 Vacation Season, in Oakland? -Alex Farr The summer season is upon us. School is letting out. The women-folk are dressing more and more scantily, unless another one of those freak cold-spells is hitting us. And, people seem to be using up some of their vacation time. Less commuters, but more of the occasional tourist, or semi-tourists in the case of Oakland, seem to be out. It's a pleasant, relaxing, fairly un-profitable season generally. At least, I thought so until an old regular started re-appearing. An older white woman, who looks like the "GhostWorld" popcorn lady, and the first time I see her in a year and a half, she hops into my cab, and off we go. Nevermind that I was third in the cabstand, I knew her, and I knew she was to neurotic and schizo to bother to try to reason with, so I didn't argue. "So, where to?" I asked. "Uhh.... uhh, take a right." she answered. Just like old times. So, I turned the stereo off, remembering that she has a tendency to mumble. "Ok, make a left. No, not this left, the other one. There (pointing, I guess, in the back seat)." "So, you mean a left on West St.?" "I'll tell you when." So I nod, passing Martin Luther King, and slow down for the next left, which is... West. "L..f...." she mumbles. "This left?" "Ye... 'h... sah..." she mumbles some more. I take the wild guess that she's mumbling that it's what she said... and make the left. And then I drive. And I drive. "No, I told you to make that right!" "What?, when?..." "Back there... ohh, you're just... you're gonna give me a discount on this, right?" So I smile. "No. You have to tell me if you want me to turn. There's a shield there, so the night driver doesn't get stabbed at night... and it makes it a little difficult to hear. You're gonna have to project your voice a little..." "Are you sure you're not just deaf?" I just smile. "Yes, I'm sure." Just like old times... So, to spare the painful details, we drive a winding route through the crack neighborhoods of West Oakland, slowing down whenever we pass a collection of young men congregating inactively upon any porch-like surface. I don't know which is worse though: the mumbled directions, the pauses in the middle of intersections as cars back up behind us while she tries to think, or the inane conversation in the meantime. "No, wait... hold on... can you just pull up a little into the intersection?..." (This as I attempt to cross a busy street that is unmarked from a stop sign.) "No, I'm not gonna just hang out in the middle of West St." (Yes, we have to cross and re-cross, and re-cross some more while she looks for one of the dozens of dealers she knows... Neverminding, along the way, the fact that on every other block there're a couple of guys who seem to jump up off their porches and greet her by name...) Or, "So, you ever fix a clutch?" "Naah..." "My mechanic, he wants $70 an hour for labor!!" "Yeah..." I answer, "That works out to about $35 for a half hour to check it out... which is waived if you want them to do the work... Yeah, that's about right." "That's outrageous!!" "Ok..." I answer, having long since given up attempting anything approaching rational conversation with this lady. So I drive her around, chain smoking to help me keep myself distracted enough not to explode at her for being an idiot. We make maybe 2 or 3 stops, at each of which she gets out to chat with a different "homey". And then she finally decides she's ready to go back to her condo in Emeryville, which is a zip code just outside Oakland that the developers love... It would've just been an amusing anecdote, if I hadn't driven her on one of her runs 3 times that day. And twice the next day. And 3 times the next day. And once the day after that (I refused to come across town to pick her up the 2 other times she called me. Mostly because she seems to feel that her regular business entitles her to a discount, rather than owing a tip for my patience...). And since then, it's been about 3 weeks now, I've picked her up anywhere from 1 to 3 times a day to make her runs. She spends anywhere from $10 to $25 for the cab on each run, and assuming she's just buying $20 rocks, she's spending anywhere from $20 to $80 on each run... Ahh, vacation time in Oakland... No wonder she's outraged by the how much the mechanics want. Maybe, if they were to assure her that they will spend the money on crack, she wouldn't be so offended. I almost feel sorry for the lady though. It's Sunday as I write this, and I don't work on weekends because, without the commuters there isn't enough business to make me get out of bed at 6 AM... and she sounded so distraught as I tried to explain this to her... and, I can't help but wonder what she's gonna do if no other cab driver will put up with her shit to take her on a crack run! I mean, what'll she do?! The horror. The horror.
the New Waybills there's No Place Like Home... You gotta be shitting me Alex |
