets in her job. "They all live such interesting lives. They've all got a great song. All you have to do is listen."

Handsome Jack

Jack was a rarity: both a ladies man and a man's man. There was an easy, relaxed, unpretentious air about him that everybody liked. At the same time, he was clearly special. You could tell that he was going places. He was much too intelligent, too good-looking and too talented to spend his life driving a taxi.

After graduating from Julliard, he spent a few years in L.A. doing bit parts in films and television. But his wife hated the place and he found himself being type-cast as a psycho-killer so they moved to San Francisco. He did a lot of theatre and had a semi-recurring role as a street cop on Nash Bridges. They were thinking of expanding his part but the series folded before anything happened.

His wife left him for sleeping around too much. This stuck him as odd because he thought that they had an open relationship. But he could hardly argue against the facts. A few weeks later, Jack heard that she'd moved back to L.A. with one of the show's producers.

His loss gave him pause for thought. Although he looked ten years younger, he was 38. As his father might have phrased it, "it was time to shit or get off the pot."

One good thing about his new solitude was that it finally gave him the chance to re-work a play he'd written in college; a satirical comedy about a detective. Jack thought it might do well as dinner theatre with audience participation. He sold the idea to a producer and they re-furnished a small supper club. Jack directed and played the lead.

It caught on and became a local hit. It quickly garnered a reputation that went beyond the city. Sienfeld stopped by with an entourage and said that he thought the show would make good TV. He gave Jack a few names.

Things were happening fast now. Jack found himself working 12 hours a day and driving taxi 3 days a week on top of it. He was exhausted but exuberant. It was close to how life should be. Drop the cab Driving and it would be how his life should be.

A production team agreed to do three pilot shows. Don Johnson said he might guest star in one of them but had a conflict and pulled out. But the shoot went great anyway. The wrap party was a celebration. Everyone liked the episodes and they liked Jack. Word was that Letterman "just loved" the series and and there was talk about Jack appearing on his show. Some network or other was certain to pick the project up.

Jack waited and waited and and waited. Then, nothing happened. The dinner show ran it's course and closed. With all his expenses, Jack barely broke even.

It took awhile for reality to sink in.

One night Jack picked up a gorgeous woman outside of one night club and took her to another. The chatted and she made some comment about a movie star. Jack, as he had so often before, took the opportunity to lightly hit on her,

"But you're better looking than she is."

The woman looked at him like he'd touched her with filthy hands and snapped,

"Let me out here, cabbie!"

So that's how it would be. Jack getting older, the women getting younger. He envisioned an endless series of snobs and drunks, fraternity boys and girls, middle-managers and power-tripping clerks, corporate lawyers and creeps lining up with arms stretched out for as far as he could see.

He'd never thought of himself as "a cab driver." He'd done it for 15 years but it was only part-time. Temporary. Now he knew that he'd became the word that he most detested, a "Cabbie."

A Little Short

Early twenties, dark hair and nice looking, she stepped into my taxi. Avoiding the contamination of eye contact, she quietly commanded me to take her to an address. Then, she snapped,

"I'm in a hurry. I have a date. I only have $8.00."

An interesting sequence. It was at least a $10.00 ride.

Now there occasionally are people who will say, "I've only got $8.00 - just drop me whenever the money runs out." Or, sometimes they'll even say, "Drop me off at $6.00. I want to give you a tip." In either case, I'll usually take them all the way to where they want to go.

A young investment banker once told me that he only had $7.00 for a $10.00 ride and that I should drop him off when the fare hit 6.70. As usual, I asked him for the money up front. He gave it to me and we headed for his destination. Just as the meter clicked on 7.15, a woman flagged me down. It was a nice day so I told the banker,

"I'm going to take you up on your offer."

I pulled the cab to a stop. With a stunned expression on his face, he started to reach into his coat pocket for his wallet. Then, remembering what he'd told me, he reluctantly got out of the cab.

