girl (with) a job?

   I guess it's time to change the title of my blog since you're looking at Philadelphia's newest Lyft driver. That's right, I got myself a new job driving people around town in Carol, my Corolla. It's only been a week and I've had to drop one lady off on a random street corner because she was going to throw up, drove a lady with pink eye and her 2-year-old with no car seat to CVS and back home, and a tourist to Macy's because "she heard that it's a landmark in Philly".......????. For a girl with no job, I'm up at 6:40am so I can drive in rush hour for peak pricing until about 11 and then I come home, sometimes take a nap, do some homework, and then find some household chores to keep me busy until my roommates get home to hang out with me. 
   I'll never ever forget one of my first few riders, Sandy. I picked her up with her luggage and an airport destination. Of course I forgot to clean my trunk out because I'm not used to having people in my car, so we put her luggage in the back seat, making her sit up front with me. Every introvert reading this right now is cringing at the fact that a pure stranger had to sit in the front seat in awkward silence for a 20 minute ride to PHL, but it turned out to be one of my most favorite passengers yet. 8/10 of my passengers don't talk, but the ones that do ask me the same variety of questions/statements: "Is this your full-time job?", or my personal favorite, "wow, I've never had a young woman driver before". Sandy said both. I told her how my mom isn't a fan of me picking strangers up in my car, but how I'm a grad student and this is a flexible, easy way to make money. I told her how I average between $100-$130 in 4.5 hours a day and that I get to meet cool people and drive to new places. She asked about my family, I told her my whole story. I asked her where she was headed at the airport, she told me her story. She loved hearing about my trip to Korea and my brother's journey in the Paralympics, and then she said the nicest words to me ever: "You're going to make a great counselor, the world needs more support."   I'll never forget Sandy, she was such a nice woman. I hope she had a safe flight and I hope I get her as a passenger some day again.
   It'll be one week tomorrow of me driving for Lyft, and I'm excited to see how many more interesting stories I get from it. I might even get brave a do a late night Friday shift to get some drunk blog post material. Side note: I would like to apologize (or say you're welcome) to every Lyft/Uber driver that has ever seen me and my friends drunk. But for now, this will be my full time job, until the money runs out or people start taking public transportation, or until next fall when I start substitute teaching again.. but in the meantime, keep rideshares fun, Philadelphia.