A Student for Life

After the more or less sudden end of AMY&PINK, I felt lost. By my late 30s, my life seemed to be over. What was there to come of it now? Except a heart attack from too many frozen pizzas, too little exercise, and too much jerking off to dubious porn. The only things that kept me alive were the interminable voicemails from my good friend Hannah, who probably knew me better than I knew myself at this point, the programming course that the employment office forced on me so that I wouldn’t be completely useless to society, and the fact that I was much too lazy and cowardly to commit suicide.

On a hot summer day, I went to Munich. After I had bought a book about Japanese pop culture, I sat down on a bench to skim through it. I noticed that I was in front of the city’s university. Young people were swarming around, chatting, laughing. The large buildings watched over the small figures, most of them scurrying around frantically, whose future would be formed in them.Two fashionable women had taken a seat next to me. The blonde proudly told me that her little sister had registered just in time for the entrance exam for the upcoming winter semester. The brunette marveled somewhat exaggeratedly. I hope she gets in! For sure!

I was sad that I never had the opportunity to become a student. When I got back home, I was interested in what I was allowed to study with my qualifications. Communication design. Graphic design. Interactive media. The last one sounded cool. I filled out the application form from the nearest university and was invited to the entrance exam and the following interview. Then I was a student. A few weeks earlier, I had thought that my life was over, that there was nothing more to come. But suddenly I found myself in a new story, with new goals, new tasks and new people. An unexpected adventure had begun. After all, I’m a student for life.