I am always a little jealous of retired people, even if the other party is Angela Merkel, because I have not yet been able to retire. I always ask how old is the earliest I can enter a nursing home, and can I be an exception. In fact, I have always felt like a centenarian. On the football field, when our central defender strikes back, I will stay away from the midfield “for safety reasons”. Sometimes I forget one of the three major tenor singers. After finally remembering it, I realize that I am now one of the top ten tenor singers.
Why not just go straight and move into a nursing home now? I can make sure that the room I live in has the best view of the rose flower bed. I can be the strongest man at the Elderly Prom, watching the other residents arrive tremblingly and belatedly. Although my knee may be a bit problematic, I can dance while sitting, and I can even sway a colorful silk scarf in my hand and dance enthusiastically. In the nursing home, I may finally be free to finish my university studies. Didn’t Brian May, the guitarist of the British Queen, have a PhD in physics at the age of 60 (after interrupting his studies for more than 30 years)?
When I was young, I always thought: If I get bored after retirement, I can read all the works of popular fiction writer Carl May. At the time, I felt relieved that I wanted to. After all, there were 70 of them. Boredom is a terrible threat. Why can’t we celebrate Christmas every day? Or at least the TV show “Want to Challenge” is broadcast every night? Slowly, I got used to the boredom well. After all, this was a must-have skill at the time, because we had no internet access, TV had no programs for a long time, and both parents had jobs.
We use a pencil sharpener to sharpen all the pencils that can be found at home, use them to pierce a huge eraser; hold the tennis ball in our mouth, spit it up, and then catch it with our mouth, and so on, and so on; call the TV station to tell the time Check whether the time shown on the TV is correct, and then practice closing your eyes to estimate for one minute; try to hold two straws at the same time; stand upside down for half an hour to make the brain blood flow full and double wisdom; put a Smurf doll on the record , See how he turns; put the long biscuit into your mouth as much as possible, but don’t break it.
I was sure at that time that I would definitely go to West Germany in the future. Over there, boredom is gone, video recorders, computer games and drugs (of course I don’t take drugs, because addicts will die in the toilets of train stations) everywhere. Some people work too hard and get myocardial infarction, and some people don’t have a job at all. Before going to bed, I always imagine how happy relatives who picked me up at the train station would say, “You are finally here!” They proudly introduced me to everyone, as if I was a child prodigy, and it was only because I came from the East. Germany.
Another thought keeps me awake at night: I want to choose a career that I will be deeply bound to for the rest of my life. I imagined myself every morning before sunrise as an inconspicuous little spot in the flow of people who couldn’t see my head. I walked through the dim factory gate with a pigskin bag on my back, which contained lunch boxes, hot water bottles and rest time. Counting the days leading to retirement next to the molding machine or sewage pump. We were not only forced to appear in a certain company every day after our childhood, but we also learned to think independently and listen to our hearts at an early age, and we were driven out from there. Many men still go out every morning after retiring with a bag of papers to prevent neighbors from making gossips.
Cookies in the shape of a Merkel silhouette
Around 1950, former German Chancellor Adenauer who grew roses
I know very well that my profession is just a disguise. I will work mainly because I can get things that are difficult to buy in East Germany. Chefs can have glass bottles for ketchup, scientists can have printing paper, and doctors can have sharp scalpels. Unable to decide what I want to do in the future, I became a writer so that I at least always feel that the best in life is yet to come. In any case, when people reach old age, they can finally read the children’s book “Michele from Ronebega” again (this time with grandchildren), and they can enter the zoo for free and apply for various discount cards over 65 years old. Go to the barber shop again, you can enter the higher age group in the Berlin Marathon, and at the same time is the youngest among them, you can wear a hearing aid, you can also turn it off when a visitor arrives, ignoring all unwilling speech.
I have never been jealous of Merkel’s work, which naturally includes getting up early in the morning, never getting sick, and always being vigilant to prevent the country from getting into trouble. I only envy her that she has three bottles of drinks in front of her every meeting, and she definitely doesn’t need to pay (and she never touches it most of the time! If it were me, I would hide it and take it home. Therefore, When attending a recitation meeting, I always ask the organizer to prepare a bottle of red wine with a stopper). In addition, as the head of government, she can receive great gifts every time she visits her country. The host will rack her brains to choose a gift that makes her happy, and she can also spread her preferences cleverly through intelligence agencies.
But in addition to free drinks and gifts, all year round must decide what is good in everything? In contrast, it’s more fun to not follow orders in private. I have to make constant decisions in disciplining my children, which annoys me. Faced with children, I acted as if I always knew the correct answer, persisted and tried to remember my persistence, so as not to ask them the exact opposite next time I was not careful.
