larry. joyless and fucking angry.

This is Larry. He drove me from Manhattan to Brooklyn on Sunday night.

I got into the taxi. I was on the phone getting the location of future drop-off. I told him "4th Ave and Union St, please."
Him: There is a Hess Station on that corner, I can drop you there. Make sure your friend knows that's where you're going to be. Call her and tell her.
Me: Well, I will call him when I get there. It will be fine.
Him: You don't understand. I was written up in O Magazine for being the best taxi driver in NYC. I will not just leave you there. I need to know you will be safe. [This is not entirely true. Here is the link. And it's ironic that he is written up in an article about "finding joy" because as you'll see, Larry fucking sucks at finding joy.]
Me: Okay. That sounds awfully nice of you. Thanks.

I asked Larry to tell me the story that got him into O. Basically, he gave a man and his in-labor-pregnant wife a free ride to the hospital. The man happened to work for Hearst. Nice, right? Sure. Things quickly turned from nice to racist to angry to fucked-up.

Larry went onto tell me things like this:
"I make shit money and that's before taxes. I'm fuckin 64 and I'm workin my ass off."
"I just got over fucking prostate cancer and I gotta sit on my ass in a taxi."
"I got laid-off last year and now I get fucking ripped off, by everyone! Blacks, women, Puerto Ricans... everyone!"
"I coulda gotten married to a woman with hundreds of millions back when I was 48, 49, 50. She had a kid. I loved the kid. I didn't love her. I left her. Now. My girlfriend just had a stroke; she's fucking suicidal."
"You know why women won't date me? I live in a fucking walk-up."

"LARRY!" I said. "LARRY, look. You are alive after the cancer. Things can't be that bad."

"Yea, I'm driving you to Brooklyn from Manhattan. And you see all these empty taxis heading back to Manhattan? Yea, that's gunna be me. Fine. I'll fill up half a tank at the Hess station. And then I'll use it by the time I get back to Manhattan with no one in my taxi. I'm not saying you need to tip me 25% but, people don't fucking tip these days."

"Well. Okay. Right, I mean, that sucks, Larry. It's fucked up."

We pull into the Hess station some time later. We both got out of the taxi; he had to fill his tank and I had to get the fuck away. I think we shook hands. He waited until he saw the him, Larry waved and got back in his taxi. He didn't even thank me for the 25% tip.

Larry. The epitome of Joy.