I’ve never met Taylor Swift, but there’s very little I wouldn’t do for that woman.
Flying around the world to attend her shows? Been there, done that. Handing over all my money for tickets and merch? I’m broke but I’m going to the Eras Tour.
Spending hours trying to find Easter eggs and losing my mind trying to figure out what they mean? There were five holes in the fence!!!!! (Even the smallest detail in a Taylor Swift photo could signal she’s up to something. But some of us are guilty of taking things a bit too far when sleuthing…)
So with all that in mind, taking a day off work to celebrate her new album, The Tortured Poets Department (TTPD), being released was an absolute no-brainer – and didn’t seem like an odd thing to do to me.
But given some of the responses I’ve received since telling people why I booked the day off, you’d think I had confessed to committing some kind of heinous crime, instead of just wanting to listen to TTPD and drink wine in peace.
I’ve had everything from ‘You’re doing what?!’, ‘OMG you’re not serious’, ‘That’s a waste of annual leave’, ‘I’d never do that’ to ‘What the f**k is wrong with you?’
Those friends and colleagues would probably also be horrified to learn that it’s not the first time I’ve taken the day off for Taylor Swift either.
Last year, for instance, I booked 26 and 27 October off to attend Swiftogeddon – a club night dedicated to Taylor’s music – and then revel in 1989 (Taylor’s Version) while hungover (it was truly an experience).
I also took an entire week off last March to go to Glendale, Arizona, for the opening night of The Eras Tour, spending at least £2,000 on flights and a hotel.
For Swifties, this sort of thing is par for the course. Being a fan is pretty much a full-time job at this point. Like the Gilmore Girls would say: ‘It’s a lifestyle. It’s a religion.’
Don’t believe me? Take a look on social media. Pretty much every Swiftie I can see on there has booked the day off.
One fan I saw booked a midday massage, facial and manicure to ‘calm’ themselves down after ‘a morning of mayhem’, while another even said she’s going to take the day – which happens to be her hen do – ‘to fully blast the album in an empty house and cry’.
That’s exactly how I plan to spend the day too – holed up to take it all in solo.
Some people have taken it one step further and even booked additional days off to ‘recover’ from the new album.
The lengths that Swifties are willing to go to for Taylor and her music might seem ‘weird’ to some, but there’s actually a really simple (and scientific) reason why so many of us love the superstar and feel the need to celebrate albums like TTPD properly. Taylor makes us feel seen.
Taylor isn’t afraid to open up about her feelings and experiences within her music. The singer previously described her albums as ‘excruciatingly autobiographical’ and feeling like ‘some sort of live-streamed, public autopsy’ — and TTPD isn’t any different.
It’s no secret that Taylor went through a major break-up last year. While we don’t know her or her ex personally – or the ins and outs of their relationship – we all know what it’s like to experience some kind of heartbreak.
These situations can often be difficult to process and even trickier to articulate to others, which is where Taylor comes in.
She does a magnificent job of transforming our pain, fears, vulnerabilities, hopes and dreams into songs. Even if our lives couldn’t be more different, her lyrics make us feel like someone out there understands what we’ve gone through, and they let us know that we’re not alone.
For me, Taylor’s earlier eras will always hold such a powerful significance, as they were quite literally the soundtrack to my teenage years. I was fifteen and trying to navigate first love and heartbreak while she was singing about being fifteen and experiencing those very same things.
I’ve been able to grow up alongside her and her songs have only gotten more relatable as the years have passed.
I now know that breaking up with someone you’re in love with really does feel like death by a thousand cuts. You do still remember the good times all too well, and when you are finally ready to move on from it all, you’ll feel clean.
But it’s not all sad songs. Lover perfectly encapsulated what it felt like falling in love with my husband, and we played Paper Rings at our wedding as we had waited our whole lives for that very moment.
Tortured Poets is also going to be validating for so many listeners, but what’s especially important about this album is how important it’s been for Taylor to make.
Writing songs is what helps her make sense of her own life, and she’s openly confessed that she’s never needed to do that more than with TTPD.
Speaking to fans during an Eras Tour show in Melbourne in February, she said: ‘Songwriting is something that actually gets me through my life. I’ve never had an album where I needed songwriting more than I needed it on Tortured Poets.’
It’s obvious that a lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into making this album. As such, I want to give it the respect that it deserves, which – for me – means giving it my full attention and keeping the day free to do so without any distractions.
So I’ve taken the day off work to do just that and by the time you read this, I’ll probably be on my 113th listen.
Happy TTPD Day Swifties, I hope you’re enjoying it too and don’t forget to pencil in some time off for Reputation (Taylor’s Version) and Taylor Swift (Taylor’s Version) too, for whenever the final few of Taylor’s re-recordings are released…
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