A life in search

(DE) When I think twice, then I am a Percival, yes, yes, quite right, Percival, but female.

Perceval, the young fool, who after an encounter with knights in shining armour only knows one goal: to be a magnificent powerful knight as well, but on the journey behaves ridiculous, ruthless and self-important. He considers himself a knight early on, after putting on the with force conquered armour, and wanders around in a belligerent manner. The fools’ robe under the armour, however, determines his perception of the world and also his actions.

Yes, this is how you could describe the start of my adult life. I dreamed of these novel and film characters of the 50s and 60s. A beautiful, strong-willed and sexy woman who knows what she wants and finds the meaning of life and the love of her life.

Role models

The women in my family - typical beauties of the 50s.

My grandmother’s cheap romance novels about doctors and nobility, as well as the films about the perfect life in homeland and nature or Doris Day films of that time, fired my imagination of the happiness to be found. My holy grail.

Being a beautiful young woman was easy and I was desired, but I was certainly not independent, and apart from my soppy image of happiness, I had no idea what I actually wanted of life and what the meaning of life could be.

What my parents practised was the joy of consumption. Modern interior design, amazing clothes, good food, a fancy car, trips to Italy and everything else that gradually came onto the market. But, it was clear to me they had not found happiness. Neither did they love their jobs or found fulfilment in them, nor did they love each other or our family. At most the image that we gave to the outside world filled their lives with something that you could call meaningful. So only the ideas of writers and film directors were relevant to my search. And these created high demands and gigantic expectations or repulsive scenarios of a botched life that had to be avoided. A Black and White picture. Similar to Percival, my instruction in life matters was sometimes quite misleading and far from reality.

I wanted to appear cool, but I had a lot of questions.

So, I wandered around, always in search of fulfilment in job and love, and that on a high level. From my escape from a deadly boring apprenticeship into an academic education, I have told elsewhere. But was I on my way now? Did I now know what I wanted or had I only known what I did not want?

Pounding steps into life

My circle of friends, including each of the young men I thought were the love of my life, studied, so I studied too. I didn’t think much about what to study. Therefore the one of my friends who was particularly enthusiastic about his studies served me as a role model. I was used to pictures; they had guided me. So, I studied German, history and social studies with the purpose to become a teacher at a grammar school. The fact that because of my school education I did not even have the prerequisites (Latinum) for this course of study, did not deter me. I failed miserably in my attempt to fix this shortcoming. However, fate was good to me in that I was able to go with another young man, again a love of my life, to Berlin, where there was no need for Latin for German studies and social studies.

Uprooting

An answer to the question of the meaning of life?

Yet uprooting did not lead to independence and a search for meaning free from constraints and conventions. The fear of being alone was greater than ever. By now, I was looking for the meaning of life less at work, but much more in a relationship and the family. It was not planned, but not quite unintentionally either that I became pregnant and had a son before sitting the final exams. Mother and child are already a family. And you do not have to search for the meaning of life because it lies in the cot and screams.

Although I was still able to complete my studies successfully, my professional development was not a priority for the time being.

Nevertheless, I wanted to vehemently distance myself from the idea of an intact world in a nuclear family. The spirit of the times, bundled in literature and film, required the overcoming of conventions. But what should the alternative? How did you become happy now?

We formed a flat-sharing community with friends, who also had a child of the same age. Marriage and life in a nuclear family were out of the question. Well, my contribution to revolutionising the conventional Doris Day ideals. And I was looking for a job beyond raising children.

At the adult education centre, I was able to teach German as a foreign language two to four times a week. So even an ideologically questionable but financially rational marriage was somehow justified. I also had to accept the failure of the flat-sharing community as a concept of life and, to be honest, I wasn’t very sad about it. We now lived in close friendship but separated in small families.

Back to the beginning? I became ill. At the beginning of our anti-nuclear-family crusade, I had to have one ovary removed. After returning to a more conventional life, the second ovary was also severed. Confused and disorientated, I had to start to mull over my life concept again.

Were we a happy family? No! Was he the love of my life? No! Was I independent? No! Did I know what I wanted? Yes! To find the Holy Grail of life. And where I was, the Holy Grail of Life was clearly not! At that point, I had not even the faintest idea what it was supposed to look like!

At that time I did not see the contradiction in my ideas and expectations. On the one hand, I wanted autonomy, freedom, independence, achieve great things, with my child in my arms, secure in a group of like-minded people; in other words the ideal of the 68ers and later. On the other hand, I was looking for love, security, family, the little happiness in a relationship; the ideal of my childhood, which had only been shown to me in films, never in real life.

Restart – next attempt

So it was time to set off and continue searching!

Separation, new relationship, a move, a new task. I started writing articles and finally took over the editorial office of an advertising journal and made it into an editorially recognised weekly regional newspaper.

As a journalist one has some influence and that makes sense.

In my reports and articles I was able to draw attention to problems, report on political processes, comment on art and culture, attend press conferences and ask questions, interview local and other politicians or celebrities. That does make sense!

