I was driving cab, back in the day when it was all radio dispatched and flagging, long before digital technology. In those days the driver and the owner would split the shift’s take 50/50. However there was always the tips and for some drivers, the prospect of trips that wouldn’t be booked. That was all covered under the ambiguous term “side money”, which mainly referred to $$ kept off the sheet.
My friend TJ had picked up one of those grand old Cadillac limos a few months before. It was a classic Mafia don’s wheels; black and long, rather mysterious and somewhat threatening. One day he happened to be around when it was time for me to go to the cab stand and report for my shift.
We drove up to the busy headquarters of the cab company and stopped. I was in the rear seat, wearing my usual cabbie’s outfit of jeans and a leather jacket and a black leather cap. TJ happened to have on a suit and some headgear that approximated a chauffeur’s cap. He pulled up, jumped out and ran around the limo to open my door.
I sauntered out to the consternation of the assembled throng of cabbies at shift change. I walked over to Dick, the dispatcher who ran things, and said, “You know Dick, side money was real good last night, real good.” “ Car 92 again?” After he picked himself up off the floor he said “Guess so, just get it all on the sheet tonight kid”.
92
92
92
92 in 7
You’re 3rd up in the zone 92
When I drove cab it was radio dispatched
We lived as much in our imaginations as we could
Given the vivid reality of big city streets
Cabs were large and powerful
Built to pack passengers in on sagging bench seats
I’d cruise through traffic in downtown streets
Like a shark knifing through the waters of a coral reef
92 away south
92
Away south Vickie
Click click click
Gotcha 92
When I drove cab it became a confessional
People would open up and spill their guts
Tell me things they’d done that would leave me shocked
Until the crazies piled up so much I became unshockable
So when a dominatrix had her leashed and leathered slave
Cower on the floor
On all fours
All the way to the ‘burbs
I barely batted an eye
But couldn’t help arching an eyebrow
When she made him pee like a dog on a shrub outside their door
As I was recording the fare on the tripsheet
Every day, every night was an adventure
When I drove cab
David Trudel © 2013
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Tagged as blank verse, cabbies, cabdrivers, cabs, free verse, Maclures, poetry, radio dispatch, social commentary, taxicabs, taxis