The 3rd of July

It was a hot, glorious day when I left the garage and drove over the 59th Street Bridge into Manhattan. The only problem with this Monday afternoon was that the city was virtually empty. The usual rush hour business was nonexistent, with most people either taking the day off of work or gone out of town. The whole rhythm of the night was affected and it was just a weird pace for the entire shift. I had little clusters of passengers and then would spend up to 30 minutes driving around empty looking for work. But with the holiday, those who were left in the city decided to go out and as the night wore on, it began to look more like a weekend night than a Monday.

Of course, the later it got, the drunker everyone became. Luckily, everyone, drunk or not, seemed to be in a good mood. Two girls got in the cab outside of an Irish bar on the upper east side wanting to go to Bowery Bar on Great Jones and Bowery. After gossiping for a few minutes about some friend of theirs who they suspect has an eating disorder, they noticed me. One of them leaned up to the partition and said, "Hey, is that place any good, Bowery Bar?"

I replied, "I'm not sure. I was there once or twice a few years ago, but I don't know what it's like now. What was wrong with the bar you just left?"

"It was full of ugly guys."

"Oh."

"Yeah, they should call it McUglies, not McFaddens."

Then they grilled me for a few minutes about what it's like to be "a female cab driver," and, when I gave them my boring, routine answers, they went back to trash talking about their anorexic friend.

I guess I didn't look skinny enough to hold their interest.