My father used to be mayor for a party with a “C” in its name.

He is now retired, but the highlight of the week for him is still going to church on Sunday.

And what follows after it: the morning pint.

There's always beer, gossip and polemics there.

Anna Lena Ripperger

Editor in Politics.

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But at the church the pastors are scarce and the landlady of the "Hirschen", the last inn in town, no longer opens every Sunday.

Bad times for regulars.

Corona was just one problem out of many.

When the "Hirsch" was allowed to open again after the lockdown, my mother warned my father that he should please wear a mask at the morning pint if he absolutely had to go there.

The fact that she obviously hadn't understood the principle of the regulars' table – men gather to talk or be silent, but in any case to drink a lot of beer – was acknowledged by my father with silence.

He picked up his keys, put on his hat and set off.

Regular meetings are out of the question

I looked after him wistfully.

Not because I was so keen on the local brewery's pilsner.

Especially not at eleven in the morning.

But my father apparently had friends who wanted to see him regularly.

I have friends too.

Some of them even live near me.

But regular meetings are out of the question.

It's not me.

I am highly flexible when it comes to planning my free time.

The problem is: the others too.

And no one wants to commit.

The fear of deciding too early on something that could later turn out to be a worse alternative is too great.

And so we all put up with each other for as long as possible.

"Is this for everyone?"

These are, for example, my friends who I met during my studies and who, like me, stayed in the city.

Considering that everyone "can't say right now" whether they have time for a meeting on day X or whether they're more likely to visit friends in Valencia, we see each other surprisingly often.

But these meetings are always preceded by a grueling coordination process:

A: See you this week?

I have tennis on Wednesday.

Otherwise I can actually always.

Except for the weekends, when I'm in Berlin.

B: How about Thursday?

Before that, I'm on a business trip.

C: I'm probably at a concert there.

what about friday

A: Hm, I actually wanted to go to Berlin right after work on Friday, but I'll check again for trains on Saturday morning.

C: Is this for everyone?

Then we could fix Friday?

D: Phew, I don't even know what my week looks like right now.

Why don't you come up with something and then I'll see if I can do it.

How about, one of these friends and I thought, if we put an end to this misery?

With a fixed appointment, our jour fixe, so to speak?

If there is only one day a week for a meeting between back course, baby swimming and "Business English" training, why not commit to it right away?

Far too binding

One evening over pizza and wine - it had taken us almost two weeks to agree on a date - we tackled the matter.

It's always so nice when we meet, we start our advertising campaign.

Wouldn't we – yes, we knew, a somewhat narrow-minded suggestion – not want to reserve a specific day for it?

Gladly only every second week if that is easier for everyone.

Then the excruciatingly long process of finding appointments would be a thing of the past, and you wouldn't have to keep an eye on your cell phone and calendar all the time.

And the talks would be even more intense because we didn't have to bring each other "up to speed" first, we argued.

We had expected discussions, with questions and objections.

But none of that existed.

The answer of the others was simply: No, thank you, not interested, much too binding.

Who knows what you might miss out on - an aperitif with colleagues, a Tinder date or the long-awaited Netflix evening on the couch after a hard day's work.

I thought of the "Hirschen", my father and his friends from the regulars' table.

And I wish we were a little more like them and a little less like us.