The banker'd been running a little scam. Including the tip, he saved himself $10.00 a day going to and from work. It says something about the legendary "greed" of cab drivers that I was apparently the first one ever to cut short his ride.

But the woman in a hurry had a different scenario. She was telling me, rudely, that she was two or three dollars short and that I going to take her anyway. Furthermore, she expected extra service. I was supposed to get her there fast.

"It's a $10 or $11 ride," I told her.

"I'm a waitress," she replied me in a tone of voice that clued me into the fact that she belonged to a higher level of humanity than I did. She cemented her elevated status by adding, "I'm studying design."

In short, I was supposed to sacrifice a few dollars because she thought herself socially superior to me. Hardly a unique concept, but I'd never before heard it stated quite that boldly.

"I'm in a hurry!" she repeated.

"Are you new in town?" I asked her.

"Why?" she asked, indignant at my temerity for asking her a question.

"Don't you have a bank?"

"Of course I have a bank," she snapped angrily.

"Good. We can stop by your bank and get some money."

"There's nothing in it right now."

"Maybe you should buy a book on money management."

"I beg your pardon!" she said, appaulled by my bad manners.

"It sounds like you could use some advice."

"When I want advice I'll ask for it!" she said with finality - clearly terminating the conversation.

"What about your date?"

"What about my date?!"

"I'm sure he could lend you a few dollars."

"I couldn't ask him for money," she said, incredulous, "it's our first date."

For some reason I took her all the way home. The meter read 11.65. She handed me a ten dollar bill and commanded, "Give me back $2.00! I need to catch the bus tomorrow morning."

"The exercise will do you good," I told her, "you still owe me $1.65."

She called the police the next day to complain that I was "rude." I talked it over with Sergeant Donleavey.

"Nothing to worry about," he told me.

"Are you going to get me back my $1.65?"

He laughed.

The Argentinian or Virtue Rewarded

I took an aging black woman to the emergency entrance of UC Hospital. I pulled as close as I could to the doorway, just as I had done a dozen times before, and walked around to help her out of the back seat.

A large black cop came over and told me that I couldn't park there. I'd have to move it to the other side of the parking lot – 50 yards away.

"But she can hardly walk," I told him, "she came here because her legs are bothering her."

"Can't you read the sign?" he said pointing to a "No Parking" sign.

"Yes of course," I said, "but I'm just dropping her off. I'll take 2 minutes."

"Do you always ignore signs?" he asked sarcastically.

"Everybody ignores that sign – these are sick people. They need to get into the hospital." I heard my voice rising. I took a breathe and quieted down. "Listen – if you'd have let me do my job, I'd already have her inside."

"Don't get smart with me," he snapped. "Move it right now or I'll give you a ticket!"

"I never heard of nuthin' like this," he woman said sitting halfway out of the back door. "They always let me in here before."

The cop looked at her for the first time and mellowed a little.

"I'm sorry, mom, but the rule are the rules."

"Ain't no rules like this before," she said.

I drove the car and parked across the lot.

"I can't walk that," she said.

"Don't worry," I told her, "I'll get you a wheel chair."

There weren't any wheel chairs available so I went over and got in the cop's face. I mean I was a couple of inches away from his face but I was calm and polite. I just kept on saying over and over again,

"The lady is old and sick. She can't walk. There are no wheel chairs. I have to get her into the hospital. I need to park near the door."

He kept on telling me that the rules were the rules. But I wasn't leaving until I had her inside the hospital. I kept on saying the same thing over and over again. And he kept telling me about the rules.

I noticed an expensively dressed Hispanic man watching us. As I continued arguing with the cop, the man's expression became one of increasing wonder and disbelief.

A subtle change took place in the cop. He gradually came down from his power trip and began to soften. I could see that he wanted to help the woman but he was stuck with his rules. I had an inspiration.

"What'da say we carry her?"

