How foolish we all were to think that Ariana Grande was done delivering bops with the drop of her 2018 album Sweetener. The "God Is A Woman" songstress had one more track tucked away: "Thank U, Next," which is both an ode to her exes and the song with the most memeable lyrics of the year.
How do we know? According to Twitter, 1.5 million tweets featuring the words "thank u, next" hit the streaming platform after Grande teased the lyrics on November 2. Plus, that line "one taught me love, one taught me patience, and one taught me pain"? Over 240,000 tweets have mentioned it in the last 48 hours alone, per a release from Twitter.
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That's not exactly surprising, as Grande's new song helped her surpass 2 billion streams on Apple Music, according to the streaming service (casual). It also means that there are a whole bunch of memes to sift through, which could not be more worth it.
Below, some zeitgeist-y favorites.
One taught me love, one taught me patience, and one taught me pain pic.twitter.com/yOJYuPobkf
— The Office (@theofficenbc) November 5, 2018
one taught me love, one taught me patience, one taught me pain pic.twitter.com/jcPkfsmHH4
— Ayo Edebiri (@ayoedebiri) November 5, 2018
one taught me love
— tasbeeh herwees (@THerwees) November 5, 2018
one taught me patience
and one taught me pain pic.twitter.com/H38xEMfzB3
one taught me love, one taught me patience, one taught me that if he hasn't introduced me to any of his friends after three months something is up
— Dana Schwartz (@DanaSchwartzzz) November 6, 2018
Of course, there's no person to meme "Thank U, Next" better than the person behind the lyrics.
Grande herself took to Twitter to respond to a fan's Gossip Girl-inspired "Thank U, Next" meme. Maybe it's from the perspective of Blair (Leighton Meester) because it features Chace Crawford's Nate ("one taught me love,") Ed Westwick's Chuck ("one taught me patience") and Penn Badgley's Dan ("one taught me pain.")
one taught me love
— sav (@grandemeester) November 6, 2018
one taught me patience
one taught me ... pain. pic.twitter.com/4d2yIBvuZM
"and to dan we say thank u, next," joked the original tweeter, who was clearly not happy with his big Gossip Girl reveal, either. (I, personally, did ship Dan and Blair, but I know I'm in the small but vocal minority here.)
and to dan we say thanku, next !
— sav (@grandemeester) November 6, 2018
Grande, however, has a Gossip Girl guy she's totally here for, and it's not Nate, Dan, or Chuck.
"we saying thank u next to all these characters," she wrote. "get u a cyrus rose."
we sure do ! actually ... we saying thank u next to all these characters. get u a cyrus rose. pic.twitter.com/nnFcGB0NuJ
— Ariana Grande (@ArianaGrande) November 6, 2018
For the uninitiated, Cyrus Rose is Blair's stepdad, played by the "inconceivable" Wallace Shawn. He's a hilarious man, kind father figure, and also the guy who brought Lady Gaga to Blair's birthday party. Basically, we should all stan.
If there's one thing that the popularity of Grande's "Thank U, Next" taught us, it's that maybe the world is ready to embrace healthy relationships. Or, you know, maybe we're just always here for good meme content. Either or.
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