Today Is Never Too Late To Be Brand New

midnights is for the girls who tell their friends the most traumatizing shit through chuckles thinking its just a funny or weird childhood memory

The Great War is the prequel to Afterglow

but wait no I have more to say here. i’m just endlessly fascinated about this humongous, relationship-defining fight that Taylor and Joe had at some point. not what it was about or the details or anything cuz that’s none of our business, but just this concept she keeps exploring in songs like these of the next-level relationship security she feels because of some massive argument she expected to end things for good. the “i almost let my demons lead me to ruin this but you handled it perfectly and thats how i knew you were here to stay” of it all. it very much feels like she believes they had to go through that for her to fully fall into this relationship and trust and feel secure. i don’t think *all* relationships need that kind of trial by fire, but i definitely think Taylor did to be able to distinguish the real deal versus her past experiences. 

also stay stay stay is the precursor to all of this! the fact that she's been dreaming since her early twenties about a relationship where she just completely loses her shit for not a very good reason and her partner looks at that and says, "okay, well, this is not how to solve problems, however. i really love you, so i'm gonna do what i have to to stay with you." it's like her partner's response (via actions not words) to but i stay, when it's hard or it's wrong or we're making mistakes. anyway stay stay stay is a good song.

“give me back my girlhood it was mine first” is one of the most devastating lines I have ever heard…..something that is especially difficult for society, and men in particular, to understand, is that relationships or sex can be traumatic and damaging even if it was consensual - something doesn’t need to be a crime to be traumatizing. at the time she’s singing about in the song, Taylor was only 19, and this was a 32 year old man she absolutely idolized  - of course she would fall for his advances. yes, 19 is legal, but Taylor was so young then -she was still living with her parents, she was singing about true love in princess dresses on tour - she was still very much a girl, a naive teenager - so of course she would ignore every warning and jump at the chance to be with this older man who made her feel special. to then be discarded and played and realize you were just another notch in someone’s belt can be devastating on its own, but to go through this when that was the first or one of the first people that you were intimate with… to feel so thoroughly used and preyed upon, and to have that be your introduction to what intimacy is…it feels both heartbreaking and the shame and self-loathing can be so intense, because this person and experience affected you so monumentally while you were just another catch for them. it’s only looking back as you get older that you realize - oh my god, I was just a girl, or a kid, and this person knew that, and took advantage of that to get what they wanted….this song is so important and I’m so proud of Taylor for writing it. 

I love the line "salt streams out my eyes and into my ears" because that's such a specific feeling when you're lying in bed crying without the energy to wipe your tears. it's like a reminder that even in the lowest moments, someone else has been there and felt that and you're not as alone as you feel. which has of course always been the magic taylor's lyrics