Member-only story
Canine Comfort
And Strangers in a Car
It had been some time since I had introduced myself as a veterinarian to a stranger — four years away from daily practice, two years under Covid restrictions, it didn’t seem to matter anymore. But a frigid night and an Uber driver changed that.
We had just finished a wonderful dinner with our daughter and her best friend — really another daughter to us — involving many drinks and cheers to all the birthdays and special occasions we had missed over the past months. My husband and I gave the girls a final hug as our ride pulled up.
The Uber experience can be hit or miss. On the way to dinner, we were sure we would all die. The driver insisted on making left turns from the far right, swerving wildly across traffic, and passed other cars at high speed using the inside lane, not to mention the suspicious and loud noise from the left rear tire, begging to fall off at any moment. We jokingly shared all this with the new driver hoping it would be a cautionary tale.
But Amir was a loquacious fellow with a sense of humor and assured us he would deliver us home in one piece. He skillfully navigated the large piles of snow and shared that he had not known winter until he came to Canada as a child. Much of his family had left Syria in 1996 emigrating to Turkey, Sweden, Britain, and Canada. He had his own family now —…
