Swiftie on the DL
I can’t hide it anymore….
by GIANNA LANFRANK ★ MARCH 29, 2023
I never listened to Taylor Swift growing up. She was my least favorite human on earth for the singular reason that she was dating the (then) love of my life: Harry Styles. So I refused to listen to or watch anything with her in it. Then, when my boyband phase passed (literally not that long ago, don’t judge), I just never got into her music. I never publicly hated on her, but just didn’t enjoy the vibes of her greatest hits. It wasn’t until the spring of my freshmen year that everything changed.
I was newly single for the first time in two years. I started dating around, but never found a great connection or had anything too serious. I became an entirely different person from being alone and focusing on myself and my friendships. Then the winter depression hit, some of my friends went abroad, and now I can’t get her out of my head. I’m not lying when I tell you there is a Taylor Swift song for every emotion I have ever felt in relation to love and growing up. I feel like I was robbed of being a preteen-obsessed swiftie just because of a guy I liked (they ruin everything, don’t they?). Now that I love her and listen to her daily, I know I will never tell a guy for fear of being judged. So many guys I know hate her; they think she’s absolutely crazy or a gigantic slut. But she’s real; a part of her life is in every young girl who romanticizes love and men. So here is what I love her for, and what my fav songs of hers mean to me.
“Cardigan” - folklore
This one is a real doozy. It’s about your first love, and ultimately your first heartbreak, and I won’t lie when I tell you I sobbed too many times to this song. Finally being chosen by someone, then having that end, but they still “linger like a tattoo kiss.” Then thinking about that relationship years later when you’re alone and reminiscing. Like, shut up. Just shut up.
“You’re on Your Own Kid” - Midnights
While this one is a bit newer, it’s become one of my favorites. Taylor is searching for love in the midst of not really knowing herself, while losing and gaining relationships throughout her life. If a lyric could be engraved into my heart it would literally be: “I hosted parties and starved my body like I’d be saved by a perfect kiss.” Let me just crawl into a hole and never talk to anyone again, thanks.
Getaway Car - Reputation
This is one of the more upbeat songs that I really enjoy. Although it is about her cheating on her boyfriend in order to get herself out of the relationship, the message itself is important. “Nothing good starts in a getaway car,” like, why would you think this relationship could ever work out if it started with me trying to escape another? Crazy, genius, amazing, goodbye.
Mirrorball - folklore
Another emo one, shocker. The first couple of times I listened to this song, I didn’t really like it. But one day I started really listening during the bridge (the best part of most of her songs, in my opinion) and bursted into tears. “I’m still a believer but I don’t know why. I’ve never been a natural, all I do is try, try, try.” This same feeling has been brewing in my stomach for as long as I can remember, and it feels so good to hear these words and know I’m not alone.
Picking only four songs was nearly impossible, and I’m sure if I had written this article on a different night when it wasn’t snowing and my room wasn’t clean, there would be different songs in an entirely different order. But these pieces contain some of her best lyrics, which for me, hit very close to home right now. Not that this is new information to anyone who knows her, but Taylor Swift is a lyrical genius. With metaphors hidden behind and intertwined within each and every sentence, it’s like putting a puzzle together in your mind just to figure out what she's actually saying. I love it. While at first glance she’s just another girl who writes songs about boys, I hope those who don’t listen give her music a chance. Like a Twitter user once said, “Taylor could be Shakespeare, but Shakespeare could never be her.”