The Art of Living Other People's Lives Page 6
My driver, however, took the rules to heart. He didn’t go a half mile per hour over twenty-five on side roads, and cruised at exactly forty miles per hour on the parkway. I watched helplessly out the window as old ladies in Buicks whizzed by and ’92 Saturns looked like they were being driven by Dale Earnhardt Jr. Worst of all, his GPS took him off the parkway and onto Queens Boulevard, which is not a highway and therefore required a strict twenty-five-mile-per-hour speed limit.
What was even worse was the pressure that was building up in my bladder as the driver crept at a snail’s pace toward the airport. I knew I should have gone to the bathroom before I left my apartment, but I also didn’t know the most law-abiding person in America would be my driver. There wasn’t even traffic on the road.
The attempt to keep my frustration to myself wasn’t easy. On one hand, my driver was literally the only person following the speed limit. On the other hand, if I spoke up there was a chance of getting into a contentious conversation that could have an impact on my rating. In most circumstances, having a full bladder with no outlet to empty it takes precedence over almost everything else. I couldn’t hold back.
ME. Please, sir, do you think you could go a little faster? You will not be pulled over for going ten miles per hour faster than the speed limit, especially since everyone around us is going at least seventy.
DRIVER. No, the police are strict now about the new rule. Drivers must follow the rules.
ME. Yes, but wouldn’t everyone be pulled over if they were that strict? Like all the cars that are passing us right now?
DRIVER. This job is all I have, sir. If I lose this job I have nothing, you understand? One ticket and I will lose my taxi license and make no money. I have a family. What do I tell my family if I lose my job? Will you take care of them?
ME. I understand, but I have to go to the bathroom really bad. Like this makes the cut for top ten moments I’ve had to pee really, really badly.
DRIVER. So your pee is more important than my family?
I sat silently in the backseat, mystified by how the conversation had so quickly arrived at a point in which the value of my urine was being compared to a man’s family. I decided not to push the issue any further. Was a battle with a driver who ultimately had full control over how hard he pressed on the gas pedal really worth a lower Uber rating? As difficult as it was to remain quiet in the backseat of a car that may as well have been a parade float, with a bladder on the verge of bursting, I made the call to preserve my premier customer status. As a New Yorker, I felt weak and ashamed. But as a loyal Uber customer, I felt smart. This is what you sometimes have to do to get ahead, I thought to myself. There’s a reason not everyone has a five-star rating.
“No, my pee is not more important than your family,” I added before closing my eyes and doing my best to hold it in.
The Voice of Reason
Despite the, at times, tiresome effort to be talkative and polite during Uber rides since Vural told me about my five-star rating, it was rewarding to know I was successfully earning my rank as a perfect customer. I even considered reaching out to Uber to ask the percentage of frequent users around the world who actually maintained a five-star rating. Maybe I’d even get some complimentary rides out of it. On top of remaining perfect, I’d had some memorable and entertaining conversations with strangers, just by listening to what they had to say. At some point, being an enthusiastic/conversational/caring/cordial customer became second nature. It was like a hobby only I knew about. More like a second job.
One night I got the idea to simply ask my Uber driver what my rating was. It was during a quick ride from my office to a work event uptown. I was talking to my driver about how he liked Uber and what he thought about its business strategy and technology. When we started talking about the rating system, I saw my opportunity and quickly asked if he could tell me what my rating was, partly so I could hear another driver boast about my five stars. It had been a while since the first time and I was seeking validation.
“You have a very high rating,” he said. “You’re a very good customer.”
“I’m very proud of my five stars,” I told him. “And I really respect what Uber drivers do.”
“Five stars is very hard to get,” he responded. “You have a rating of 4.8 out of 5. Very good rating. I don’t see too many customers with a 4.8 rating. When I see them on the Uber app, I’m always happy.”
I’d stopped listening once I heard the words four point eight come out of his mouth.
“Are you sure I don’t have a five-star rating?” I asked.
“Friend, 4.8 is a very good rating,” he replied.