He thought about it for a minute, then with sudden enthusiasm said,

"Yeah. Yeah. Let's do it."

We were about the same size and she weighed only about 120 pounds. The cop and I crossed arms and locked hands. The woman rode on our forearms into the hospital.

"Just like Angel's wings," she said.

The cop and I traded high-fives and parted like old friends.

The Hispanic man wanted the taxi but he couldn't speak English. We communicated in my butchered Spanish. In an Agentinian accent, he told me he wanted to go downtown. Perfect. An ideal ride.

The meter said $18 when he arrived. He handed me a fifty dollar bill. Clearly a mistake.

"Demasiado much," I told him, holding the fifty in my left hand while I brought out a twenty with my right, "vente es bueno."

He pushed the fifty back into my fist and folded his hands over mine. He gave me a warm smile and a look of gratitude.

"Es perfecto," he said, "muy muchas gracias."

I guess they don't argue much with cops down in Argentina.

The End

Size Matters?

"My girlfriend just told me she's dumping me because my dick's too small for her."

" ... "

"I mean what kind of bullshit is that?"

" ... "

Well, yeah, it's a little small but I compensate for it. I do martial arts. Deep breathing. I'm in control. I know how to move it really well."

" ... "

"Nobody's ever complained before ..."

" ... "

"Well, yeah, there was this model lives in my building. One afternoon she asked me up for drinks. One thing led to another and next thing we were doing the nature thing ... I guess I had too much to drink ... it just flopped there on her stomach. She wouldn't talk to me after that. It was humiliating. "

" ... "

"But it wasn't size per se ... but my girl friend's got nuthin to complain about. I mean, I've had her moaning and calling out for god, crying "don't stop! don't stop!" over and over again and I didn't stop."

" ... "

"Yeah, she's playing some kind of game. Whatdaya think?"

" ... "

Boredom

"I'm a whore," he told me, "or a boy toy - depends on the action. Woman or men. I do 'em both. Tonight I'll be a harlot and a gigolo."

If this sounds like a strange way for a stranger to start a conversation, it's because you've never driven cab. I didn't know what to say so I drove on in silence.

"I'm famous. I'm in all the porno magazines. Last night, I did a well-known female politician from Washington. I get customers from Europe. You have to book me three months in advance."

I looked him over in the mirror: average height, average built, average face.

"Nothing personal," I told him, "but you're not going to make anyone forget Leonardo DiCaprio."

"I'm hung," he said laconically.

"How'd you get into the business?"

"I started doing Polk Street perverts when I was 15 and went up from there. Tonight I'm doing a husband and wife professor team. They say they want to use me for research."

"Meaning?"

"Oh, I don't know ... he'll probably fuck me in the ass while I fuck her or visa versa. Once they see my cock they usually want to suck it. Maybe we'll do a wheel."

"Wheel?"

"A circle 69."

"Sounds exciting."

"It's not," he said as he paid the bill.

He stepped half out of the cab then turned back to me, saying in an exhausted voice,

"You can't believe how boring it all is."

Class Warfare

Two women try to hail a cab: one in her early twenties, the other in her sixties; one open and friendly, the other closed and sour; both wearing haunt couture; both with the same nose, chin and eyes: granddaughter and grandmother.

It's rush hour and there's a major convention in town. They're standing in front of Vidal Sassoon but the cabs racing by are all full. The women are becoming desperate.

I'm not working but I decide to help. I feel that improving our image is my personal duty, besides the older woman's nearing hysteria. I walk over to them, give them a friendly smile and say, "relax -I'll get one for you."

I walk down a block. An empty taxi is rolling toward the curb. Two New Yorker guys are stepping in front of a couple from Iowa to steal it. As it stops, I step in front of them and grab it.

"Hey!" one of them says.

"Thanks for holding it," I say with a smile.

"Your mudder!" he responds, flipping me off.

I tell the driver the situation and he's cool with it so we go down to hand over the taxi.

