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How often do we take the time to really get to know our Uber drivers? Odds are we talk to them about the weather or maybe a sports team. Or maybe we even slip in our ear pods or scroll our phones and forget about them altogether.
However, we may be missing important — even life-changing — connections. At least that’s how one woman from Arkansas sees it now that she’s spent an impromptu but memorable day with her Uber driver.
When Katlyn Gardenhire planned a weekend trip to Denver with her boyfriend, she was bummed when his flight was canceled due to bad weather. She wasn’t about to let that ruin her own trip, however, so she decided to make the most of her day and go hiking in Red Rocks.
She called an Uber, and a man named Robert picked her up. Instead of sitting in the back seat, she jumped in the front and decided to get to know him.
“I just started talking his head off,” she later recalled to a local Fox News outlet.
Through their conversation, Gardenhire learned Robert was an Air Force veteran and a retired postal worker. He had no family in the area and took up driving to get to know his surroundings and fill his time.
Once they reached their destination, Gardenhire felt like the conversation had much more potential. She also saw the look of awe on Robert’s face at the pretty landscape. So she made a decision.
“I turned to him and I said, ‘I don’t know if you want to do this or not, but I’m alone and I would like some company. Do you want to hike with me?'” said Gardenhire, adding that she didn’t get any weird vibes from him.
Much to Gardenhire’s surprise, Robert agreed to the hike.
“I could tell from his facial expressions and our chat that he needed some fun or maybe just someone to talk to,” Gardenhire explained in a Facebook post that went viral. “I wasn’t really expecting him to accept my invitation, but he did! Five minutes later, we were leaving the information desk with our ‘you are here’ pamphlet and headed on a 1.5-mile hike.”
The hike wound up being a great day for both of them. They took photos of each other and learned more about their backstories. They had such a great time they decided to grab lunch at a rooftop bar down the street.
After that, they decided to explore downtown Denver together. They grabbed coffee, visited candy stores and bookshops, and Robert even watched as Gardenhire skated at “the cutest ice skating rink.”
Through it all, they developed a friendship and even discovered they have the same birthday. At the end, they exchanged numbers and Facebook pages, hugged, and promised to keep in touch.
“He told me that I had made his day, as he did mine,” Gardenhire recounted in her Facebook post. “Saturday morning, I could’ve easily just gotten in the back of Robert’s car, ignored him, and played on my phone, but I decided to be kind. I engaged in conversation, asked questions, and got to know someone. Little did I know what the day would unfold, but I don’t regret it one bit! Bottom line, you never know who could use your kindness. Be kind, be present, be positive, make a difference.”
Some may caution against striking up this kind of friendship so quickly with a strange man. In Gardenhire’s case, she is a former news reporter and is used to extracting information from people. She only received positive vibes from this man, and it ended up being a serendipitous day.
More importantly, this story and Gardenhire remind us just how important it is to be present in our daily lives. That doesn’t mean we have to all engage with strangers, either. Being in the moment with friends, children, partners and family members will help to develop stronger and more positive connections in our lives.
These days, it’s so easy to disengage with our phones and media and not pay attention to what’s happening around us. But if we can make a pointed effort to put down the devices and look around, who knows what wonderful things we can discover.
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