Taxi Driver Wisdom

Hail a taxi cab, open the door to a burst of easy listening music, breathe in the poppy air freshener, lean over the seat, and say hello to the next Jean Paul Sartre or Kahlil Gibran. Taxi Driver Wisdom takes readers behind the Plexiglass curtain with pearls of wisdom from the most multicultural, multiethnic, multireligious group of philosophers ever assembled: New York Cab drivers. Atmospheric black and white photographs are paired with pithy quotes from downtown Descartes and freeway Foucaults-and bound with a faux leather cover just like the finest cab upholstery. Cheaper than an ashram and less of a hassle than Freudian analysis, Taxi Driver Wisdom is the shortest possible route to enlightenment. You may never want to take the bus again.

Risa Mickenberg is a New York-based advertising writer and free thinker whose resume includes the award-winning Snapple campaign. Two of her great grandfathers were cab drivers.

Joanne Dugan is a freelance photographer. She estimates that in the ten years she's lived in New York, she's taken 1,000 cab rides, five with Harlod the checker cab guy.