I get out and open the door for the women with a magnanimous gesture.

The granddaughter smiles with gratitude. Grandmother looks me over with a cold eye. I'm wearing the designer sweater, shirt and slacks that a friend chose for me at Goodwill. But the old woman isn't fooled. Maybe it's the Reboks.

She holds a dollar bill out toward me.

I give her a friendly wave and a gesture of refusal.

She thrusts the bill out again, this time with an expression of hostility and distain.

Who am I to think I can be friends with her?

The Yuppie Panhandler

"You must help me. I have AIDS!" she exclaimed, incredulous and amazed, not believing that anyone could refuse to help her ... HER. It must have been her first day and it was amazing.

She was 28, a fresh faced beauty like Jean Seberg or Tea Leoni. Her blond hair had been freshly cut just below her ears. She wore a beige blazer over a navy blue business dress, nylons and polished blue shoes with three inch heels.

She'd clearly done everything right: she had the degree, probably an MBA, she'd worked hard and had risen to middle management. She was neither an addict nor a drunk. And yet ...

Can you imagine the people she must have gone through before arriving on the street? How many rejections she must have had from family, lovers, friends, relatives, colleagues, associates, acquaintances, welfare agencies and charities? And she still didn't get it. She still believed that she was the center of the world.

Nevertheless, she was smart. She'd figured out the business right away. She came over to me at Pine and Van Ness - maybe the best corner for panhandling in the entire city. Cars get stuck at the light, three across and at least three deep, for several hours every day.

I saw her every evening for a couple of weeks and then periodically after that as in time-lapse photography.

The next time, there were holes in her nylons and she no longer told people she had AIDS.

Then her hair turned brown, she had no socks and her clothes were dirty. She'd broken the heel on one shoe and hobbled over to collect her money.

I hadn't seen her for about a month, when she showed up wearing an army jacket over her business dress and Converse All Stars. Her shoulder length hair was tied back back in a bun.

I didn't have a dollar and was looking through my brief case for one that I'd misplaced when a couple climbed in the back of cab.

"Do you have change for a $5?" I asked them as I dug through my things.

They responded with a deep, silent pause so I glanced up. I saw two aging people dressed in black that had the clean-cut, Americana look of a Norman Rockwell painting - only they'd been warped and embittered by too little affection, unpleasant sex and too much money.

The woman stared at me, offended. I finally found a dollar and gave to Seberg-Leoni.

"You shouldn't do that," the woman snapped. "It just encourages them."

"To what? Keep eating?"

"If you feed them, they won't work," the man stated.

"I don't know if she can work - she has AIDS."

"Whose fault is that?" the woman asked archly.

"Actually," I told her, turning around with a smile, "it's mine."

The pair spent the rest of the trip pinned back on their seats, looking as if they were riding with a boa constrictor.

I saw Leoni-Seberg one last time, about a year later.

She looked ageless - as if she'd she'd been born on the streets. She wore jeans, beat-up tennis shoes, a sweat shirt and an army jacket. She'd roughly cut her hair back to her ears. She was still lovely but you had to search for the beauty beneath her raw and reddened weather-beaten skin.

She hadn't lost her sense of self - no small feat living the homeless life. She still stood confidently and asked for money as if it was owed to her. She stared at the people who passed her by with contempt.

She took my dollar without recognizing me and, giving me a businesslike "thanks," waved to a homeless man across the street. He dressed like she did and, like her, looked as if he'd never been anything except a beggar.

He came over and the two of them walked off, striding together, gently bumping shoulders and elbows, talking intimately, counting and pooling their money, planning their future.

Half a Story

A lot of guys try to impress women by demeaning cab drivers but this was the worst case I've seen.

He actually wasn't bad looking. I figured him for 15 years away from being his high school's star quarterback. Except for a pot belly, he was still in decent shape.