Alternative without the promise of the Grail

Goal reached? After the initial euphoria, which lasted a few years, it was clear that by doing this work I could not really make a difference or create something. This regional advertising paper was too small and insignificant. Essentially everything remained the same. I searched in the politics, art and esotericism for solutions to the pressing question of the meaning of my life. I did not find exactly what I wanted, but there were some attempts.

The relationship also did not live up to the hopes I had placed in it. Luck of life, nothing! Again there was nothing to feel of the togetherness that I had read about and seen in films. Even Beauvoir and Sartre seemed more harmonious than me and my husband. The love of my life had even become the nightmare of my life.

And then something happened that threw me off track. I became ill.

Illness – another attempt

After a major operation in which it as by no means clear whether I would survive, I was able to do something about my bad attitude towards life.

After some half-hearted attempts not to break all bridges behind me, I found myself in teacher training in a different town. I lived with my son and a colleague in a shared flat and had separated myself from everything that had been depressing. However, it soon became clear that this search and the associated changes of location and career had a price. I also lost friends and opportunities that I had liked.

But even this adventure, which I experienced at the age of 40, did not bring me closer to my goal. The holy grail of happiness in life was as nebulous in its form as it had been at the beginning of my journey.

I achieved my goal of becoming a qualified teacher, but because of my age and the fact that my first state examination was from a University in Berlin – and not recognised in Bavaria, I was not able to find a job in Bavaria.

From now on, the stops on my journey where I had to get off and change trains, were not necessarily chosen freely. But the hope of finding the Grail always accompanied me.

Constraints – several attempts

For two years I sold newspapers at the International Press News Agents at the town’s Central Station. After that, I ran courses for a non-profit organisation targeted at marginalised young people enabling them to obtain a school leaving certificate. Then I worked as a freelance writer and online editor for a management consultancy. When the economy collapsed and companies started to make cuts, I had to register as unemployed. Finally, I was able to get a job as a part-time teacher at a municipal grammar school on a fixed-term contract. I earned as much as I received in unemployment benefit but at least I had something useful to do. The students may have had a different opinion, but all right. After leaving my temporary contract I went back to my hometown where I found a position at a private school. However, after one and a half years of exploitation, I could bear it no longer. There were so many lessons, substitution and supervision hours to be done each week that I had difficulty finding time for preparation and marking. In the long run, I could not live up to my expectations as working more superficially so as not to collapse is not given to me. So I tried again to get a job at a municipal school in a larger city.

The Grail – within reach

At a municipal comprehensive school, I came closest to the Holy Grail. I was allowed to design my lessons quite freely, work in teams with open and creative colleagues and make friends. The family background of the pupils was often problematic. Performance and willingness to learn were often low and the parents not accessible. But we fought for every student. We were successful. It was fun, it made sense! However, a change in leadership brought my engagement to a premature end. I simply could not get used to and adapt to these new exclusively absurd teaching methods and a climate of compulsion and fear.

Consequently, like so many other members of the College, I asked for a transfer, which was granted to almost everyone. But by now I had landed in the world of a normal grammar school, in which some teachers have been working all their lives, where change was not welcomed, teamwork was not an option and the support of a new colleague was very limited. Parents were more present but often demanding and suspicious of teachers.

Only a project, initiated by the director to integrate foreign children and young people into the regular school system, even into the Gymnasium, was to my taste again. This work made sense. My new task was to guide, design and lead the team. Yes, that came close to the holy grail. It was a great pleasure for me to develop this pilot project, but also a lot of work. Now, at the age of 63, after all these years of constant beginnings, I was just about able to do the job. But my strength faded. I felt that I would no longer hold this holy grail in my hands.

I had given up the dream of the love of my life decades before and now also the dream of the meaning of my work, of great lasting achievement. My time was over. It broke my heart, or rather, I suffered a heart attack during the first few days of my holidays in the year 2016.

At the end of the search

I survived, but I never returned.

When I look back on my life, I see a woman who has successfully pursued several professions, but which never led to the goal she dreamed of. Love relationships were not even remotely successful in her life. After all, for most of her life, she could not even stay in one place. Since when I was 16 years old I moved about 20 times and I don’t have the feeling that I will ever arrive at the Grail Castle. Here ends the proximity to Percival’s search. He finds to the true knighthood, founds and lives in a happy family, proves himself worthy of the Grail…

I, on the other hand, have not discovered the meaning of my life or the love of my life. That means I have not found my Holy Grail. I have always sought and never really given up. And, let me make it clear at this point, I do not believe that the way can be the goal.

Appreciation of the search

But do I have reason to complain? To whomever.

Yes, I have no solid ground under my feet. Yes, I never found the happiness of life in many ways, above all in terms of my somewhat naive ideas. Yes, I did not become the one I had imagined. Yes, I let go of all the dreams of my youth.

But I am someone who is still willing to learn.

I have spent my life with hopes for the future and now at the age of 67, I am learning to live in the present.

All my life I tried to realise my ideas of life and love. Today I try not to develop any more ideas, just to see what else there is for me.

I have a wide range of experience, insights and knowledge in my rucksack and while that is also a burden, it is mainly a treasure. I want to look at it, to appreciate its beauty, use the useful and dispose of the useless. Maybe my holy grail is underneath and I just didn’t discover it in the heat of the battle of my life. (TA)