My First Time

    My first day of driving cab felt like a disaster. I thought I knew the city, but I spent most of the day lost and fumbling for my maps. The dispatchers were rude and the customers were strangers, people who knew me for a rookie because I was a stranger to them, too. In retrospect, I can't believe I stayed with it for nine years.
    I was trained proper, don't get me wrong. A dispatcher named Brent had trained me a week earlier, before I had my official cab license in hand. He showed me the finer points of fluid maintenance-oil, transmission, power steering, brakes, and coolant-and he stressed the need to monitor fluids to ensure a smooth running cab. Twelve hours of in-town driving takes a toll on vehicles, he told me sternly. I was shown how to work the meter-on/off, charging extras, shutting off time, and how to check my starting numbers. He told me how to fill out my paperwork and vouchers, as well as how to figure my lease for the day. Brent explained the two-way radio, how to turn it on, what buttons not to push on it, how close I should hold the microphone to my mouth as I talked, and what I could say over the radio. The FCC probably doesn't have time to monitor our humble radios, but we still have to follow their rules. Correct radio procedure was a must, and all traffic had to be proceeded by a driver's call sign number. I was given the number "59, " and I use it to this day, long after I have gone on to other duties. Brent told me how the last driver who had my number was a good-natured man, liked and respected by all. Unspoken but nonetheless emphasized was the message that I was not to tarnish his memory by shameful or dishonest behavior behind the wheel. All that done and said before we left the lot.
    The bulk of my training was behind the wheel, me driving and Brent telling me where to drive as he pointed out important pickup locations in town. I felt like I was in driver's education, again, inordinately careful about my speed and how I stopped for lights. He was watching me drive, I know that, now; I've trained many cab drivers since starting, myself, that I understand what he was doing that training day. Every address and regular pickup point he showed me had a customer behind it. The lady on Markle rode twice a day, five times a week, depending on taxis to get her to and from work. The foster kids we picked up each morning at 6:00a.m. were troubled and abused and I was not to allow them to sit in the front seat because they were apt to cause a driver problems. Good old Kenny used the cabs to take him to the bar in the morning and home from the bar in the afternoon, 7 days a week. At one point during training my eyes must have glazed over with the details Brent was feeding me. He broke off his description of yet another customer's idiosyncrasies and told me he knew I wouldn't remember everything he said that day. When I needed to remember something he had said during training, he assured me, I would remember enough to get me through. My training as a cab driver took 2 hours, and Brent even went so far as to teach me how I was to fill my gas tank at the end of my shift, how I was to return my taxi washed and vacuumed and ready for the next driver.
      I pestered Brent with questions that day, exploring possibilities and situations that I thought could occur. I was green but I've never been accused of stupidity. A long time ago, before I was a cab driver, I learned that if you don't know something, ASK, someone will tell you the answer. I wanted to know what to do if I had problems. What if the cab broke down, or if my meter stopped working? If a customer refused to pay the fare or worse yet, took off without paying, I wanted to know how to handle the situation. What about traffic patterns and accidents? If someone got hurt getting in or out of my taxi, how would I be held accountable? Would I be held accountable? How much of a danger factor would I face with winter on the way? What was I supposed to do if there weren't any calls? I asked Brent my questions and he answered each one with the same emotionless delivery. I suspect he had answered such questions many times before, to people long gone from the cab company. After we returned to the office the owner was there to ask me how I was doing; was I ready to get started as soon as my cab license was ready at the police department? Years later she would admit to me that she was terrified I would leave as soon as I realized what being a cab driver entailed. I'm still not sure, after that disastrous first day, why I stayed.