Of course he didn't say hello or greet me in any civil manner. Instead he barked out a command in a tone of voice that told me that I'd already displeased him and had better watch my step. Then, he immediately started talking to his date. Or, rather at his date. She didn't say a word. He interrupted his monologue every block to give me new directions. I'm not lying - every block. And we went straight most of the way.

I decided to have fun. I accentuated his absurdity by parroting an order every time he gave me one.

"Go straight!"

"Going straight!"

"Go right!"

"Going right!"

He keep glaring at me but I think to actually comment on my commentary would've been uncool. It would've meant acknowledging his lack of absolute control.

"Stop here!"

"Stopping here!" I said, hitting the brakes and bouncing him off the back of my seat.

"No!" he snapped angrily, "in front of the store."

"Stopping in front of the store," I said, slowing down gradually this time.

He got out, gave me a fierce stare and went inside.

"What piece is this?" the woman asked about the music playing over my radio.

I turned half around. She had moved from behind me and was leaning on the middle of my front seat with her chin on her forearms. She was long and slim, open and lovely.

"Brahms isn't it?

"Yes, but I can't place the symphony."

"I think it's the third."

"Of course," she said, slightly snapping her fingers. "Hi, I'm a cello."

"Hi, I'm a base."

"I thought so."

If I was doing satire I'd write something like "small world isn't it" or "it must be fate" but the truth is that there was a click, an instant connection. I can't tell you how rare it is to meet a customer who can tell the difference between Brahms' symphonies.

"I'm not with that asshole," she said. "He's a partner at my sister's law firm. I gotta make nice."

"Too bad ... Maybe you can help me? I'm looking for a good recording of that little solo mediation by Hindemith - do you know it?"

Why such an obscure piece? I was looking for a good recording of it but the sad truth is that I'm a music snob. I wanted a woman who could go beyond Brahms.

"You mean the Op 25 #3?"

"Yeah - that's the one."

"I've played it."

It was fate.

"I'd love to hear you play it."

"Is he bothering you?" The all star had returned with a stern, school master's expression.

He'd been gone less than two minutes and I'd forgotten he'd existed.

"Not at all," she said, sliding back behind me.

He gave instruction for the next six blocks but I no longer felt a need to comment. When we stopped, he gave her a command,

"I don't like his attitude - don't tip him!"

She gave me $7 for a $6.70 ride. They climbed out. I heard her say, "Oh, I forgot something." She came back and slipped me a twenty folded around a business card. On the back she'd written:

"Hindemith."

Buddy

If I'd realized how drunk he was I never would have let him in my taxi. I wasn't paying attetnion when he came out of the bar. He'd already flopped into my front seat before I had a chance to do anything about it.

He was tall and wearing an expensive three-piece suit, 50 years old and 50 pounds overweight. He was so loaded he could hardly speak. I needed to have him repeat his address several times before I could understand his slurr.

"San Carlos ... San Carlos."

That was a relief. We were already in the Mission. It was little alley six or seven blocks away. I wanted to dump him as soon as possible.

As we approached his street, he recovered some of his gift of speech.

"Don't take the long way, buddy," he slurred, "I was born in this town."

"I'm not taking you anywhere but home, buddy - what's the address."

"San Carlos. I told ya San Carlos buddy."

"Were on San Carlos, buddy."

"No - San Carlos buddy - top of the hill."

"You mean the city of San Carlos?"

"Right buddy - top of the hill."

"That's meter and a half. It'll be $70 or $80.

"Yeah yeah, meter and a ass. Top of the hill buddy."

Just when I was beginning to like him, he ignored my "No Smoking" sign and lit a cigarette.

"There's no smoking in here," I told him pointing to the sign.

"Whataya gonna do about it?" he asked as he leaned forward and, keeping the cigarette in his tightened lips, blew smoke in my face.

I pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and threw it out the window.

"Hey buddy!" He wheezed, sizing me up for a punch.

I put my right forefinger between his eyes, an inch from his face, and said,

"You can chase it if you want."

