Sincere appreciation for a much-needed ride
Recalling the fundamentals of memorable service
Update: this column was amended with slight wording changes on July 13th.
On July 11th I pulled into the parking lot at beautiful Rideau Acres park, car loaded with coolers and equipment and food and a big, energetic dog.
I was on my way to my daughter’s campsite to help celebrate my grandson’s birthday. The day was blazing hot at 11am and sure to get a lot hotter. Quickly glancing at the invitation, I assumed I would be driving my car full of stuff to the campsite.
But, whoops! Day guests are required to park in the lot at the gate to the park and walk to the site.
In the office, I got a map of the park. My daughter’s site was the very farthest, most remote, lovely, picturesque site in the place. Had I known I would be walking to the site, I would have packed a wagon or a bundle buggy; but I had neither.
At my car, I quickly sorted through the “must haves” and “nice to haves” in my trunk and loaded one sturdy bag with the minimum of what I thought I would need, including food and drink and shoes and towels and presents. It was a heavy, awkward bag.
I put my lab Biscuit on a waist-tie leash and headed to the campsite. It was a long, long, hot, hot walk. (I would have called my daughter for a ride, but she and all the birthday guests were busy at a Reptile Show on the grounds.)
Between the Duck Pond – where Biscuit took an intense interest in the ducks – and the washroom, which was a landmark on the way to the site, I was able to sit on a “Dog Walkers Bench” which was thoughtfully supplied with fresh water, treats, and some shade. My shoulder was sore from hauling the heavy bag, and my feet hurt from the gravel road. It was really, really, REALLY hot; I was most worried about heat stroke, which I experienced in 2024 for the first time in my life and which I now realize is a significant and dangerous risk.
As I schlepped along the long road full of trailers, I realized I was lost. Fortunately, I came upon a man sitting on a golf cart at the side of the road.
“Excuse me,” I asked, panting and sweating. “Can you show me where I am on this map?” I held out the map the Park Office had provided me.
“Oh, you’ve missed your turn,” he said cheerfully. “You turned right at the washroom when you should have turned left.”
“Look,” I offered. “I don’t have any money on me. But I will happily pay you in fresh picked strawberries if you will just drop this bag of stuff at that site while I walk over with my dog.”
“Don’t worry about that!” he laughed. “Hop on, I’ll give you a lift over.”
With that, Mark dropped the “hatch” at the back of the golf cart and piled my heavy bag on top of it. Biscuit and I got settled in the passenger seat and he set off to find my daughter’s site.
Along the way, we chatted amicably as though we had known each other for years, not minutes. He was from Smith’s Falls, and worked for an aggregate firm. He spent summer weekends at the trailer park in Rideau Falls with his family and went back and forth to work. I had taught some Junior Achievement classes in Smith’s Falls and have a real soft spot for the town.
In only a matter of minutes – quick, easy, friendly, effortless minutes – Mark was dropping me off at my daughter’s campsite. Had I been carrying the wallet I left locked back in the car, I would have paid him anything he asked. As it was, he even refused to take any strawberries in payment for the transportation, but scooted away waving cheerfully back to his family’s site.
As I watched him drive away, it occurred to me that everything about that lift was exactly the best thing you could ever hope for in ground transportation.
I was so tired, and so hot, and so overwhelmed managing my dog past distractions that Mark’s ability to provide me a ride was a special gift. He had a resource – the golf cart – that I did not have. But he had more: he had a cheerful disposition, a service attitude, and a competent understanding of the winding trailer park roads.
When I needed it most, he had everything I needed; and, he was more than willing to help.
Those elements are exactly the same things I remember of every great Taxi ride I have ever taken, whether it was as a 19-year-old closing bartender in Sarnia or a rain-soaked Mom leaving a doctor’s appointment with kids in Toronto.
In recent years, much of the ground transportation industry has become hugely political, complicated, unpleasant, and contentious. The days when really what everybody wanted was a friendly driver with a service attitude who earned a decent living doing valuable work seems to have been lost. Taxi drivers have lost their lifetime security, and Uber drivers are underpaid slaves; it’s been a lose/lose decade.
I wonder what it would take to get back to the basics in ground transportation, and whether it is even possible to do so.
What do you think?
