two by two: taxi

robert deniro in "taxi driver" still has the monopoloy on the quintessential new yorker, the humble engineer of human transport in this teeming city of millions. he embodies the madness, the insomnia, the wonderland-esque quality of the city that is crazy by day and crazier by night. we taxi drivers are all a bit like this - all mad hatters in a city that only makes sense for us according to the snapshots we get of it during our respective shifts. we know more truth about this city than most new yorkers can get in a lifetime of living here. you could say we are the city. only difference being we drivers are all just too fucked up to ever be taken seriously.

the missed connections of pablo neruda

imagine new york: thousands of people walk past thousands of other people on a daily, hourly, minute-by-minute basis. during the day, it is a sea of people, a blur of lightly colored impressionism, one person fading into another. nights are sharper, edgier - bright lights blur into fantastical streams of light and color, shining in a way that makes people more apparent. but you still don't notice them do you? you walk right past them until one day, suddenly, holding on to a subway strap, driving down lexington in a taxi, wandering around times square, someone pops out at you. some face, amongst a sea of faces, looks at you and changes things, if only for a second. suddenly things slow down. suddenly you stop, the frenetic pace of things pauses ever so slightly, and you look...you SEE.