Mario the Driver

Mario is the typical guy except that he does things a little differently. He takes his bath at night to save time in the morning. He wakes up 5 minutes before his alarm clock would ring. He stores pineapples in his refrigerator but never eat them. All his socks are green. And he has an extra toe on his left foot.

Yes, Mario is a little odd. But he is just a typical guy. Why? Because like most guys, he wishes to have a wife. He has found a potential partner: Claudette. He wants to marry her.

Claudette could be a very good wife. She can cook rice within ten minutes. She can fry eight pieces of fish and wash twelve plates at the same time. Her favorite color is blue but most of her blouses are red. She could write her name legibly using both her left and right hands. Her mother bore three healthy children so it would be safe to assume that Claudette would do the same. Not that she necessarily have to bear three children. It’s just that her children ought to be healthy too.

Yes, Claudette could make a good wife. She likes Mario too. She agreed to be his girlfriend and they’ve been together for three years already. But when Mario asked her for marriage, she declined. She does not want to marry him. Not now, never.

Mario was devastated. No, he is suicidal. He calculated the time, effort, and money he invested for Claudette on the last three years of their relationship and eight months of courtship. Come to think of it, the latter is more expensive.

All this time, what was Claudette thinking? Mario is sure that he is not psychologically disturbed, not emotionally unstable, not mentally incapacitated, and nor is he socially unadjusted. Perhaps Claudette is all of these because no normal woman would reject a man like him.

Still, Mario won’t give up in finding himself a wife. He has to find an efficient and effective method to gather women. Or a method of exposing himself to them.

Finally, he found a solution: he will be a taxi driver.

It is an easy job. He will just be sitting whole day and savor the air conditioner—the one thing he lacks in his apartment. Then, he will drive around looking for some potential wife. Women will be calling out for him. If he’ll like them, he’ll let them in. He will play romantic songs while he drives them around. He will initiate some conversation too. And if he’s lucky, the women might be on their way home. He will remember their address very well.

He gave himself a deadline. One month. So many things can happen in a month. He believed that within that time, he could finally find a woman for a wife.

It’s been two months since Mario was driving a taxi. And still, no one would want to be his wife.