Small Reputation (Gaylor’s Version)

I’m sure this is just another coincidence, right? 😉

How are we doing, Gaylors? Because my heart rate has yet to come down. Between Karlie being at the final show to all the costume changes to the 1989 announcement, I need a long nap. But nevertheless, I persist.

We’ve all seen the gorgeous colors of the 1989 CDs, right? We have crystal skies (blue) and rose garden (pink), which both correlate with lyrics. But then we have aquamarine (green) and the following, sunrise boulevard (yellow):

So I’m thinking, must be either the name of or a lyric in a vault track. Which, probably. But I took to google and found this:

Hmm, a play. Probably a coincidence. Unless?

Oh that sounds kinda familiar…

Okay, what’s the plot?

I could see some parallels, but I’d need to read more (and I will).

Another match for sunrise boulevard, a song:

It’s an unlikely connection, since this song came out in 2017, but some of the lyrics do sound like something a gaylor wrote:

A bop tbh.

Moving on, I thought I’d see if there were any connections with sunset boulevard, since we’re in a time warp anyway:

I found this movie, which seemed like an unlikely connection until I realized it was released on August 10th, 1950. Um, what? Let’s see what it’s about:

Oh my god. Miss Americana, is it you!? I looked up the plot and there is a Joe, a Betty, and all kinds of scandal. I’m definitely going to watch it.

We all watched the Karma music video on Friday (or Saturday), right? And then we all watched it ten more times because there IS JUST SO MUCH THERE. Right?!

I can’t even begin to unpack the whole thing yet, but let’s talk about the yellow brick road scene.

Taylor is obviously wearing ruby slippers (“the rubies that I gave up”) alluding to Dorothy/the Wizard of Oz. But she’s not wearing the rest of Dorothy’s getup. That’s because she’s not Dorothy, but in fact a friend of Dorothy.

She’s holding a broom (lots of witchy themes from her lately) and blows a kiss of blue (iykyk) glitter to three grim reapers (the two SBs and…?).

She’s keeping her side of the street clean, which harkens to the YNTCD MV where she clearly shows which side of the street she’s on:

Other things of note: it appears there are daisies embroidered on her collar, as well as growing along the yellow brick road. Her braids are also looped (“your braids make a pattern”).

The yellow brick road itself may be a nod to Elton John and his album/song Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. Here are some of the lyrics from that song, as well as a generally accepted analysis of the lyrics:

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Seems like it would be super relatable to Taylor, right? Add in Elton John’s queerness/coming out journey, and the parallels continue.

There are probably a hundred other things I’m missing just from that scene alone, but what I really wanna talk about is the yellow beret, especially in light of current news surrounding Taylor.

When I saw the yellow beret, I furiously googled “yellow beret” + the names of Taylor’s muses, but I came up empty-handed. Because Taylor is specifically not wearing a Dorothy costume, I knew that fucking hat had to mean something. Then I remembered — isn’t yellow beret a military term? And we know she loves a good war story. To Google I went, and the results did not disappoint.

During the Vietnam war, all physicians in the US had a mandatory draft order. One of the ways to avoid the draft was to apply for a position with a Public Health Service program called the NIH Associates Training Program. Because the elite program was highly competitive, only a small percentage of doctors were able to serve their required military time without going to war.

Yellow beret was a self-deprecating and derogatory term used by and for doctors who avoided getting a green beret/going to war (yellow can be associated with cowardice, i.e. “yellow-bellied”) via the NIH program.

Sounding familiar? But wait there’s more.

Bob Seger wrote a song in 1966 called The Ballad of the Yellow Beret. It was written as a parody of the song The Ballad of the Green Berets. Here are some of the lyrics (I encourage you to read all of them!):

Verse 1: Fearless cowards of the USA // Bravely here at home they stay // They watch their friends get shipped away // The draft dodgers of the Yellow Beret

Okay, I’m seated.

Verse 3: Men who faint at the sight of blood // Their high-heeled boots weren't meant for mud // The draft board will hear their sob stories today // Only the best win the yellow beret

Oooookay.

Verse 4: Back at home a young wife waits // Her yellow beret has met his fate // He's been drafted for marching in a protest //Leaving her his last request

Are you screaming yet? Just wait.

Verse 5: Put a yellow streak down my son's back // Make sure that he never ever fights back // At his physical have him say he's gay // Have him win the yellow beret

And if that wasn’t enough, two of the last lyrics are “I've got a pimple on my trigger finger” (ew) and “well, we were planning on having children sometime soon” (devastating). These themes also align with The Great War, epiphany, etc.

But despite attempts to diminish their efforts through claims of cowardice, these “yellow beret” physician-scientists contributed to some of the most important and innovative medical research we have today. Dr. Fauci attended the training program, as well as nine others who went on to win Nobel Prizes.

I cannot stop thinking about this image, and how haunting it is.

We know she lives in fear of her stalkers. We know her dad is constantly worried about her being k*lled. That terror has surely gotten to her.

This type of behavior is beyond an intrusion into her privacy. She has said she has trouble seeing herself as a person. This is treating her like an exhibition or a commodity.

I worry that this will impact her possible coming out plan, or may even cause her to go back into hiding after the eras tour.

(note: These are NOT excuses, I do not agree with her choice to associate with Matty no matter the outcome. But I believe this is blatant PR work and everything we know right now, she wants us to know)

1. She’s looking to destroy her good girl image. She’s sick of being infantilized and held to impossible standards. Even after the hyper sexual vigilante shit performance, gaylors are being told they’re disgusting for implying she is a sexual person. She wants to be seen as a grown woman who can publicly make mistakes and not be held to some bizarre standard of purity and perfection.

2. She wants to demonstrate how fake her relationship with Joe was through the ever-changing narrative. Was he the love of her life and she’ll never walk Cornelia street again, or was that all PR and it was never really about Joe Alwyn?

3. She’s been telling people she has cheated, participated in infidelity, etc multiple times through her music, and yet she is still upheld by many fans as being some kind of god fearing wifey-mama material. Again, she’s looking to shatter that image by moving on so quickly to Matty and the implications surrounding that.

4. Should it come out that they weren’t actually dating (I’m hoping anyway), it will help the narrative that the media will pair her up with any man she’s seen with (but not a woman).

5. This protects any of the women she has been and/or is currently involved with. We got a taste of Singlor, then Gaylorism began picking up more mainstream traction, then Matty happened. That’s not an accident. Specific women were being named and shit was shut down fast. I cannot imagine the ironclad NDAs some of these folks must have.

6. Matty was the most obvious choice for the next beard. In addition to helping clear kissgate out of the search results for “Taylor swift the 1975,” he helps fit the narrative of any new music she plans to release about her secretive, scandalous relationship(s). Plus, based on how south it went with Joe, I’m sure there weren’t a ton of stable individuals looking to jump into a bearding contract with the most powerful woman in the music industry. Matty doesn’t care about his reputation (that is abundantly clear), so I’m sure it was an easy sell.