By David Kilby
Much has passed since my previous post about ridesharing and deliveries, but it's all part of the adventure of living life to the fullest. One ride on Memorial Day weekend sent me to Brooklyn, and on another late night I was driving people all around Long Beach Island making about $32 an hour.
Despite how crazy this work can get, I enjoy it. I like not knowing where I'm going to end up each day. I have a sleeping bag and a 6-foot back storage area in my Dodge Journey where I can put down the seats and sleep as long as I need to (one advantage of being only 5' 7"), and I have a Planet Fitness membership for showers, workout machines, and massage chairs whenever I need them.
Life is a theme park with thrills all around us if we know how to look. Yesterday, I was just thinking of how I used to pay to play arcade games where I could drive around (in fact, my son still plays and loves such games). Now I get to play the same game in a real vehicle, and I get paid to play it!
Of all the attractions we can choose to enjoy in life, the most important thing is to do the things we really love to do. Or else, we are wasting our theme park visit. Some people prefer the lazy river or the monorail where they just float along or coast. Some people like to schedule their visits to each attraction, making sure they catch all the shows. (I find that these people are very good at marketing.)
I'm more of a roller coaster guy. Sometimes I have to wait a long time for the good parts to come; but I live for that ascent where I can see everything from high above, and then the butterflies that come when life takes me for a ride. I may be taking other people for a ride to where they need to go when ridesharing, but I hope they know that they are contributing to the bigger adventure I enjoy each day.
It's tragic that some people choose a job or career that they don't even enjoy, because they think they have too many expenses to do anything else. That's crazy. Or sometimes people think they're so needed at their job that there's no way they could leave, because no one else could fill their role. That's just condescending. We should do what we do because we love it. Being good at it and being paid decently for it are secondary and tertiary. In fact, I contend that if we love what we do we will eventually become good at it and get paid at least fairly for it. And getting paid fairly for our work is all we should expect. What is fair? Whatever the purchaser is willing to pay. Yes, some customers will be stingy, others will be generous, but most will be fair. I know this from experience. Do what you love, and everything else you need will fall into place. There will be hard times, but happiness is a choice.
Some people may say I am trivializing the inevitable tragic parts of life that we all eventually experience at least once or twice. I'm not though. Not even theme parks are completely free of tragedy. We live in a fallen world, and we will potentially face adversity wherever we go. As much as theme parks try to build a Utopia, the fact remains: there is no Utopia here on earth.
I believe we need to go through the stages of grief when we experience a tragedy, but, as St. Paul wrote, "this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:17). Life is a theme park not only because it provides opportunities to embrace a new thrill at every corner, but also because it is merely a staged set compared to the true glory that awaits us in heaven where we will experience reality in its fullness.
This post has taken on a much deeper tone than I originally intended. I hope the reader understands my tendency to wander off into tangential territory once in a while. But let's go back to the original subject matter now.
I still haven't decided which statistics are most important to share regarding my rideshare and delivery work, so don't look for consistency here. For the most part, how much I made per hour, how many hours I worked, how much I made in a month, and the number of trips I took are most important (at least that's how it seems this month), so here are those stats for the month of May 2024:
Amount Made (Net) | Hours | $/hour | Trips |
$1,506.43 | 92.8 | $16.23 | 175 |
It's a good (and fun!) habit to try and beat my own records each month, so I will try to do that in these four categories this month. My record month is still April 2024, when I made:
Net | Hours | $/hour | Trips |
$2,534.99 | 125.3 | $20.23 | 219 |
I did achieve a slightly better hourly rate in October/November 2023 ($21.90), but that's probably because I was driving my Ford Fusion with better fuel economy. I'm only now learning how to take bigger gigs that my Dodge Journey could accommodate and my Fusion could not, so hopefully that advantage will begin to show in future months.
If you want to see any other stats regarding my rideshare and delivery work, let me know which ones you want to see in the comments. If you want to join me and make some money of your own, here are some referral links:
Drive with Lyft in New Jersey, and you get a bonus up to $150 if you give 130 rides in your first 30 days. Terms apply.
Earn with Uber. Earn at least $1,480 for your first 150 passenger trips in 30 days.
Thanks for joining me on my journey back into the black.
Featured image generated by Midjourney
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