MEMOIR
That Time We Locked Ourselves Out of a Convertible
A memoir, a comedic tragedy
When we arrived in Los Angeles, it was a gray and smoggy afternoon. My mom was suffering the effects of jet lag, I was glued to my first ever iPhone, and my dad was his bright and cheery self. The taxi ride down the city’s most bustling boulevards tried its best to eat away at his persevering patience, but he remained steadfastly smiling as traffic stalled, horns honked and upper class furies flared.
“Keep honking! It’s not gonna get you there any faster!” my mom pointed out astutely, struggling to conceal some annoyance.
“So when you first moved here from Haiti, was it a difficult adjustment period for you?” my dad asked the cab driver warmly, his grin holding strong in the face of the overbearing orchestra of beeps and open-windowed berating's that surrounded our shabby little taxi.
“Ah, my friend, when I first arrive from Haiti, this city felt like another world. The pace, the noise, everything different. In Haiti, life moves to the rhythm of the island — it’s a dance. Here, it felt like everyone was in a rush but going nowhere fast. The buildings, so tall, the streets, so full, and the noise… a carnival every day, but without music,” the taxi driver replied with a thick creole accent.
