A Night Behind the Wheel in NYC
Everyone thinks that being a taxi driver, if I know all the streets, it helps with everything. Sure, yeah, it does help, but what’s more helpful is knowing people. Trust me, after a decade behind the wheel, you get a front row seat to human nature in all of its raw and most unfiltered forms.
I usually start my shift around 6 pm. That’s when the city shifts gears, office workers head to bars, tourists try to catch the Broadway shows, and couples are prepping for their date night. By 9 pm, it’s a whole different crowd. The after-hours world comes alive: bartenders, dancers, chefs, night owls, and sometimes folks who’ve had one too many.
You get a thick skin fast. I’ve had fares throw up in the back seat. Others try to skip out on the fare. A few, after too many drinks, will spill their life stories to me about their divorce, their estranged kids, their lost dreams. I just listen. Sometimes, that’s all people want.
There was a night, maybe two years ago, a Wall Street guy in a suit got in around Battery Park. He looked wrecked. “Drive,” he said. No destination, just “drive.” So we circled Manhattan for an hour while he stared out the window. When I finally dropped him off, he handed me $100 and just said, “Thanks for the silence.”
That’s what this job teaches you: to read the moment. Some riders want to chat. Some want to be left alone. Some just need to cry in the back seat of a yellow cab because in this city, sometimes that’s the only place you can.
The apps have made things harder. Uber and Lyft have taken a lot of business away. But there are still plenty of people who wave a hand on a cold night and want the classic yellow cab experience. I keep going for that.
By 4 am, the streets start to clear. The city exhales. I grab a coffee, head home, and watch the sun come up. Tomorrow night, I’ll do it again. Different faces, different stories. Same city. And for now, that’s enough.