"So that's how it is," he said, backing off.

"That's how it is."

I turned on the classical station. The music tends to pacify drunks. We drove for 30 or 40 minutes without talking. By the time we reached San Carlos, he'd sobered up enough to give me clear directions to his home.

"Here we are buddy," he said, pointing at a large bungalow, "second house from the top."

I pulled up and he got out, staggering only slightly. The meter read 64.75. Ordinarily I would've have lowered it to 55 because we did go a little out of the way but not for this jerk.

"Let's just say 64 plus 50% equals $96."

"Well ... you can forget the 50%, buddy. I'm not payin it."

"But I told you up front."

"I don't care what ya told me. I'm gonna to give you some money and you're gonna take it."

I thought about this. I hated to give in to the prick but this wouldn't be exactly a high priority item for the cops. It was friday night. By the time they came, if they came, I would have lost the $32 and more in time.

"Okay just give me the $64."

I made a mistake by folding so quickly. He became drunk with power in addition to the alcohol.

"I don't have cash," he said, smiling in a way that let me know that he was lying, "can you take a credit card?"

"We're not set up for it."

"Lucky for you," he said laughing, "it isn't any good anyway."

"Listen buddy - I took you home. You've heard great music. We've played your game. It's been fun but I've gotta work. Just pay me ... please."

"You're gonna have to take a check, buddy."

"Can I use your telephone? My cell isn't working."

He graciously invited into his kitchen and handed me a phone. I called 411 and loudly asked for the number of the San Carlos police. Buddy thought that this was really funny. When I told them the street number, they didn't recognize it. He took the phone, gave them the street again and started complaining that I wouldn't take his check. He gave the phone back to me and the cops told me that the address was actually in the city of Belmont - a half block away from San Calos. I had the wrong police department.

"Let me make the call," Buddy said smiling in triumph and taking the phone.

He started boring the Belmont cops with a monologue about his check and the current climate of mistrust. I went looking for a bathroom. As I walked down a hallway, I head a tv playing in the distance. I followed the sound and found a wiry woman with with brown, greying hair watching the tube.

"Don't freak out," I calmly said as she began freaking out. I quickly told her the tale ending with, "he's making me call the police."

She shot out of the chair and walked to the kitchen so rapidly that I could hardly keep up with her. She grabbed the phone out of Buddy's hand, apologized to the police, hung up and, without saying a word to her husband, opened a drawer and counted out $110 for me. Then she opened a small purse and gave me an additional 40 cents. Despite her shock, her anger, her anxiety and, probably, her despair, she tipped me exactly 15%.

As I walked toward the door, Buddy started after me.

"Nobody messes with my family, buddy," he said threateningly.

"Stop it!" his wife snapped in tone of voice that let us both know that whatever shards of a sex life had remained between them were now history.

I'd had smoke blown in my face: I'd been insulted and threatened, taunted and demeaned: I'd let myself be humiliated: I'd lost at least $30 in time.

But hey - this is cab driving.

There's a grand view of the Bay from on top of the hill, one hundred ten dollars and forty cents isn't bad for two and a half hours' work and I may well have delivered the coup de gras to a truly horrible marriage. Not a bad night so far.

I head for the airport. Friday night. It should be moving.

Rookie

My first day they gave me a cab that wouldn't go up the steep side of Nob Hill.

"This must be some sort of initiation," I told my refined lady customer as I drove around to a more gradual slope, "pay what you like."

That didn't turn out to be much but she did give me invaluable advice. "Don't wait in hotel lines or spend too much time at the airport. Not if you want to make money."

Yellow Cab had hired me because I had a perfect driving record. What they didn't know was that I'd been traveling and hadn't driven a car in six years. I'd pretty much forgotten how to do it. I was afraid to make lane changes. I'd get on the freeway and just stay in one lane. Some customers of course bitched but I learned another invaluable lesson. What your driving teacher told you was true: it doesn't do any good to speed in traffic.

