Green Badge Man

GREEN BADGE MAN

Almost light. Have to find somewhere to park this taxi before daybreak.
Don't want to be seen in daylight. Should've gone somewhere grassy. Go
where the hills roll forever. Where the dew glistens on the grass.
Where the soil is soft. Easy to dig. Some place where the digging is
easy.
So much to think about before the morning comes.
Lots to mull over.

My daughter, she said to me, "Come and live with us." The husband too.
He said, "Trevor, you'd be more than welcome to stay." Both of them
thought I was down about things and they seemed united in the offer:
"Come and live with us for a while," they said.
I was touched. My son wouldn't have been so thoughtful. He's one of the
great talkers, my boy. He says what he thinks you want to hear because
he doesn't have the front to say what he really thinks. I used to
believe in all his promises. As did his mother. We believed in the
promise he showed. He was the first in the whole family to get himself
an education and go to university. I can't remember what it was he
studied there, film studies or something but he could've gone on and
done whatever he wanted with his life. I don't know why he turned out
like he did. Stupid, it is. A terrible waste. The last time I spoke to
him I listened to him telling me he was going to go and live in
Australia. I asked him what he going to do there and he said, "Don't
know?DJ'ing hopefully?See what happens when I get there." I wished him
all the best although from what I gathered he was just going to the
other side of the world to be as lazy there as he is here. Never a
mention of jobs, or careers. Except DJ'ing.
Three years at university and he wants to be a Disc Jockey?..in
Australia.
I haven't seen the lad in ages. I'd've liked to have seen the silly
sod. Whenever I suggest we should meet up he goes, "Yeah, okay, let's
do that," and then I try to make an arrangement while on the phone and
he comes out with his old favourite: "Let me call you next week to make
it a definite."
Next week comes and goes and the phone doesn't ring and he won't return
my calls.
I wouldn't say I was a great father but?
What a waste, though. If I knew he was using the head he was lucky
enough
to have on his shoulders then I could take not seeing him like I do. To
know he was doing something with his life would be a comfort. But it's
the waste of it. The bone idleness.

My daughter, she's a different kettle of fish. She is that much younger
than he is and I think she sussed and learned from the bullshit factor
of her brother at an early age. She's clever, that girl. She doesn't
suffer fools gladly. Regardless of all that, it wasn't for me, the
offer she made. That kind of kindness wasn't my cup of tea.
Besides, I prefer my being by myself.
That's why I've always liked to drive, why I became a taxi driver, I
suppose.

I like being my own boss. Taking orders from no man.
Simple pleasures.

I'm not a fancy type. Not a fancy Dan. Never wanted much and that's
lucky as I've never had much. I'm not the wanting type. I pity those
who are. To me, I don't think they know why they want half the time,
which is why they never want what they have. Always wanting something
else. Left wanting. We're a nation of wanters, that's what we are.
Whereas I keep it simple. I want to drive and I do drive. There it is:
driving. How many can say they have what they want and so want no more?
Not many. You could probably count those people on one hand. But give
me a set of wheels, a road to drive on and you won't hear me
complaining.

I never moan. I have to put up with it daily, people in the back of my
cab wishing away their lives. Daydreaming about where the grass is
always greener. I suppose we're all prone to it now and again. I admit,
I can be the same. I've been told I have my moments. We all do, though.
It's natural. As for me, I like to drive. The pleasure of sitting
behind the wheel hasn't left me, not in all these years.

I never seem to leave the cities. I'd like to escape this city. Leave
before the morning comes. Go where you can hear the flow of water.
Where it doesn't look dirty after it's rained. That's the city for you.
Always judge a city by the way it looks after the rain. The concrete
gets dirty from the pollution. The puddles here are black. The grime
from the pollution drips down the walls, the windows, colours the skin,
gets right under the fingernails. It's like looking at the dirt rings
after a bath. Once the rain stops and the water runs down the guttering
of the city and into the drains of the capital it's like the bath's
plug has been taken out and then you see the dirt sticking to the
sides, the sides of the roads, the buildings, the windshields of the
capital. Filthy, it is.
You should see the dirt on my cab after a day's driving.
Shocking.

