Thursday, June 1, 2017

"How To Get Angela Merkel Back For Good"

We last visited the writer, Rebecca Schuman, in April's "What Do Germans Think of the Juicero?".
From The Awl:

 Deutschland ohne us.

We thought she’d be weak without us but she’s stronger. Thought she’d be broke without us, but she’s richer. We thought she’d be sad without us; she’s pounding pilsner.
 Yeah, yeah, we get it. She will survive and keep on surviving. 
The German term for dumping someone is jemandem den Laufpass geben (YAY-mon-dum dayn LOUF-poss GAY-bun), and literally means “to give someone his discharge papers,” a.k.a. the veritable dispensation of a giant cosmic jackboot, ejecting one from the army of love. (Don’t blame me for the Germans’ weird metaphors, man.) My fellow Americans, it’s not hard to read the beer foam: Angela has dumped us. She’s publicly changed her relationship status from ES IST KOMPLIZIERT to GO FUCK YOURSELF. She’s blocked us on Snapchat. She’s swiped whatever direction you swipe when you reject someone. She’s given us the Laufpass, and she’s fucking loving every second of it. 
But it’s cool. We’re fine without her. Like, we’re doing really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really great. Better than ever.

But let’s say, just for the sake of a thought experiment — something we now really enjoy doing as, like, a hobby, with all of the time we no longer have to spend on our RELATIONSHIP — we wanted to see if we could get her back. 
The first thing we’d realize, after a few failed attempts with a boombox and the Dolly Parton version of “I Will Always Love You,” is that grand romantic gestures do not have any discernible effect on a people who detest any display of public emotion that is not directly related to Robbie Williams leaving Take That or soccer (more on that in a minute). 
No, everybody knows that if we wanna win back our lover, we gotta get with her friends. We must ingratiate ourselves into, and make ourselves indispensable to, her posse, as my mother still calls a group of people who hang out together because she heard the New Kids on the Block say it in the 1989 Hangin’ Tough “documentary” I owned on VHS and insisted on watching every morning before middle school. In short, we must get good at doing the things that Angela’s friends like, so that they find themselves wanting to hang with us again without even realizing it. Before we know it, we’ve gone from wannabes to marquee members of die Crew, and Angela is simply so accustomed to finding us chilling everywhere she goes that she’ll forget she Heisman’d us in the first place. 
So, here are the things we have to feign expertise in, schnell. 
Soccer. I’m sorry, Fußball. The “real football,” as we will now call it henceforth, is very important to us, and we definitely understand it. The vicissitudes of the Bundesliga are extremely interesting and I for one would like to read about them in the newspaper for a long time, and then discuss them at length with anyone who also would like to discuss them at length. If we can only figure out who the favorite team of all of Angela’s friends is, and then orate over beers until very, very late into the night about what makes that team good at real-football — and thereby what counts as being good at real-football in the first place — then we will be BFFF once more....
...MUCH MORE
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