My parents are Tchibo’s loyal customers for many years. Almost everything in the family comes from Tchibo’s flagship brand TCM. As East Germans, they know that they cherish a handful of items and only buy those on the shelves, and they are happy that someone makes a decision for them. There are enough annoying decisions in life: pizza or pasta? Big room or small room? Burial or cremation? There is no end! Then, as the prime minister, you have to decide whether to sanction Russia or conclude a trade agreement with Russia, whether to sell weapons to Turkey or Greece, and whether to support or expel the Interior Minister Seehofer. Once the wording is incorrect, there may be a diplomatic crisis, and the DAX index will plummet. And no one will thank you! I would say “thank you” to the courier (and even go down the stairs to meet him), I would also thank the waiter in the restaurant, the beggar who pressed the button on the control door of the savings bank for me, but thank the Federal Chancellor? Nothing!
It is strange that nonetheless, some of us are willing to bite this sour apple and voluntarily take over the position of Federal Chancellor. Fortunately, this is the case, otherwise the classic scene at the kindergarten parent meeting is likely to appear: when it comes to who brings the bib home to wash, who is responsible for preparing gifts for the teacher in the next two years, everyone has a stiff expression and drooping eyes. The nerves are tight. At this time, don’t make any noise, even if it’s just your knees, you will lose. I learned this in the army: learn to keep a low profile, never raise your hand voluntarily, and don’t attract attention!
Photographer Andreas Mir has taken pictures of Merkel many times. This time, he asked his 70-year-old mother Annegrett Hahn, a theater director to pretend to be Merkel, and took a set of photos in the former Federal Chancellery in Bonn to reflect Merkel’s retirement. Mill said: “I am 41 years old and Merkel has been in power for 16 years. This is a long time and a large part of my life.” These photos have been in Dresden since July 10th. display. Prior to this, Mill had taken a set of Merkel-like photos. At that time, the federal government even thought it necessary to declare that the woman in the photo was not Angela Merkel herself.
It is said that power is addictive. Once the head of government has stepped down, how big is the psychological gap?
Merkel can travel to China with college students to see the relics of the Tang Dynasty; read all the newspapers every morning, write letters to tell the editorial office of the spelling error of the author’s name; try to make a hole in the candy with the tip of the tongue.
She can play the piano like former Prime Minister Schmidt, grow roses like Adenauer, write memoirs like de Gaulle, play golf like Trump, or engage in extramarital affairs like Mitterrand. Many leaders of countries also write poems, such as Stalin, Karadzic and Mao Zedong. Berlusconi also recorded a love song record.
She can also reserve a small supporting role in a movie by director Wim Wenders. If a leader of the country dies, she can be secretly happy because she can chat with her old colleagues at the funeral. If there is really nothing to do, it is always right to enjoy a foot care.
In short, you should find a hobby for yourself in time. My grandfather specially collected stamps with beautiful women’s portraits, which made my grandmother angry, and when he sorted the stamps, she could not ventilate the kitchen, otherwise the stamps would fly everywhere. Although there is always an unpleasant smell of cabbage at home, my grandfather never complained about being bored.
I feel very sorry, because Merkel is about to retire, I may never be able to talk to her about her policies anymore. I actually have some suggestions for improvement, such as how to make all crimes disappear: If it is stipulated that all citizens must wear police uniforms at all times, people will never know if the opposite is a real policeman, and they will abide by the law if they are prudent. The police are needed. For another example, you can play the original film with subtitles on the TV so that the Germans can learn foreign languages by themselves; if the car horn makes a fart sound, the honking will be reduced, at least it will not sound so harsh; the speed of the revolving door of the mall cannot be Based on the slowest walking disabilities imaginable; at least half of all parking lots in front of discount markets, furniture stores and supermarket chains can be planned for residential areas; for our time, the federal with sharp claws The eagle appears to be too aggressive, and I prefer our national emblem to be a sloth; the right to nap should be written into the Basic Law; the school hours of primary and secondary schools should not be earlier than 9 o’clock. And the most important thing is that orthography should be cancelled. After all, the most important thing is what we say, not how to write it.
Photographer Andreas Mill
An official photo taken by Andreas Mir for Chancellor Merkel in 2009
Angela Merkel can visit me at any time when he is bored. We can observe the hallucinating patterns together, talk about the very fashionable retro costumes and interesting outdated youth language, look at the former East German film “The Legend of Paul and Paula” or the old crime film “The Police Call “Or “Retired People Never Free” starring Helbert Kefir (he is 100 years old!).
