I like talking and listening with taxicab and ride-sharing drivers. It gets me away from only talking and listening to myself or my friends, who tend to have the same outlook on life as I do. It introduces me to new ways of looking at the world.

And it’s often interesting, which I figure comes with the fare. Like paying for a movie, though I would never eat popcorn in the backseat of a taxi.

Recently, I enjoyed one of the best rides ever. The driver told me two stories, both pretty amazing — one for its happiness, and one for what it told me of how convincing TikTok has become as a source of news to many people.

First, the happy-ending story.

The driver started talking about her life, how her teenage mother had given her up for adoption at birth. How she always wondered what her mom was like, how she wanted to meet her and build a relationship.

She never blamed her mother, accepting that it was the best decision mom could make at the time under the circumstances.

But she never gave up trying to connect with her mom. Sleuthing her way through social service agencies and closed adoption records, she succeeded in finding an agency that said it would deliver a letter to mom, telling her of her daughter’s interest in connecting.

She laughed as she told how the agency tracked down mom at her job, handed her an official looking envelope, and mom feared it was a notice from a collection agency. But after reading it, she realized it was a different kind of past due notice. Her daughter wanted to see her.

They met, they talked and they shared the lives that each had missed. 

Then we switched subjects, though I’m not sure why. The driver started talking about data centers. That’s when I learned she gets all of her “news” from TikTok. 

She told me data centers have single buildings that stretch for miles, all under one roof, and that developers dig down 50 feet or more, probably to hide secret stuff underground. She was particularly concerned about those 50-foot-deep holes and why no one knows about them, as if anyone could hide a hole as deep as a five-story building.

She continued reciting what she had learned about data centers from TikTok. It was all pretty unbelievable to me, but I was along for the ride, not to debate.

And while discussing her reliance on TikTok, and her distrust of any other news source, she asked me if I knew about all the pyramids hidden around the United States. Real Egypt-like pyramids, built of limestone blocks. Real, though a secret to all but a few people.

She knows they’re real because she saw them on TikTok. I didn’t ask her if she knew the locations. I didn’t want to know, just in case I had been to the town and missed seeing a 100-foot-tall pyramid in front of my trifocal eyes.

She is totally convinced the pyramids are real, even though she admits she doesn’t know anyone who has seen them in person.

I thought about discussing with her that TikTok and social media are full of made-up “news” and manipulated photos. But she seemed so happy at finding her biological mom, I figured, who am I to question what she believes is real. She now knows her mom is real. After that, the pyramids really don’t matter.