    My first day as a cab driver, five days later, left me shaking at the dispatcher's window, fighting off tears and wishing I was somewhere else. The day was a failure from the beginning. It started at 5 a.m., much too early for Little Heather's taste. I've been a night person all my life, and I have my elder sister's diaries to prove it. Old entries in her diaries mention how 3 year old Heather wouldn't go to bed until after 2a.m. I tried to get my boss to let me drive nights, but she was adamant about me being a day driver, even though she had night shifts open, too. The night before I started I didn't get any sleep, awake and worrying about my new job. I didn't know the morning dispatcher when I saw him; I had trained in the afternoon, long after he was done for the day. The dispatchers were rude, I thought, not a please or a thank you for the entire day. They were used to dealing with drivers who knew the program and I didn't have a clue. I thought I knew the city, but I didn't know it like a local; I had to be led to calls with directions, causing the dispatchers to be curt. I knew where the middle and high schools were, where to find the hospitals, the airport and the train station, but that was it.
    Grade schools, public and private, nursing homes and day care centers, senior housing and neighborhood bars-I didn't know where any of them were. Hell, half of them were given out as names-take it to Jefferson, pickup at Solberg, ask for Janice at Hillview. There were numbers and names spoken over the radio that Brent never mentioned, and I was in a constant state of confusion. Weren't there only supposed to be four cab drivers out there with me? I knew enough to listen for my number, though, and the number 59 became my lifeline that day. Business was so slow I knew I wasn't making any money. At one point I was sitting in the parking lot of a Kwik Trip, exploring my meter buttons and creating unknown mis-meters. I had already read the newspaper and was so scared of missing something on the cab radio that I didn’t dare listen to the am/fm radio. One of the other drivers pulled up long enough to tell me to hang in there, Tuesdays weren't normally so slow. Later, I almost had an accident when someone ran a red light during afternoon traffic. I saw him in time to stop, but it was seen by another cab driver and reported it to dispatcher. Brent gave me a stern, well-worn talk about the importance of safe driving. I knew I wasn’t at fault, I mean, nothing actually happened. The driver who reported it spoke up for me, though, defending me as quickly as he had reported the transgression. After a long day of feeling stupid, I resented his kindness as much as I did Brent’s lecture. I didn’t ask anybody to stand up for me. I just felt used and abused and decided I was a failure at driving cab.
    The following two days were my scheduled weekend days. I seriously considered quitting the cab business and not returning the following Friday. The reasons behind my return are varied and personal. My unemployment had expired the week I started driving. Bills would continue to arrive with alarming regularity. I hated job-hunting and if I quit the cabs I would be forced to replace it with another job to pay bills. Finally, I was stubborn. I wouldn’t let myself quit without trying my best, and experience taught me that one day on a job doesn’t mean squat. In my years of being an employee I have learned that I always want to quit on the first day of any job.
    So I sat down over my two days and asked myself what would have made the first day easier. How could I have been better prepared? Maps were a necessity, since there were streets on the northside I didn’t know very well. I had been given a list of 6 factories owned by a company the cabs had a contract with, and a map of the local University campus, but that was all the assistance new drivers got. It wasn’t enough.
    I made up my own list to guide me through the streets. Starting out with daycare centers, I combed the phone book for the official addresses of all grade, middle and high schools, public and private, for a 20 mile radius. I wrote down their names and addresses and typed it up in a one-page list for easy reference. Following that I listed all the senior housing, eldercare facilities and nursing homes on both sides of the river, names and addresses, both. I figured, when the dispatcher sent me to a call I wouldn’t have to waste his time and patience by asking where things were, I could just say “10-4, 59 to BSJ”. Any place I didn’t know would be on my list and I could refer to it before I started to the call. If I was given a locale I didn’t know I would ask once and add it to my list, never needing to ask again. Eventually I would know where stuff was and the job would be easier.
    Armed with my map and my list, I returned on Friday morning, arriving at the taxi office determined to do the best I could. I suspect the dispatcher was surprised to see me, but he didn’t say anything, merely handed me keys and paperwork and told me where to pick up my first call of the day. It did get easier, after I prepared myself to do a better job. Within a month I was known as one of the “good” drivers, and after two months I knew I didn’t want to do anything but drive taxi. I was one who did not ask a lot of stupid questions, one who knew where things were and didn’t waste time when business was brisk. After three months I was tapped to dispatch out of the cab on Sundays when the office was closed. I was a slacker,
still, but I wasn’t a quitter.