The world froze for a few seconds in the back of that Uber as I filed through a mental Rolodex of potential suspects who could have given me a rating less than five stars. Was it the man who’d cheated on his wife? Had I probed too deeply into his personal matters? Did he decide to take his frustrations out on me? Could the conspiracy theorist sense my doubt? Did I argue one second too long with the frustratingly slow driver? Maybe it was a driver I didn’t expect at all. Someone I’d complimented and gave my utmost attention.
“This is unbelievable,” I mumbled out loud. I waited for my driver to console me but he didn’t.
“I had a five-star rating a few months ago,” I admitted. “I’m pretty upset to hear it went down. I never gave a driver any problem and I rated every single driver five stars.”
The driver, like so many of the others, thought before he spoke, reaching in his mind for something honest and helpful, not only speaking for the sake of throwing out words and passing the time. It’s a quality that’s hard to come by, but surprisingly common among people who spend hours driving people around each day.
“You know, I have to say,” he said, before trailing off into silence again. “You know, I want to change my answer from before. There is one problem with Uber and it’s technology. It lets men decide the value of other men. That is too much power.”
The driver was right. The ability to rate the value of another person is a lot of power and responsibility. In my notes about my Uber rides, which had become a strange diary of sorts, I scribbled down my conversation with him under the headline “The Voice of Reason.” Sure, I understand the rating system as a necessary component of a business that trusts people with the safety of others. Though some things are simply better left unknown. If there were a universal rating system in life, which determined our socioeconomic status or whether or not we’d experience a peaceful afterlife, and we were all aware of our ratings, the world wouldn’t have many genuine people left. We’d all be living for the sake of pleasing whoever was judging us—hearing but not really listening; talking but not actually saying anything; going from point a to point b without ever considering the journey in between.
Breakup, Breakdown
My first real relationship was in seventh grade. At the time I’d only kissed a handful of girls, though one make-out session in middle school is equivalent to about three one-night stands as an adult. The girl I was dating was named Nicole. She was a cute cheerleader with blonde hair and a nice house. Nicer than most of the kids’ houses at my school. I asked her to be my girlfriend the same night a copycat version of the Harlem Globetrotters performed at my school. One of the players threw me his sweat-stained purple headband after the game and I gave it to Nicole as a symbol of my commitment. From that point on she carried it everywhere she went.
Our relationship was strong for about three weeks, and then Valentine’s Day came. I woke up the morning of Valentine’s Day twenty minutes before my bus came with no gift for Nicole. Desperate, I dug through my closet in hopes of finding something red or heart shaped. The only possible gift option I came across was a Sylvester the Cat stuffed animal I’d won at a carnival months earlier. It had been sitting all that time under the weight of sneakers and sports equipment and its body had become wrinkled and half collapsed. It looked like a homeless Sylvester with severe facial palsy. I had no choice but to
stuff it into my backpack and head to the bus stop. At school I quickly threw it into my locker. Luckily Nicole was late to school and we’d have to exchange gifts at the end of the day.
Once classes were over I slowly made my way to my locker to meet Nicole. When I arrived she was waiting with flowers and a chocolate heart the size of her torso. I considered running in the other direction, but it was too late. There was no turning back. All I could do was pray that Sylvester was her favorite Looney Tunes character.
Unfortunately, Sylvester is nobody’s favorite Looney Tunes character. If anything, he’s arguably the most perverted and diabolical Looney Tunes character. When I pulled his limp, wrinkled body from the bottom of my locker, Nicole’s face went from a smile to utter confusion in the time it takes Bugs Bunny to say, “That’s all, folks.” We walked out of school in silence before getting on our respective buses, me with chocolate and flowers, her with a secondhand carnival prize.
Later that day, I was outside playing basketball with a friend when my mom yelled to me from the house: “There’s someone named Michelle on the phone for you.” Michelle was Nicole’s best friend. I picked up the phone and she gave it to me straight. She told me Nicole was embarrassed and hurt by my gift and that she didn’t want to be my girlfriend anymore. It was over. Just like that my first relationship turned into my first breakup, and the news was delivered through a third party. The next day at school I asked Nicole for my sweat-stained purple headband back.