I'd get on the freeway during rush hour, find my lane and stick with it. Another taxi would get on right behind, blow past me and go into a frenetic lane changing mode. We'd arrive at the airport at about the same time. Once in awhile, I'd even get there first.

The company gave me the worst day shift. There were about ten cabs for every customer. The radio dispatchers didn't "hear" me or, if they did, it was was for grocery pick ups. They never gave me trips out of the city. Half the time when I showed up my rides weren't even there. Other drivers cut me off and stole my fares.

I'd played sports in school but I never subscribed to a "winning is the only thing" philosophy. Like everyone else, I'd gone through a Buddhism phase in the 70s and had come to look upon competitiveness as destructive behavior. I wasn't about to race wildly down streets cutting people off like many of fellow cab drives just to make a little money. On the other hand, a little money was exactly what I was making - very little.

One slow Sunday afternoon (there are no fast ones), I took a radio call on 24th St in Noe Valley. Being given a call, however, was no guarantee of actually getting it. You still had to arrive at the address first. I got to the intersection, a few buildings away from the order, a clear 15 seconds before my competition. It was a busy two-lane street. If I pulled forward I would have had to double park and block off the other cab. I waved him on so that he could pass by freely.

To my surprise, he stopped in front of the address and, blocking me off, got out of his cab to ring the doorbell. He was thin, dressed all in black with a tattoo and an earring - a punk.

"What are you doing?" I asked incredulously as I stepped out of my cab. "I was just letting you by to -"

"I don't talk to drivers," he snarled, "you wanna steal my ride you can talk to Nate."

I snapped. I mean I went a little crazy. Being treated and talked to like that after I'd graciously done him a favor - threatening to get me fired when he'd stolen my ride - incensed me. I vowed revenge.

We worked the same shifts. I studied him for awhile. When he saw me watching him, he arrogantly stared through me as if I wasn't there. I started following him with my taxi whenever I came across his cab on the street, actually stalking him on slow days.

The first time I got even, he was stuck at a red light waving to a customer across the intersection. I swooped down the other lane and, timing it perfectly, cut him off just as the light turned green.

It felt good but it wasn't nearly enough. The Romans ruled their provinces by executing ten people for every one of their soldiers that was killed. It sounded like a good principle to me.

I lost track of how many times I stole one of his fares by either cutting him off or racing insanely to beat him to a radio call. I stopped counting at eight.

One time, I was hiding behind a small truck which was behind him at an intersection. I could see him in his side mirror but he couldn't see me. He frantically scanned back and forth. I had him paranoid. Seeing nothing, he finally relaxed. I made a double lane change, went out into a left-turn lane and swung back to cut him off and steal his fare again just as the light changed.

A few days later, I got a ride to the airport and decided to eat lunch while I was there. My favorite punk was sitting at a picnic table. He gave me a shy, nervous smile and started talking to me in a friendly way. I sat down. He showed me pictures of his wife and his little baby girl.

"They're the loves of my life," he told me. "It's okay if I don't make $100 every night but, if I come up short too many days, I can't cover the rent."

I ended the vendetta. I no longer cut people off or raced them for orders. But then, I didn't have to. Other drivers didn't steal rides from me anymore. The dispatchers were 'hearing" me. I drove better cabs and had been promoted to a night shift.

The Romans knew what they were doing. I had the reputation of being a driver that you just didn't want to fuck with. For better or worse, I was no longer a rookie.

You Can't Cheat an Honest Man

A late Monday night in winter. It was so cold that I drove up Taylor through the Loin without even seeing a derelict or an addict.

A young black man came jogging down the street carrying a shrink-wrapped Sony digital video camera and looking repeatedly over his shoulder. He ran in front of me to cross the street then, glancing back, turned around and came over to the cab.

"Hey man," he said rapidly, showing me the box, "I think they're after me."

