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Carrying the wait
Jun. 27th, 2008 12:28 pmThe first job of a taxidriving day is always a bit of a gamble. The sight of the car parked outside the day driver’s house remains a thrill, even after so long driving. It’s a new adventure, twelve hours of unexpected people and places, every shift different. I might spend the night within a few kilometres of Parliament House, I might make several interstate trips, I could find myself drawn into the outlying suburbs and never get back to my usual haunts. The empty cab, freshly cleaned and gassed up, is a promise of adventure.
I transfer my kit over to the taxi, switch on and settle in. I hook up my iPhone and its Bluetooth box, sit RingBear on the dashboard, fill the centre console with torch, chewing gum, cologne, Leatherman, polishing cloth and camera, and tuck a novel under the seat. Sometimes I bring along my MacBook Air in its protective sleeve.
I do the paperwork, noting the odometer and taximeter readings, whether the car is clean, fill in the date, my name and so on, and then tuck the envelope into the console. During the shift I’ll stuff it with receipts and dockets, and twelve hours later I’ll write down the final totals.
I sign on to the various computers. Despatch system, two credit card terminals. They all want my license number and a code.
And then I plot into a radio zone, ready for work.
As I say, it’s a gamble. All over Canberra, night drivers are logging on, looking for their first job of the day. And passengers have been calling the taxi base, putting in requests for taxis. There will also be timed bookings, requests made days or hours before for pickups, usually to the airport.
If there are more drivers than jobs, then I’ll have to wait for my first work, or drive to a rank for someone to walk up to my cab.
On the other hand, if there are more passengers than cabs, I’ll be offered work immediately. This is where it gets chancy. When there are few cabs and many passengers, delays build up. Passengers get fed up with waiting for their booked cab and hail down one off the street, or from a rank. The cabbie who finally accepts the booking is going to go short, not to mention the lost time spent driving to the pick up address and waiting for a passenger.
So, when I sign on to the system to be offered an immediate job, I’m suspicious. This happened last shift. I logged into the O’Connor zone and immediately the computer warbled at me with a job. Chances were that the pickup point would be towards the centre of town, and I’d be heading that way anyway, so I hit the “Accept” button.
And groaned when I saw the details. The job was forty-five minutes old. In that time, my passenger would likely have found alternate transport, or be very unhappy when I finally arrived. Naturally, I’d be blamed for the delay.
The address was a medical centre that was a little out of the way of passing cabs, so I didn’t give up hope entirely on arrival when nobody was waiting for me in the declining winter afternoon. I slowly cruised around the centre, looking for anybody who might be looking for me. And when I returned to the main entrance, there was.
She was an old lady, white hair and walking stick. I stopped the cab and bounced out to give her a hand.
“Hold on to me, dearie,” she said. “I’m full of steroids and all wobbly.”
I did my best to be a rock for her, holding the door steady while she settled in. Always happy to tuck a lady into the front seat, reaching in to hold the seatbelt out, checking that her dress is clear of the door and then closing it firmly for her.
“You’ve been waiting a long time?”
“Yes, but that’s all right. I was sitting down inside out of the cold. I had to wait three hours for the car repair man last week.”
I looked at her.
“I’m 94, and still driving,” she said proudly. “Just down to the shops and back, but I’ve still got my license.”
I apologised for the delay on behalf of the company. It might not be my fault, but passengers like their inconvenience to be recognised officially. A sympathetic soul can amend hours of anxious waiting.
We chatted about the early days. My passenger had been born long before Canberra was the national capital, but she’d been born in the region. Back when she was a schoolgirl, there would have been just the Canberry church and a few lonely farms here. No Lake Burley Griffin, no Black Mountain Tower, no Parliamentary Triangle. And no three hundred and fifty thousand people living in sprawling suburbs.
Just bare sheep paddocks, scattered stands of gum trees, and the sleepy Molonglo River winding along.
I warmed to her. She liked talking, she had stories to tell, and her wit and intelligence was sparkling keen.
And she’d travelled the world. I love hearing traveller’s tales.
“I’ve been across to California twenty five times,” she told me.
I looked at her. That’s a long and tiring trip over the Pacific.
“My second husband was an American, and we lived just south of Los Angeles airport in a three level house overlooking the beach.”
She went on to tell of how she had fallen in love with the ex-soldier during a visit to the USA. He had been an officer in an armoured regiment with Patton’s Third Army during WW2, and one summer they had rented a caravan, and driven from Utah Beach all the way into Germany, retracing her husband’s wartime path through France, over the Rhine into the heavily defended Metz area, and into the ruins of the defeated land.
“He recognised everything, every little patch of woods, every village, and oh, he had such stories to tell!”
I wanted to drive on and on with this delightful lady, listening to her clear voice and romantic stories. Her childhood home, Californian beaches, the bocage country of Normandy, Paris and the Rhineland. We could do it off the meter. But instead we pulled up at her neat suburban house and she directed me where to park to avoid the steps.
She showed me her driver’s license when she paid the fare. Sure enough, there was a birthdate before the First World War, and her photograph smiling out. “Look at how the background hides my white hair!”
She was beautiful in person, white hair fully visible as a nimbus around her happy face in the late afternoon sun when I helped her out of the car, and gave her my arm to the front door.
As I pulled out of the drive, she stood at the window and waved to me. I blew her a kiss and smiled off down the hill for my next passenger.