Nicole’s breaking up with me was the first time I realized the fragile nature of relationships. Granted, on the day of the Big Break, I went right back outside and finished playing basketball, but it was the beginning of what would be a long streak of getting dumped. It took me a while to realize relationships took effort, and for some reason I always felt a step behind. They say girls mature faster than boys do, and I think it was true in my case.
My next girlfriend after Nicole was also a cheerleader. Her name was Lauren and she happened to be one of Nicole’s close friends. She was the girl every guy in school had a crush on. I figured she’d heard about my poor gift-giving abilities from Nicole, so the fact she still gave me a chance made me like her even more. Lauren was the first girl I felt any real sexual attraction toward. We didn’t actually have sex, but I’d sneak off with her any chance I got for intimate make-out sessions in strange places, mostly the public library. We’d have our parents drop us off separately, claiming we had group projects we had to work on. Then we’d run off to the most hidden corner of the library and kiss passionately against a wall of books. Looking back, it was an intense affair for a couple of seventh graders.
What went wrong with Lauren was that while she was ready to take our relationship to the next level and do things like go to the mall together and hold hands, I was fixated on making out in the library. It was all I could think about. My daily thoughts were consumed by the desire to make out with Lauren against a wall of old books, despite the fact we’d done it countless times. Eventually she got tired of the same routine and called it quits. That’s when I learned that a key factor of being in a relationship is exploring new things, no matter how good of a kisser you think you are. Lauren grew up to become a professional cheerleader for an NFL team, so I still get to see her on Sundays a few times a year. Oddly enough, I do get the urge to visit a library when her face pops up on my TV.
After middle school came high school, and that’s when relationships became trickier and breakups got ugly. Before high school, breakups were just small bumps in the road that were easy to shrug off. If Nicole didn’t like my terrible gifts I’d find a girl that did. If Lauren was tired of making out in the library then I’d date a girl who’d never made out in a library before. Getting over people was simple and didn’t come with any prolonged mental abuse. High school is usually, for most people, when breaking up makes you realize you’ve got a lot more emotion inside of you than you’d thought. Mostly anger and jealousy.
The first time I learned that a relationship could be truly toxic was in tenth grade when I started dating a girl named Andrea from a few towns over. She was exotic and sexy and was the first girl to cheat on me. The phone call I made to her the day I found out she cheated was the first time in my life I felt I’d acted purely off instinct. The moment she picked up the phone I was overtaken by a rage I didn’t know I had. I yelled and cried and reprimanded her for not honoring the agreement to be my exclusive girlfriend. I felt wronged and needed to make it clear how hurt I was. Most of all I felt like a stranger had taken and used something that was mine and only mine. For some reason I kept using the analogy, “If someone broke into my house and started playing my PlayStation I’d be furious.”
After all the yelling and crying I decided to give the relationship another try. I thought I was being generous, but looking back, I was afraid of change. It was easier to be miserable with someone who had hurt me than go through the process of finding someone new. I’m not sure why we ever do this, but I especially don’t understand why we do it when we’re young and have the most energy we’ll ever have in our lives. Maybe we like being in relationships in which we feel the person who wronged us owes us something. We think we’ll forever have a “get out of jail free” card because they were the ones who fucked up first. This, of course, is never the case.
As soon as I hung up with Andrea I remember thinking, “What just took over my body and made me say the things I said and feel the things I’m feeling?” I’d never felt so strongly about anything in my life. It took everything in me not to call her back and repeat everything I’d just said just to be sure she understood how shitty she made me feel.