If the camera was actually in the box, it was the Sony digital video that sold for $2,000. I was in film school and this was the same digital camera I'd been lusting over for two years. Real movies had been made using it, not just documentaries ... if the camera was in the box.

"Come on man," he said almost in whisper as he continually scanned back and forth looking for cops, "just give me a hundred. Take it off my hands."

"Let me see it," I said.

"Hey man," he said, protecting the box. "You're not gonna try and rip me off are you?"

"Don't be ridiculous," I said, "I'm a cab driver."

He thought about this for a few seconds then handed me the box.

It felt right. I shook it and could feel the camera inside the packing. I quickly turned the box over and over. It had the original cellophane tightly stretched around it.

"Come on man," I gotta motor, "take it or not."

"I don't have hundred - it's been a slow night."

"Whataya got?"

"I can give you forty."

He took it. I grabbed the camera, hid it behind the seat and drove off. I stopped a few miles away after checking to see that I hadn't been followed.

It turned out that the box didn't have the original cellophane on it after all. The wrapping had just been cleverly pushed into the corners. I opened the box. It was tightly packed with newspapers. I dug through them and found a smaller box about the same size as a video camera. I opened it. It was also packed with newspapers. In middle of the papers was a rock.

Smuc! Idiot! Liar! Thief! Sucker! Loser! Me.

Who ever said that writing the truth was easy?

Pizza

Eddy and Leavenworth, the lower depths of the Tenderloin. Addicts are milling about, talking, looking for a connection.

A ten year old boy spots a pizza carton on top of a trash can. He opens it. There is a piece and a half inside. Pepperoni and sausage, I believe.

He turns to his crack-whore mother to offer her part of it.

She grabs the box with her left hand and wildly slaps the shit out of him with her right, knocking him to the ground.

She puts the box back on the trash can and takes out the pieces that are melded together. She eats. Her eyes glaze over as she chews, showing neither pleasure nor desire nor guilt.

A Cruel Hoax

A cab drivers nightmare.

A dumpy, blond woman of around 30 stood in front of the hospital arranging a dozen 40 gal bags. I could see it all in an instant. It would take me 15 minutes to both load and unload the cab. She'd go three blocks and would have a voucher. I'd neither be paid for my time nor get tipped.

A nurse came over to help her and they both turned toward me as I walked over from the taxi.

"What's this?" I asked, " a cruel hoax?"

"You don't have to help if don't want to," said the woman heatedly.

"Oh, lighten up Mary," the nurse said with exasperation. "He's just making a joke."

"Come on," I said as I grabbed one of the bags, "show me how you want it packed."

The nurse kept smiling at the stupid jokes I kept making while I loaded the car. Mary quietly chatted to herself as she re-arranged every sack I put in.

When we finished she told me, "They stole my husband from me."

The nurse folded her arms and looked at Mary with deep and helpless sympathy.

On the way over to her new half-way house, I got to listen to Mary's chatter. They used to call it "word salad" - words tossed about without subtext, context or meaning. But it wasn't that simple. Most of it did sound like disconnected gibberish but it obviously meant something to her.

Besides, some of the things she said made perfect sense. She was moving across town to Bernal Heights, one of the most complicated neighborhoods in the city. She gave me precise and exact directions on how to get to her place. The bizarre thing was that her instructions were wrapped inside of rambling clauses and seemed to have nothing to do with whatever else she was saying.

Other things that she said make perfect sense and were insane at the same time.

"I'm really Mary Queen of Scots," she told me. "It was Elizabeth that took my husband because I'm beloved of the people and she isn't."

She continued the chatter while she helped me take her bags up a few dozen steps to her porch. I wished her luck and was about to leave when she said, with deep and pathetic despair,

"I only want them to give my husband back to me."

I kissed her on her forehead - the seat of her manic, twisted, disconnected world. I couldn't have done her any harm. Nothing else had helped.