In New York, as we speak, another snow storm is about to hit. The busy sidewalks clear and the extensive NYC traffic subsides and for a second there is nature-induced peace. While I love watching the snow (from indoors of course) as it is falling down so peacefully, the outcome is a wide array of dirty slush, slipping cars, and winds so cold that my one dollar Target gloves might as well be thrown away for their thin material makes frostbite seems undeniable. What also comes in the aftermath of a snowstorm in New York City is an excess of cab fare being taken from my freezing hands and quickly given to the taxi driver with the request to get to my destination as soon…and safely…as possible. A simpler way to say this is snow storms in New York cause me to lose a lot of money.
A few days ago, after the second of big storms had just hit, I decided to take a cheaper approach and wait for the bus to get to my job. I waited by myself for at least ten minutes and waited another ten minutes while an older Asian woman was shivering along side of me. I saw cab after cab going by and with no bus in sight, I finally gave in to my aching hands, grabbed yet another ten dollars out of my pocket and hailed the yellow money guzzlers known as NYC taxi’s. As I got in the car and noticed the older woman looking colder and colder I made her an offer, “I’m going to 77th and second. You can ride with me all the way there and I’ll pay.” “I’m going to 68th and York,” she retorted. “Okay, do you want to go with me to my stop? It’s closer for you and you can get out of the cold”…after a few seconds of thinking she politely said no so I closed the taxi door and was off.
Once warm in the cab, the cab driver turned to me and asked, “Did that woman say no when you offered her a free ride?” “Yeah,” I replied, “I think she thought I would try to take her money…oh well.” After several minutes of silence, the driver responded, “I want to tell you something…In this world there are good people and there are bad people. Good people think everyone around them is good. Bad people think everyone around them is bad. I’m a good person, you are a good person, but most people here? Most people are bad people.” “Wow,” I responded, a bit surprised at this philosophical outburst, “Do you really think so? You really think some people are purely bad?” “Yes, I have seeing many in my cabs. They always assume everyone is out to get them. Good people assume the opposite.”
Before we could have any further of a conversation, my stop had already come. I thanked the driver for the ride as well as for the short yet thought provoking conversation and got out of the cab. As I walked into work quickly to get out of the cold, I begin looking around me as the possibilities of good and bad in each human being. Is the woman holding her purse a bit to tightly in fear of a possible mugger any worse than the girl swinging her purse freely down the street? Is the man smiling to all those around him somehow better than the man snarling with disgust at the world? Though the cab ride was way too short for a solid conversation, the taxi drivers words had somehow stayed with me and produced the need to figure out how much I agreed with this very black and white philosophy. What did I decide?
Unfortunately, I think much of our good and bad feelings come from where and how we were raised versus what is innately in us. The little boy growing up in the ‘hood surrounded by drugs and violence might have a bit more fear than the suburban child who rode his bike to school. Does that make one boy less good than the other? I think not. Yet, wherever we grew up and however we were raised, our society has become increasingly more afraid of other human beings. Generosity and warmth has been replaced by greater seclusion and fear (no doubt that the cyber world of facebook and blogs like this don’t help). While I disagree that no one person is fully good or bad, what I hope (naively maybe) is that we can work towards is the strengthening of our own goodness as well as the kindness we purvey. Maybe then will the next woman I offer a ride to accept, sans apprehension, hesitance, or fear.
Dear Anna,
This is a very thought-provoking, but disturbing piece of writing. Throughout human history there have periods of hardship within cultures or between cultures that prompted dualistic beliefs about people’s behavior and their performance. These black and white philosophies launched insideous prejudices and fatalistic attitudes about life. The cab driver, no matter how honest his statement or his perception, has contributed little to improving the situation. He could have encouraged the woman to get in the cab with you and travel to a bus stop or subway stop closer to her destination, that you could help her pay. But as “Manichaeans” in the past did, the driver denounced the “bad people” he saw each day, but offered little practical advice to the “good people” he encountered as to how they can empathetically assist people in need without judging their characters as being “good” or “bad”.