Let's Play By: Isa Meu Graduate Student Card: 4 Does a story usually start with the description of the main character? Or would you rather consider jumping right into the nuts and bolts? I guess in my case a description needs to come first so you don’t get the wrong ideas about who I am. Just think of me as one of the people you’ve never met but always wanted to meet: Handsome, not too smart but certainly not dumb, interesting, easy to get along with. The type of person your Mom would want to see as your significant other. But the most interesting part about me that I usually do not share – and I do it now only because I know you, dear reader, will never tell anyone – is what I do for a living. I like my job; I would even be so bold and say I love it. I’m on duty 24 hours a day, seven days a week, every week of the year. I get to talk to people; I get to hang out with the coolest kid on the block, I get to play games. You may be wondering what it is that I’m doing, well, let’s put it this way: I’m a helper. I’m a helper of sorts for people in all kinds of situations, but not like a business advisor or a counselor. My clientele is every‐thing from star to bum, from millionaire to burger‐flipping teen. I lend them my ear, let them spill out their secrets talk about their fears. And then I help them. One of the people I got to know very well over a longer amount of time was Jim. Jim had had a rough year and was about to jump from a bridge when I came to the res‐cue. He let me take care of him for a while, wondering why I was friendly and didn’t judge him (of course I did, but only secretly, I never told him). Jim had been perfectly happy until he was laid off, then his life went downhill and he never recovered. His wife left him and took the kids with her; he couldn’t pay the mortgage on the house anymore, in short: He was screwed. That’s when he decided to jump off that bridge and I stepped into the picture. For me there’s one thing about my job that I really dearly love and that’s finding out what the person truly wants. And then to give it to him. With Jim it was fairly easy, he wanted to die. And that is not my interpretation, that is what he told me! “Eddy”, he said, “Eddy, all I really want is to get out of this place and move on”. That’s a clear statement to me. And he said he wanted to see his wife and kids again (and get even with his wife). I said I would help him in any possible way. The tricky part about my job is to actually keep up with what’s going on, otherwise you’ll literally have your ass dragged to hell if you’re not careful enough. I sat down after our talk and drew up a chart with all the information I had of Jim, so I would be prepared later on. I needed to get together with my colleagues and decide what to do about Jim. Usually we would get together over Pizza and Beer, make a couple of jokes and enjoy sharing our stories. This time we went right down to work. “Drown”, “Decapitation”, “Suffocation”, everybody was shouting and marking off little squares on a board whenever a word came up. I already had “Electrocution” and “Poison” on my card, when my colleague Amy yelled “BINGO” and waved her hands frantically in the air. We congratulated her on the victory, clapping and shaking hands. As I looked down on my card I was satisfied with the result and stuffed it back into my pocket. I was pleased it had worked out so well. Are you wondering what happened to Jim? Well, he got what he asked for. He saw his wife and kids one last time. And he’ll be electrocuted in about an hour hence my reminiscing about his case. He poisoned his wife and got caught, now he’ll move on to a better place. And he should be thankful I arranged that for him! Although the last time we met he screamed bloody murder. But that is part of playing “Death Bingo”… there’s money, death and passion.