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I'll start off with the line itself:

親公認で付き合えるこの状況だけで、奇跡と思わなくっちゃいけない。

The line seems simple enough. I know だけ has a few more meanings than just "only" but none of those appear to fit here either and I get the feeling "only" is close to what's intended, but not not quite right. Here my literal, word-for-word translation: "In only this situation that I can go out with him/her with parental authorization, I must think it a miracle." It's ugly but I think it makes sense, save for "in only this situation". It's plain my understanding of that is wrong. How should I be interpreting だけ here?

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  • 1
    Did it actually say 奇跡を instead of 奇跡と?
    – user4032
    May 15, 2016 at 23:40
  • It did actually say 奇跡を I believe. I will double check when I get a chance.
    – FinS
    May 15, 2016 at 23:45
  • Whoops, never mind. It did indeed say 奇跡と. My bad, tried to write it from memory.
    – FinS
    May 15, 2016 at 23:47

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「[親公認]{おやこうにん}で[付]{つ}き[合]{あ}えるこの[状況]{じょうきょう}だけで、[奇跡]{きせき}と[思]{おも}わなくっちゃいけない。」

「だけで」＝「だけでも」 in this context.

It means "even just", expressing the fact that a seemingly bare minimal condition would actually look quite satisfactory if one tried to see it from another perspective.

"Even just this situation where we can go out with our parents' permission, we would need to consider a miracle."

It implies that one should not hope for more too soon.

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  • I am a native speaker and I think this answer is correct. Nicely put!
    – Jun Sato
    May 16, 2016 at 17:43
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With just [her?] parent's OK to go out, I could only think "miraculous [is life]"

So it could be translated as "with just ~Q" in this case.

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  • That's a good way of thinking about it. Thanks.
    – FinS
    May 16, 2016 at 0:28

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