This is how relationships and breakups go for a while when we’re young enough to be naive about most things but old enough to make sex a priority. We view the people we’re interested in as the most physical versions of themselves that we can show off like new shoes. We don’t really consider their personality, sense of humor, or quirks. We mostly just consider how labeling them our boyfriend or girlfriend will make us look. The inevitable outcome of most of these relationships (except for the high-school sweethearts who somehow find a way to make it work) is savage breakups and bloodthirsty arguments. After all, we don’t really know the people we’ve decided to date at that age. We just know how they look and dress and where they fall on the spectrum of high-school popularity. So when they do act in a way we didn’t expect or show a side we couldn’t have guessed existed, we’re shocked and angry and demand explanations.
It’s a messy period, but it’s also an essential one. At least I like to think so. Sure, most high-school breakups stem from cheating, or jealousy, or a general overly possessive nature, but at least during those breakups we’re learning to identify some qualities we don’t like. Sometimes we fight to prove our innocence: “She only called me because she had a question about the homework.” Sometimes we fight to dismantle someone else’s innocence: “I know for a fact you were talking to Jake at lunch yesterday.” At the very least, we’re learning to stand up for what we believe in. That’s an important lesson, even if you’re an awkward teenager yelling into the phone loud enough to express anger but quiet enough so your parents don’t hear from upstairs.
Though more than anything, the messy period of arguments and grade-school drama helps prepare us for a whole new and unexpected stage of relationships: college relationships. And with college relationships come college breakups.
College relationships are great because we finally start dating people for their personalities and points of view. They are also terrible because in college people’s personalities and points of view change with the wind. In turn, the breakups consist of fewer raging indictments and more selfish laments. This person doesn’t understand my poetry. They don’t respect my need for freedom. They don’t watch foreign films. How could I be with a person that’s not helping my soul evolve? They’re holding me back. If high-school breakups are about understanding what you don’t like about other people, then col
lege breakups are about finding what you do like about yourself. Or at least we think that’s what they’re about at the time. In college, the entire world is in front of you. Any and every dream is still fresh and possible. All you know is personal growth and freedom, not personal finances and corporate structure. Relationships aren’t built to sustain college.
Personally, I was a sucker for this stage of breakups. I may have even started craving them. I couldn’t help but feel each new breakup further fueled my creativity. I figured every aspiring writer thrived on pain, isolation, and the validation that people don’t get you. I loved the person I was during those breakups. I was capable of Academy Award–worthy monologues at the drop of a hat. I’d use obscure movie references to describe how I was feeling and quote Nietzsche in my “good-bye forever I hope you find happiness in life” Facebook messages. Music had so much more purpose after these breakups. I’d listen to Radiohead and Bon Iver under the stars and feel like the most important misunderstood person in the universe. It was terribly narcissistic, but I have no doubt each one of those overly dramatic, perversely self-centered breakups helped me discover something new about myself. And isn’t college really just about discovering yourself?
I once broke up with a girl in college because I needed a good personal narrative for a creative-writing class I was taking. I had writer’s block for weeks and finally decided I’d write about what it’s like to break up with someone simply for the sake of writing about it. In my mind it was some great artistic exploration. My professor’s notes were that it was extreme and mean. The girl didn’t take it well either, but I told her I was using artistic license. I was that guy.
Luckily, I was able to stop being that guy once I started getting into a few more serious relationships. The type of relationships that don’t end a few weeks after they begin. I even got into one relationship that lasted beyond college and revolved around that scary four-letter l word that’s not lust. Breakups become an entirely different monster once relationships are established on the foundation of love. To fall in love is to say, “I trust you enough that you won’t hurt me.” It’s a confirmation with yourself that after years of mistakes and personal discovery, you have finally determined what makes someone ideal in your eyes. When these relationships don’t go as planned, it’s difficult to admit you were wrong. Nobody likes admitting they wasted time with something they thought was a sure thing. In turn, breakups tend to avoid the real issues altogether, and instead focus on problems that are irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. For some reason it’s easier to blame a failed relationship on the way your partner chews their food than to look them in the eyes and admit, “I’m just not in love with you anymore.” It’s less of a struggle to tell someone they spend too much time thinking about their career than to just say you feel you’re too young to settle down.