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There are many enduring mysteries in pop/rock music: "what did Billy Joe McAllister and his girlfriend throw off the Tallahatchie Bridge?" and "What won't Meat Loaf do for love?" and "What the hell is 'froggy style'?" Paul Simon has contributed to this choral cold case file a couple of times, and while it'd be nice to know what he and Julio were doing down by the schoolyard, the more compelling mystery comes from his 1975 hit, "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover."

I imagine that most of you are familiar with the song, but here's the capsulized version in case you aren't: the narrator, presumably Simon, is meeting with a woman who wants to help him leave his lover. She tells him that there must be fifty ways to do so, but they really only discuss five (arguably six).

This makes some sense; a couple is having dinner or some other quick meeting, and they're able to rattle off five ways to leave lovers pretty quickly, so it's not too much of a stretch to say "if we can think of this many this quickly, then there must be, like, fifty." But without elaborating on those other ways, I think the listeners are right in feeling a little cheated. Here's the established list:

1. Slip out the back, Jack
   
2. Make a new plan, Stan
   
3. Don't need to be coy, Roy
   
4. Hop on the bus, Gus
   
5. Drop off the key, Lee

The arguable one is "just get yourself free," which is repeated.

I've seen other attempts to flesh out the fifty ways, but they often devolve into "five ways to leave your lover, and forty-five ways to kill them," which is not how the line goes. So I'm going to do one better. Here's my attempt to help you in your struggle to be free: the missing forty-five ways to leave your lover.

6. Write up a scene, Jean
   
7. Do it on stage, Paige
   
8. Sing it in chorus, Morris
   
9. Take out an ad, Tad
   
10. Act like a dick, Nick
    
11. Bail on a date, Nate
    
12. Call her a bitch, Mitch
    
13. Say he smells bad, Brad
    
14. Say he's too small, Saul
    
15. Stick her with the bill, Will
    
16. Tell her she's fat, Pat
    
17. Give her a spank, Frank
    
18. Make him feel pain, Jane
    
19. Take him to a bris, Kris
    
20. You could just beat 'er, Peter
    
21. Don't brush your teeth, Keith
    
22. Live like a slob, Bob
    
23. Bogart his weed, Reid
    
24. Say you've got crabs, Babs
    
25. Give him VD, Bree
    
26. Dump him for his twin, Lynn
    
27. Say that you're gay, Jay
    
28. Say you're a man, Ann
    
29. Have sex with her dad, Chad
    
30. Do it through text, Rex
    
31. Do it by phone, Joan
    
32. Send it by mail, Gail
    
33. Just go for a drive, Clive
    
34. Pack up and leave, Steve
    
35. Tell her you're dead, Ted
    
36. Shave all his hair, Clare
    
37. Sell her as a slave, Dave
    
38. Blaspheme her god, Todd
    
39. Just pull the plug, Doug
    
40. Fake your own death, Beth
    
41. Give her no space, Chase
    
42. Make him feel blue, Sue
    
43. Say "go to Hell", Nell
    
44. Sing "You're so Vain," Lane
    
45. Take back her ring, Bing
    
46. Say you won't marry, Gary
    
47. Get up and get gone, Dawn
    
48. Just say how you feel, Neil
    
49. Tell her the truth, Ruth
    
50. Just try 'em all, Paul

And get yourself free.