With a start like that, a twelve hour shift is a breeze. I finish at three in the morning, scrape the ice off my windscreen and drive off, an inner glow lighting and warming me home as I think on the people I meet and the places we visit.
I transfer my kit over to the taxi, switch on and settle in. I hook up my iPhone and its Bluetooth box, sit RingBear on the dashboard, fill the centre console with torch, chewing gum, cologne, Leatherman, polishing cloth and camera, and tuck a novel under the seat. Sometimes I bring along my MacBook Air in its protective sleeve.
I do the paperwork, noting the odometer and taximeter readings, whether the car is clean, fill in the date, my name and so on, and then tuck the envelope into the console. During the shift I’ll stuff it with receipts and dockets, and twelve hours later I’ll write down the final totals.
I sign on to the various computers. Despatch system, two credit card terminals. They all want my license number and a code.
And then I plot into a radio zone, ready for work.
As I say, it’s a gamble. All over Canberra, night drivers are logging on, looking for their first job of the day. And passengers have been calling the taxi base, putting in requests for taxis. There will also be timed bookings, requests made days or hours before for pickups, usually to the airport.
If there are more drivers than jobs, then I’ll have to wait for my first work, or drive to a rank for someone to walk up to my cab.
On the other hand, if there are more passengers than cabs, I’ll be offered work immediately. This is where it gets chancy. When there are few cabs and many passengers, delays build up. Passengers get fed up with waiting for their booked cab and hail down one off the street, or from a rank. The cabbie who finally accepts the booking is going to go short, not to mention the lost time spent driving to the pick up address and waiting for a passenger.
So, when I sign on to the system to be offered an immediate job, I’m suspicious. This happened last shift. I logged into the O’Connor zone and immediately the computer warbled at me with a job. Chances were that the pickup point would be towards the centre of town, and I’d be heading that way anyway, so I hit the “Accept” button.
And groaned when I saw the details. The job was forty-five minutes old. In that time, my passenger would likely have found alternate transport, or be very unhappy when I finally arrived. Naturally, I’d be blamed for the delay.
The address was a medical centre that was a little out of the way of passing cabs, so I didn’t give up hope entirely on arrival when nobody was waiting for me in the declining winter afternoon. I slowly cruised around the centre, looking for anybody who might be looking for me. And when I returned to the main entrance, there was.
She was an old lady, white hair and walking stick. I stopped the cab and bounced out to give her a hand.
“Hold on to me, dearie,” she said. “I’m full of steroids and all wobbly.”
I did my best to be a rock for her, holding the door steady while she settled in. Always happy to tuck a lady into the front seat, reaching in to hold the seatbelt out, checking that her dress is clear of the door and then closing it firmly for her.
“You’ve been waiting a long time?”
“Yes, but that’s all right. I was sitting down inside out of the cold. I had to wait three hours for the car repair man last week.”
I looked at her.
“I’m 94, and still driving,” she said proudly. “Just down to the shops and back, but I’ve still got my license.”
I apologised for the delay on behalf of the company. It might not be my fault, but passengers like their inconvenience to be recognised officially. A sympathetic soul can amend hours of anxious waiting.
We chatted about the early days. My passenger had been born long before Canberra was the national capital, but she’d been born in the region. Back when she was a schoolgirl, there would have been just the Canberry church and a few lonely farms here. No Lake Burley Griffin, no Black Mountain Tower, no Parliamentary Triangle. And no three hundred and fifty thousand people living in sprawling suburbs.
Just bare sheep paddocks, scattered stands of gum trees, and the sleepy Molonglo River winding along.
I warmed to her. She liked talking, she had stories to tell, and her wit and intelligence was sparkling keen.
And she’d travelled the world. I love hearing traveller’s tales.
“I’ve been across to California twenty five times,” she told me.
I looked at her. That’s a long and tiring trip over the Pacific.
“My second husband was an American, and we lived just south of Los Angeles airport in a three level house overlooking the beach.”
She went on to tell of how she had fallen in love with the ex-soldier during a visit to the USA. He had been an officer in an armoured regiment with Patton’s Third Army during WW2, and one summer they had rented a caravan, and driven from Utah Beach all the way into Germany, retracing her husband’s wartime path through France, over the Rhine into the heavily defended Metz area, and into the ruins of the defeated land.
“He recognised everything, every little patch of woods, every village, and oh, he had such stories to tell!”
I wanted to drive on and on with this delightful lady, listening to her clear voice and romantic stories. Her childhood home, Californian beaches, the bocage country of Normandy, Paris and the Rhineland. We could do it off the meter. But instead we pulled up at her neat suburban house and she directed me where to park to avoid the steps.
She showed me her driver’s license when she paid the fare. Sure enough, there was a birthdate before the First World War, and her photograph smiling out. “Look at how the background hides my white hair!”
She was beautiful in person, white hair fully visible as a nimbus around her happy face in the late afternoon sun when I helped her out of the car, and gave her my arm to the front door.
As I pulled out of the drive, she stood at the window and waved to me. I blew her a kiss and smiled off down the hill for my next passenger.
With a start like that, a twelve hour shift is a breeze. I finish at three in the morning, scrape the ice off my windscreen and drive off, an inner glow lighting and warming me home as I think on the people I meet and the places we visit.
