about musketeers.

was trapped in traffic in front of the monroe hotel on thursday morning. nothing new. happens to me everytime i try going to hamra. am sitting in the cab, on the passenger seat next to the driver who has to keep both the radio and his transmitter on at all times; hence creating the unique mix of nerve-wrecking, head-turning pandemonium that would make any sane human being wish he could drop dead and go fry in hell rather than stay in this god-forsaken cab.
and as usual, i try to calm my nerves by first applying the mind numbing psychotherapy trick à deux sous, and allow my eyes to wonder in the cars next to me. it is then that i saw him. i couldn't believe it. it was Athos. u know the wise musketeer, of the 3 musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. U know, the hottest one... the one who is smart, cool, fiery, old and mature... the one with a secret. and u'll never believe it, he was driving a cab! a musketeer in a cab. the situation had been so bad in good old Richelieu's Paris that Athos had to leave the force to come drive a cab in Beirut. can you believe it?
not only were we settling for a lesser beirut, and lesser versions of ourselves, but Athos had chosen to drive a cab. not that i c anything wrong with cabs, and cab drivers. any profession is a good profession—including the oldest the world has ever known, which btw has witnessed the earliest recorded money transaction in the world. layssa min 3amalonn 7akeer wa lakin honak onassonn 7akiroun. and i am no 7akira. but for a musketeer to turn cab driver... it must be really really really bad.

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later that day, t and i were in a cab driven by a english-speaking foreman turned poker joint owner who was thrown of out of the states for some shady reason. if i remember correctly, i think he also told us that Mr. Nabih B.'s wife used to get trashed in his joint. no musketeers there...

cab drivers... can't live with 'em, cant live without 'em...