“Where are you from?”
Based on his accent, I thought he was going to name an Eastern European country (he pronounced “it’s niiiiice” in just the same Borat-esque way as my father-in-law) so I was surprised to hear that he was Palestinian. Thirty years of driving a cab in a city halfway around the world from where you were born can do that to you, I suppose.
Like most progressive but shamefully sheltered San Franciscan liberals, I am obsessed with stories of real people from the Middle East. So my heart went out to him as he proceeded to tell me about his life in this city.
He arrived from Gaza 30 years ago and opened a small grocery store on a corner south of Market Street. He was single, and young. Eventually, a pretty, repeat customer found her way into his heart. Janet was what he’d call a “modern woman”, originally from Scotland but living alone in San Francisco. Thus began a mad, passionate love affair.
He loved Janet and he wanted to marry her, but Janet didn’t want a family. Being a traditional Palestinian man bent on carrying on his heritage, children were more important to him than love. So he mailed away for a Palestinian wife. Janet was heartbroken, but they did remain friends. For years she continued to live across the street from his grocery. He would visit her every day, and although he insists he was faithful to his marriage, his friendship with Janet continued unbeknownst to his new bride.
One day, Janet packed up her things and announced that she was moving back to Scotland. She declared that living in the same city as her lost love was too painful, and that she couldn’t stay. He never heard from her again.
I asked him if he loved his wife the moment he met her. He laughed at me and said that no, “Palestinian love doesn’t work that way.” He said that although his wife was very sweet and pretty, “It takes many years to truly love your wife in the way she deserves.” I thought that was endearing. They have three children now, and a house and a full life together. Although Janet came to his mind easily, triggered by some random question I had asked, there was no trace of regret in his voice about the path he had chosen almost 30 years ago.
Then he paused.
“It’s funny,” he said. “Something strange happened to me last week.”
He had picked up a passenger in Pacific Heights who asked him to take her to the Mission. Something in her voice was familiar as he listened to her chat on the phone with a friend. She got in the cab on the phone and got out of the cab still on the phone, so he never spoke with her or even got a chance to look her in the eye.
A few days later, this same woman got in his cab again. Now, I take cabs almost every day in San Francisco and it’s been rare that I’ve ever had the same driver twice, so the simple fact that he picked up this same woman twice in a week is astonishing in itself. Again, he recognized the lilt of her voice, and he asked her, “Are you from Scotland?” She was. He asked her for her name. She said “Janet.”
My mouth dropped at this new twist in the story. I waited for him to tell me about how they reunited years later and connected all the dots.
“Was it her? Did she recognize you?”
He smiled. “I’m sure it was her.”
For his own reasons – which are not too difficult to surmise – he left it at that. She got out of his cab, and he never turned around to face her.
