strange in general.

It's past midnight and I'm in a strange city, strange in general and strange to me. By following bad advice and making a bad decision, I've ended up in Detroit two hours later than I was supposed to and separated from my colleague. I don't know what else to do but take a cab to the hotel and hope for the best.

I get a cab outside baggage claim, feeling self-conscious and out of my element. I am wary of the cab drivers, as if I have "SUCKER" written on my forehead. But if I am a sucker, then I am, and the bottom line is that I need to get to my hotel.

I tower over my portly, dark-skinned driver as he loads my bags into the trunk. I get into the backseat and settle in for what the driver tells me will be a twenty-five minute wait. I'm tired and ill-tempered, frustrated at myself for having gotten myself into this mess of a situation. I decide to talk to the driver, just because he's foreign and possibly interesting, just because he's a distraction.

I'm not good at small talk with strangers, or at least I feel like I'm probably not, because I think that I ask questions that are not really small. I ask about history or family or job satisfaction, because those things are interesting to me. I like to know where people are from, how they got where they are, if they like it now that they've arrived. My cab driver was from Bangladesh, and he'd been in Detroit about ten years. He had family living in New York, but none around here. He asks a little about my life and seems to think it's novel: a girl my age with a career, living alone. I don't know much about Bangladesh, but I know that it's not known for its women's lib.

"Do you like driving a cab?" I ask.

A pause. "No, not really. But the economic situation is very bad here. One of the worst unemployment rates in the nation."

"Really? Why is it so bad?"

"Because the automobile companies are sending their jobs overseas."

I want to laugh at the bitter irony. Undoubtedly this guy's family came to the States for that elusive American dream, to find work and better pay. And now he was stuck working third shift driving a cab because all the jobs were being sent to his homeland. This is why I ask questions like these, because the daily struggles of people who are regular but still completely unlike me are what interests me.

As we pulled off the interstate to my hotel's exit, my little Bangladeshi cab driver invites me to lunch the next day. I tell him that I will likely have to work through lunch, which is a complete fabrication. But I am charmed and quietly flattered at this man who has tried to quite literally pick me up. I wonder if he harbors a special place in his heart for southern women who are much too tall for him or if I've just charmed him by taking an interest in his life. Maybe he figures I want to be rescued from my lonely existence by someone who will support and impregnate me.

We arrive, and he gives me his business card in case I need a ride back to the airport in two days time. It says that his name is Al, and I ask if that's short for something long and hard for Americans to pronounce. He says yes, but doesn't tell me what.

I get safely into the hotel, and Al drives away. I'm exhausted but relieved to at last be at my destination, even if my destination isn't somewhere I particularly want to be. At least I'm not stuck driving a cab.