"Are you good with computers?" he asked, apparently oblivious to the growling in my head. I glanced at the lap top I had placed down on the counter. (Why continue to hold it when you're in it for the long haul because some jerk had to order a bar drink?). Its exterior is speckled with dents from being dropped and a few diet coke stains from last week when I accidentally tossed it into the recycling bin during my overly zealous house cleaning frenzy. My laptop, like me, wears the telltale signs of stress on its outer sleeve, but it still functions. Most days.
"How good do you need?" I asked. The mocha drinker had a friendly face, so I decided to cut him some slack. It turned out he couldn't get his lap top to start up. I admitted that I wasn't very savvy, but he seemed certain I had to know more than he did. Funny, just because I was carrying one around. Maybe I'll start carrying around a big fat pay check so folks will automatically assume I'm worth something.
He seemed desperate, so I told him I'd be happy to push some buttons. It's how I deal with computers and remote controls and the random flashing lights on my dashboard. My car dashboard, the old fashioned kind. At work, I have my own special way of pushing a return through when the wheel of death on the screen starts spinning out of control and the customer looks as if she's going to throttle someone. An extra scan, a double click, one more scan and one more double click and I'm in. Nobody else is willing to try my carefully developed system, but I swear, it's foolproof. I am an accidental computer geek.
Anyway, I showed off a little bit and read the strange instructions on Mr. Mocha's computer screen as if I actually understood what the words meant, executed a few random pushes and clicks and, voila!, the screen changed and all of a sudden there were some different incomprehensible instructions up there. He thought making it to a new step indicated some progress. I puffed out my chest a little bit, happy that someone was recognizing my well hidden genius.
We stared together at the screen, which was assuring us in some convoluted terms that it was thinking deep thoughts. He looked amazed. I pretended to be engrossed in thoughts that were as deep as those of his lap top. We waited and stared. "Can you believe I used to be a successful salesman and now I'm driving a taxi?" I was taken aback, mostly because I cannot remember the last time I met a taxi driver who spoke English like a native. I thought about the three hours I had spent a day earlier navigating expressways and surface streets in a torrential downpour to get my daughter to school and friends to the airport and me to work at a location I had never been to before. Hmm, maybe I'm qualified to be a taxi driver. Why was he talking about it as if it were a bad thing?
Unfortunately, I didn't have my resume on me, that impressive piece of paper that starts out strong and fizzles out into a big sheet of white space. Maybe I could add something about my computer know-how, fill up some of the emptiness, and ask Mocha to pass it on to the people who hire taxi drivers. I glanced at his lap top screen. The wheel of death was still spinning, the promises of deep and highly evolved thought processes still blinked on and off. I wasn't feeling all that optimistic, but he still looked encouraged. At least something was happening. I know the feeling. Like yesterday when I got off the expressway just so I could experience the sensation of movement, even though it was in the wrong direction. Yes, I could definitely apply to be a taxi driver if my new career in computer repair fell through.
I encouraged Mocha Man to sit and relax, since "several minutes" in computer speak is a term of art that has nothing to do with time measurement as people of merely average intelligence would understand it. He trusted me; I had become his guru with my random pokes and prods. He sat and sipped. I scurried off to my couch.
"You did it!" he suddenly called out to me. He was beaming. His lap top was up and running, and he would be able to communicate with the taxi dispatcher and earn his keep for the day. As usual, I got paid nothing for my priceless service, but I am feeling confident and motivated as a result of my time spent making rain. Today I will work on my resume.
And though I don't know Mocha's name, I jotted down his cab number, just in case I need a reference.
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