It started with Stan and ended with Jose

My little 2010 Ford Focus was not sounding good. At low speeds, it had a distinctive wheeze that made it sound like it was out of breath. I had been told by someone who knows about these things that the spark plugs probably needed changing. So, I drove my car to Stan’s Auto Center, in Lafayette, the city near where we live in rural Louisiana. Stan’s had been recommended as trustworthy and capable.

The car would be ready the next day, the manager told me. So I called Uber to take me home. As many of you know, when you book the ride, Uber provides you with the name of the driver, the car make and the license number, along with a small photo of the driver. I was going to be picked up by Howanda, an African-American woman who would be driving a white Chevrolet Traverse.

She arrived about ten minutes later. I opened the passenger door and peeked my head in. “Ok if I sit in the front?” I asked.

“You sit wherever you like, Honey!” she said.

I installed myself in the front, and we were off.

Howanda was personable and up for conversation. She had a big smile. I could feel her energy immediately. We got around to talking about family.

“Do you have any children?” I asked.

“Four! I have three grown boys, twenty-one, twenty and nineteen. And a twelve year-old.”

“Twelve? That’s a big gap.”

“I know. My husband—my ex-husband—and I had the two boys and we wanted a girl, but the third was a boy so we said, that’s all.”

“Is the fourth one a girl?”

“No! A boy!” she laughed. “My husband and I got divorced. When people ask me who’s the father of my twelve-year-old, I say Jose Cuervo. My girlfriends and I went to Houston for a weekend, and I got a little wild. I had a lot of Jose Cuervo, and there you are.”

“Do the older boys live around here?”

“They do! They each have a wife or a girlfriend, but they love their mama.”

Her phone rang. It was on speaker. It was her mother telling her that she was going out tonight.

“You mom lives with you?”

“She does, and we like that.”

I told her that my daughter lives in New York and is a singer, writer and performer.

“It’s a difficult life,” I said. “Being an artist. But she has a lot of friends who do the same thing, so they…”

“They support each other.”

“Yes!”

“You have to surround yourself with people who support you,” Howanda said. “And you have to get rid of that one person who sows doubt, who tells you that you can’t do it. There’s always that one person trying to crush your dream. You can’t let anyone crush your dream!”

“No! You can’t.”

What a pleasure it is to talk about your children. Especially if they’re ok and healthy and trying to do what they need to do.

I became reflective, “I read somewhere recently—you know how sometimes you hear something you might have heard before, but it’s just the timing that makes you really hear it? Someone said the more you surround yourself with positive energy and people with positive energy then that will attract more people and situations with positive energy.”

“Yes!” Howanda said. “I agree with that!”

We were now off the expressway and deep in the country where I live. I realized I didn’t want this conversation to end. I told her I just got married.

“Congratulations!” she said. It was genuine. I could feel it. Anyone could.

“Thank you. I’m very happy.”

“I’m happy for you, too.”

“My wife grew up around here,” I said.

I’m still getting used to saying my wife. It feels a little odd and wonderful. It feels—how shall I put this?—grown up. I’m 78, but it still feels grown up when I say my wife.

Howanda turned right on Courville Road where we live, my wife, Gaywynn, and I.

I got out of the car.

“It was very nice talking to you,” I said. It was.

“Yes!” Howanda said.

I was reluctant to see her go. Has that ever happened to you? After such a brief encounter?

She turned her white Chevrolet Traverse around, drove to the road, turned right, and then, her car picking up speed, she was gone.