Hell is other drivers

I picked a woman up at a coffee shop the other day. She was there with someone, and I was taking her to work. I didn’t know this initially—obviously, she explained everything during the ride. People love to explain things during their ride. 

I saw them parked in a truck, waving, and realized they were flagging me down. She then messaged that she was in a wheelchair. This happens fairly often, maybe a few times a month. Practically speaking, all this means is that I get out, help them if they need it, and then I fold up the wheelchair and put it in the trunk. This seems like bare minimum stuff on my part, but from what my passengers tell me—this is not the case.

 This is how it goes.

An uber driver pulls up, sees someone in a wheelchair (or someone with groceries) and leaves because it will be too much work, or too annoying. That’s cruel. But it happens, a lot.

I picked an older guy up once on what might have been the hottest day of the year. He was at Walmart, and he had groceries. He told me two ubers before me had pulled up only to immediately leave and cancel the ride when they saw the groceries. I felt terrible for him. This old guy was just trying to make it back to his sad and now expensive madison apartment. But even this was stifled by the absolute plague that is Other People.¹ 

Other drivers are mostly awful according to my passengers. Some passengers remain silent the entire ride, but if they do talk—they generally tell the same story. 

 My last uber drove so fast, they say.

Passengers tell me all the time about their previous driver stopping for gas. This alone blows my mind. I would die of shame if I ever had to stop mid-ride and get gas. Just last week a passenger told me they had a driver stop and get $60 worth of gas. Think about the type of psycho who decides not to get—you know—$8-10 worth just to make it to your drop-off. No, they stand out there and pump $60 worth of gas while you sit in the backseat wondering whether this is a practical joke. 

Women tell me horror stories.

 Men ask for their number, if they’re single, where they live, if they want to hang out. One woman continued to be contacted days after the ride. Several women have told me they sometimes pretend to talk to their boyfriend on the phone so the driver won’t suspect them of going home alone. This is horrifying. 

Again, I do what I consider the bare minimum when it comes to hospitality. Simply not doing these things have made me a great uber driver. Complete disinterest makes me stand out. 

A surprising amount of uber drivers never clean their car.

Every uber smells. I’m told this so much it’s become white noise. Like a thing every passenger has to say before continuing. So many passengers get in my car and immediately say it smells good in here. And it’s only because I spent two bucks on air freshener. 

Passengers constantly tell me how clean my car is. I vacuum my car maybe once a month.  I use Armor All wipes a couple times a week. I keep my trunk empty for luggage. These are fundamental things that I’m learning are not common. 

The bar has never been lower.²

I drive people where they need to go. I don’t offer water or snacks. I don’t ask them about themselves—because I don’t care. I don’t treat my passengers like my therapist—something  passengers frequently do.³ Sometimes I help with luggage, sometimes I don’t.⁴ But I always help with wheelchairs. It should be noted that this is explicitly required of all drivers. Drivers are reminded frequently, and we are reminded that not assisting with wheelchairs will lead to deactivation.⁵

 I like to think I’d help without the mandate. 

Back to my passenger at the coffee shop. 

Her boyfriend helped her in the car—put the wheelchair in the trunk, and we went our separate ways. She is immediately ingratiating, and begins to tell me all about herself. She tells me she is a recent amputee. That she is struggling to adjust to life with one leg. She hasn’t mastered the wheelchair, she says, but she’s gotten much better. 

She was in a terrible car crash, and as she says this she gets out her phone and I can feel her locating and swiping through photos. 

She shows me the carnage. 

I see a crumbled car. It’s a photo we’ve all seen before. A completely totaled car. And she’s really going at it to lean up from the backseat so that I can see the pictures on her phone. I’m on the interstate going about 65mph and this woman, who recently lost a leg from a car crash, is waving a phone inches away from my face. 

She tells me what she remembers. There were trucks on both sides of her. The one on the right had a trailer, and it merged into her. This caused her to hit the truck on her left. She ricocheted, and when she hit the first truck again this time she got caught underneath the trailer. Her car came free and flipped, and she went through the windshield. 

Neither truck stopped. 

 Those two drivers continued their day. As far as she knows neither driver was ever heard from. It was hard for me to get past this point. But she was eager to continue her story, giving no hint of any count of monte cristo like vendetta against these two other drivers. 

Another driver did stop. He was a former army medic, and he quickly fashioned a tourniquet. She tells me she lost so much blood the emts used every drop the ambulance had on board. She emphasizes this point, calling it her second miracle—the first being the army medic. She told me ambulances don’t typically carry the amount of blood she required. This one had more than usual and it saved her life. 

There is no meaning to life other than to live it. Chaos is the only god. But I understood this woman when she told me she was here for a reason. 

She was in a coma for weeks. She woke, and had the phantom sensation of legs, but was instead met with the traumatic realization that her right leg had been amputated. 

Depression hammered her for weeks. 

Handicap ambassadors—so to speak, came to her aid. They were positive, upbeat, and brought with them the promise of a normal life. She told me she hated them. Please go away is all she wanted to tell them. 

But she got better, as she put it. She realized she could be miserable or she could be not miserable. As we arrived to her destination she pointed out a dead bird.

I dropped her off at work and drove away with the jejune sensation of inspiration.   

1.  More and more I find myself and those around me saying some version of people are awful. Is this new? Have we always so openly bemoaned the horridness of other people? I suspect the internet is to blame. The internet is a giant mirror that allows us to finally know for sure how terrible we all are.
2.  There is a terrific episode of Southpark about this phenomenon that features James Cameron searching the depths of the ocean for “the bar”.
3.  People will get in as if in mid sentence of a story and get out talking right up until the moment they shut the door.
4.  A handful of times this ended badly.
5.  A fun dystopian term for fired. I was once deactivated for knowingly canceling the ride of a blind person. It was a mistake on their part, and I was quickly reactivated. The truth was that I canceled because I was at the wrong place, not because they were blind.