Driving is my sole pleasure. I put on my green badge, start up the
engine and switch on the taxi light and I watch the streets for
pedestrian souls, arms aloft as if they were drowning.
That's how I think of them, now and then.
Not that all souls are worth saving.
I have stopped for people when I knew they'd be nothing but
trouble.
Those who should not be saved but when they see my light and hail their
arms I pretend I'm on a mission and I must, I must obey.

"You can," said my daughter, "stay with us." I appreciated the
kindness. People aren't kind all the time. I've been told by my son
that I have a warped view of humanity. I told him he should try working
with the general public and then he'd understand that people can be
such out and out cunts at times. I'm not saying I'm better than
everybody else as I know I have my moments. And I'm not saying I've
never had kindness done to me. I've been lucky, on many counts. I'm
grateful for what I've had. Not begrudging of what I've got. Sometimes,
though. Sometimes.

What goes around comes around, I guess. I could've been kinder. I'm the
first to hold my hands up: I could've been more thoughtful, yes. I
didn't do as much for my wife as I should have done when she was
poorly.
That's something I can't deny.
I could've given more and then I might've known more kindness
myself.

Then there's luck, though. Always being on the receiving end of Sod's
Law. Not always, I admit. I'm not the self pitying sort. I've no time
for that wallowing in the coulds, mights and maybes of life. There is
no point to that. None at all. But then when I think of my wife, and
why she was poorly. When I think of her and some of those who aren't
poorly, it does my head in. The injustice. I can't make any sense of
why she had to go through all that as she hadn't harmed a fly.
The best thing, so I'm told, is not to dwell on the past. Move on,
Trevor. Think of the future.
It's just as well as thinking about the past sends me crackers.

And that's another thing, there's no privacy in London. Nowhere to
claim as your own. It's all taken. Claimed. Owned. You try and get a
little something for yourself but someone has got there before you. I
mean, really, you've got to be quick. Quick like those foreigners. The
crafty continentals. The Arab and the Jew, now they've got the business
brains. They're quick and have the acumen. They use their education,
those continentals. Good luck to them, that's what I say. I don't
begrudge them what they have. Provided they've earned it, they can have
it. I've always said that hard work reaps its own reward. There are two
types in this life: the wanters and the go-getters. Some people, my
passengers, they like to ask my point of view. "Trevor," they say to
me, "don't you think we're ruining this country by giving everything
over to the continentals?" That's what they ask me and I won't be
drawn, though. I'm very rarely drawn to answer when they say to me,
"Trevor, don't you think it's a scandal that we're allowing Wembley
Stadium to be rebuilt by the krauts?"
My passengers want answers, guidance. I know what I think but I like to
try and keep my opinions to myself. Politics is funny. It makes people
react in funny ways. My grandmother, she wouldn't discuss anything
political as she thought discussions became arguments and nothing was
ever resolved. She never made a comment about the news. I admired that.
Whereas sometimes I can forget myself and when a passenger says to me,
"Trevor, how can we save the National Health Service?" I occasionally
give my answer and say, "We're a nation of wanters."
They tend to mull on that for their journey.
I won't say no more once I've said my piece. I'll let them think it
over. Trying to get to the square root of my thinking given that
they've been raised and educated in The Land of Wanting.

It was good of the pair of them to say "come and live with us". That
was kind. Was it genuine? Was it a genuine offer or were they going
through the motions and churning out the niceties like my boy was so
fond of doing?
Saying what was right.

All in all, looking at it from their point of view - which you had to
do - did they want me in their lives? It wasn't as if my daughter was
by herself. No, it wouldn't have been right. Their hearts were in the
right place. Her heart was. She's like her mum in that respect. I think
my little girl wanted me with her. Like she said, "I want to keep an
eye on you dad and know you're alright." I was choked when she said
that to me. I saw the husband and I thought he looked relieved when I
told them "no" although he said otherwise. It was a scene. A drama.
Very embarrassing. I was choked, she was choked. I can't stand
scenes.
That's why I left. Got in the cab. From the first day to the last:
always the cab.

It's almost light now.