I wrote this yesterday but was only able to publish this morning…
Ohmyword. I’m writing this from a Lyft car right now. I published my last post at 1:00 this afternoon. I just finish talking about the fact that men don’t complain and now 5 hours later, I had the interaction below with ken, the driver:
He pulled up and I saw the look. I ignored it and said, “is it ok if I sit behind you?” He nodded said yes and, “what about that (pointing to bumblebee)? where u gonna put that?” I said “it’ll fold up and fit in ur trunk.” He said okay and pulled into a spot. As I went thru the motions of folding up bumblebee he oooohed and aaaahed at how he folded up but I knew that we would “have issues” when Ken started his steps to lock it in place and I could hear his grunts of frustration.
When Bumblebee was folded and locked, I said my usual “it’s a lil heavier than it looks ok?” But by then ken had already tried to pick him up and exclaimed, “this thing is heavy!” He tried again, “how u know I can pick this up?” I said “I don’t so I will get help if I need to”. He hoisted bumblebee a third time “this thing is heavy. Do u always do this? Suppose a woman comes for u?” Again I said ever so calmly, “yes I do this all the time. Like I said if u don’t want to deal with it I’ll get help.” (I didn’t say u can leave and I’ll get someone else…I was already running a little later than I’d planned) he said, “I don’t mind and I don’t want to damage it” and lifted it into the trunk.
Now this is what I meant when I said in my last post that people try to make nice after the fact. We drove in silence (which is no big deal and it gave me a chance to write) and when we got to my destination, he came out the car, took off his shirt (he had on a vest underneath) and said, “I have to get ready for this.” I heard him grunting by the trunk and he brought the scooter to me and said, “I never had to deal with one of these before. What’s it called?” I told him that it is a mobility scooter and I use it to get around. He said,”okay. Well I’m glad that I got you because now I know how to handle it. I never had to before. So is that it?” I told him that I had one more thing to do before I took off but that I’d do it. He said, “no. Tell me. I want to learn”I told him what to do, asked him if he’d close the door for me, told him thank you and scooted off.
Times like this I also wonder if I should rate the driver a “3”. I remember the first time I did that I got a message that Lyft will not pair you with a driver who’s rated a 3 or less. He tried to make up for all the initial comments at the end, but if I rate him a 3, it will guarantee that he and I will never have to deal with each other again!