Saleem The Taxi Driver

Part of the purpose of this trip is to try and figure out a little bit about myself, my life, and what's really important. I expect that these moments of Zen will come when I least expect them, and Monday afternoon in Chicago was no exception. My teacher for the day was a man named Saleem, and my classroom was the backseat of his taxi.

I actually wasn't even supposed to be in a cab on Monday. Steve and I had left Wrigley Field (to be covered in a separate post) and headed to the subway for the trip back to our hotel. The line to get to the platform was dishearteningly long, and the "shortcut" that a Chicago cop had helpfully suggested was moving just as slowly as the main entrance. With our bladders ready to burst, we hastily exited the cue for relief from the nearest toilet. Now three blocks from the subway, I figured we'd just walk south to the next stop and board there, sans lines. Alas, it was getting late and Steve needed to catch a plane back to NYC. A rare empty cab passed by and in my best New York tenor, I let out an impressive bellow of "TAXI!"

Enter Saleem.

I was actually a bit leery of the driver when we first got in the cab. Perhaps it's the skeptic in me, but I initially thought he was trying to take us on the long way back to our hotel. It was hard to understand him at first through his thick Pakistani accent, but I quickly realized that he was merely trying to avoid the post game traffic.

Saleem first piqued my interest as we drove through a gay neighborhood. Apparently there was a "leather convention" in town which he thought had ended the previous day but, based on a quick glance at pedestrian traffic, was still in full effect. He mentioned that he liked this annual event because "... the gays are good tippers. They don't have a traditional family system with kids, so they have more money." He didn't say this as an insult, but simply as an observation.

Steve was trying to catch a few minutes of some much needed sleep, so as he lapsed in and out of consciousness I continued the conversation with Saleem.

Born in Pakistan in the mid 1950s, Saleem came to Chicago in 1979, after having spent some time in Amsterdam first. He started driving a cab immediately, and continued for almost two decades. In that time, he managed to accumulate four medallions to lease to other drivers, in addition to driving on his own. In 1998, he sold his medallions and opened up a newstand/quickmart type of store. I can't say for sure if this was his life's dream, but I got the feeling that he definitely viewed it as a step up from driving. After September 11th, the economy took a turn for the worse. I never got the full details on why the business started to fail, but in 2004, after losing around $80,000, he closed shop and started driving cabs again.

Today, he works a 12 hour shift seven days a week. He splits the $650/week lease with another driver -- Saleem working 7 am to 7 pm and the other guy covering the remaining hours. He says he used to make a good living back in the day, around $1,000/week (not sure if that was gross or net). Today he says there are too many cabs for too few people, and he's lucky to pull in $500/week. On this particular day, he started around 7 am and says he didn't get his first fare until 9:30.

If I understood him correctly, Saleem got his green card years ago by marrying a woman he picked up in his cab. The story was a bit convoluted (and almost too mythical to be true), but I think he more or less helped her out financially in exchange for marriage. Even more surprisingly, I think it wasn't just a marriage of convenience -- I got the feeling like they actually lived as a married couple for quite some time. But she didn't want kids and he did, so sometime after he had earned his green card, they divorced and he found a Pakistani women who wanted a family. He now has three children, as American as you or I, two of whom are in college. Between tuition and normal expenses, times are tough. Interestingly, this wasn't always the case.

As a child, Saleem grew up in what he described as a fairly well-off environment. I didn't catch what the family business was, but apparently it had been lucrative. Not Buffet-lucrative, but enough so that he seemed to have grown up quite comfortably. Unfortunately, between constant warring with India and some poor management, the family business crumbled and the good life came to an end.

As I sat and listened to Saleem's story, I couldn't help but think of the contrast between his life and my own. Why is he where he is and I'm where I am? It's something I've contemplated many times before and will think about many times in the future. Saleem was merely the most recent instigator of introspection.

I believe in karma, and that what goes around comes around. But, the harsh reality is that life simply isn't fair. People may say otherwise, but they're being either naive or ignorant in doing so. So much of what we have in life is directly related to things that are completely out of our control. Who your parents are, where you were born, when you were born... These play an essential role in the development of our lives, and yet we're unable to choose any of the details.

It has been demonstrated countless times throughout human history that one can succeed in spite of long odds, and that one can fail despite being dealt a winning hand. But for the most part, I think the vast majority of people end up living the life they were born into, for better or for worse, fair or not. I'm a self-described optimist, so I really don't mean for that to sound as pessimistic as it does; it's just a general observation.

As it pertains to me, Saleem served as a reminder that, fairly or unfairly, I've been dealt a pretty strong hand in the poker game of life. In the past few years I've been so wrapped up and paralyzed by the thought of how to play that hand that I've missed much of the game.

My time with Saleem was brief, our conversation lasting no more than 10 or 15 minutes. I'm sure he thought I was just a polite tourist -- little did he know I was his student for the day.