Learning Empathy while Ride Sharing
By C. Naseer Ahmad
Washington, DC
Falling prey to self-indulgence and becoming self-centered is quite easy in the hustle and bustle of modern life. Around the Thanksgiving Holiday, it is a good time to step back and reflect on what is really important in life.
A few weeks earlier, the writer was scheduled to attend the monthly Shakespeare Group luncheon focused on the character “Sir John Falstaff,” who has been described as ‘Old, fat, lazy, selfish, dishonest, corrupt, thieving, manipulative, boastful, and lecherous, Falstaff is, despite his many negative qualities, perhaps the most popular of all of Shakespeare’s comic characters.’
The discussion featured a famed actor, who was also a drama professor at the George Mason University, Virginia.
While I could have taken the metro rail to get to this luncheon, I decided to hail a ride through an app on my phone as I think being on time is important.
A few minutes before the ride sharing car arrived near my office building, I got an electronic notification that there will be more riders in the car. Usually there is hardly anyone else so the ride is both comfortable as well as fast.
When I was about to get into the car, the driver pushed open the door for the front passenger seat in the rather dinky car. I was in a hurry so jumped in the car with the big rollaway bag in my lap in the cramped passenger seat space.
From the Navy Yard, across from the ballpark which is home to the 2019 Baseball World Champions - the Nationals - the car headed towards downtown Washington DC.
The driver seemed to be taking a longer route so I asked him why. He said that the company penalizes him if he veers off from the route shown on the digital map. Unfortunately, this route was congested due to the mid-day heavy downtown traffic.
Due to the snarled traffic, I became concerned about being late to my appointment and lamented the decision to forgo choosing underground rail to get to my destination. Nothing seemed to move.
Moments later, I heard a young girl’s distressing voice complaining about being fired from her job unfairly. As the car turned on G Street NW from 18th Street NW, a passenger in the backseat implored the driver: “I need to go to the bathroom.” Within seconds, he said: “I need to go to the bathroom now please.”
The driver stopped the vehicle and let the passenger in the back seat out. This passenger looked like an elderly frail man who walked slowly. We were all not sure whether he would even come back. The young lady in the back could not wait. “I have a job interview around the corner, so I will just walk now.”
Every second felt longer than the one before and I was pretty sure that I would be late for the luncheon. One option for me was to jump out of this car and take another taxi. Something inside me said that this would be rude, though. Frustration was building up in me for not taking the metro as by now I would already have been at my destination.
“Anger is not your friend,” a voice in my brain told me so I tried to make small talk with the driver. “Are you able to make any money this way?” I asked.
“Yes, this kind of thing does happen,” the driver said calmly describing some of his tough experiences.
The elderly man eventually came back and he needed to be dropped off at the Emergency Room in the George Washington University Hospital. Since I was more familiar with the area, the driver took my advice and ignored the Global Positioning System (GPS) pointers.
As he drove me along 22nd Street NW towards my destination, the driver told me that he had to come back into the workforce after retirement due to the death of a loved one and was trying to help the relative’s kids through college. I learned that he had worked at a very senior level in the Air Force but was prevented by some rule from working for the Defense Department for about five years after his retirement. During this waiting period, he lost his clearance, which would have enabled him to earn more money. So driving for Lyft was perhaps the only choice he was left with.
On that day, arriving late - even though it is not usual for me - for the Shakespeare luncheon did not bother me the least. The human suffering I had seen during this ride from the Navy Yard to Embassy Row in Washington made my late arrival insignificant and I felt so grateful to the Good Lord for the mercies bestowed on my errant soul. This delayed arrival was perhaps a way to find out what is really important in life.
