Jesus in my taxi

My husband is cross with me. On this occasion, unusually, he could actually be right. It really was a stupid conversation to get into. I mean, if you were being driven across London, hot-bed of religious retribution, in a black Mercedes mini-cab, by a total stanger (as mini-cab drivers usually are) would you get into a conversation about religion?

But my husband doesn't understand. It's things like this make life worth living.

Anyway. I was in one (black Mercedes mini-cab in London) and, as usual, doing authory things. Whendoievernot? And the conversation went like this:

Me, (making polite conversation despite having been kept waiting for 40 minutes for a pre-ordered taxi): Is it usually this busy on a Friday evening? (Stupid question if ever there was one. For crying out loud, it's London, it's Friday evening, it's slashing with rain, it's about to be December: of course it's flipping busy.)

TD (taxi driver): Busier than usual actually, madam. It's nearly Shabbat and people are getting ready.

Me: (senses now alert - am I in a Religious Situation? Are the doors unlocked?) Oh, of course.

TD: Are you Jewish, madam?

Me: (now bricking it. I mean, I'm blonde, in a highlighted kind of a way, and I really don't know if either "yes" or "no" is going to be acceptable. Seriously, are the doors unlocked?) Er, no. (Is this the right answer?)

TD: Ah.

Then - and I cannot explain this, and my husband is now really really furious with me. I mean, he did not plan to marry a martyr of any faith - we embark on a Religious Conversation in which I bizarrely though truthfully admit to being an atheist. For goodness' sake, I am in a black Mercedes with white leather seats and a total stranger, to whom I owe money, who has asked me if I am Jewish. Has he also injected me with a truth drug when I wasn't looking? Anyway, we have a strangely calm and reasoned argument, in which I profess to a calm and reasoned atheism as well as utter, total and really very fervent respect for all beliefs contrary to my own. I have no idea at this point what religion he is from but he seems like a very pleasant and reasonable guy so I have no reason (other than common sense) to pretend anything.

TD: That's good. That you respect others.

There is a pregnant pause. Then surrealism conquers my life again. He tells me that he is Iranian (interesting, but this could mean nothing. It could, on the other hand, mean a lot. I am certainly not equipped for this. My experience of the sensitivities involved is limited. After all, I live in Morningside, near a place called Holy Corner, the entire holiness of which is imparted by the ominous existence of four Christian churches) and that he was brought up as a fervent Muslim (I'm slightly losing it now. I'm a really nice and mutually-respectful person but is that going to help?). He spent many years hating Christians. The word he actually used to describe himself was "anti-Christ". Now, I am fingering the door-handle and my phone and wondering why the hell I didn't listen to my husband more often when he told me that I should stay in Edinburgh and quite preferably in the kitchen. On the other hand, since I'm not a Christian, I am not entirely sure what the problem is, but I am fairly sure there is one. Surely I am innnocent?

Then, my taxi-driver tells me that something happened. Jesus came into his life. Specifically, Jesus came into his taxi. Oh yes. And actually he (sorry He) was sitting just where I'm sitting. I feel slightly uncomfortable about this and shift a little way along the white leather seat. It doesn't seem right, really. To sit there. But really, it's true. Jesus sat there, he says, as real as I am (possibly even more so at this point, as I have completely lost any sense that I exist at all, or at least on any plane of reality that includes sensible and real things like Starbucks and tomato ketchup).

Jesus, bless him, had absolutely without warning got into the taxi to tell my taxi-driver to come off drugs, because he was an addict and his life was a mess, and the taxi-driver did. Just like that. It was amazing. And now he drives a black Mercedes, which proves it, because before that he was driving a Ford Fiesta. (You see, as I had to work out for myself later when attempting to rationalise this story, it wasn't actually THIS taxi, because at that point the taxi-driver didn't have this one.) I have a feeling that Jesus did a pretty good job, as my taxi-driver seems like a very calm and nice individual.

Unfortunately, he (taxi-driver, not Jesus - I think) dropped me in the pouring rain absolutely nowhere near the place I'd asked him to, so that I had to ruin my turquoise boots stomping around in the rain trying to find the place, but hey, that's life.

Ruining the turquoise boots is probably a sign. In the words of my favourite film, "it's a sign by any standards". It's certainly a sign that I should do what my husband tells me.

I am left with one niggling doubt after this encounter. And I don't think it's a question I'll ever know the answer to. What do you think - did Jesus pay his fare or was he free-loading?