As I entered in the scary world of high school, she made me feel like I wasn't the only one who obsessed over boys who would never like me back in Teardrops on my Guitar.
Towards the end of high school, she inspired me to dance in the rain in my best dress, though I wasn't quite as Fearless as she proclaimed to be.
When I experienced the awkwardness of my first year of college, Tay was there, narrating my life through her album Speak Now. (I may or may not have bawled my eyes out to Dear John while at the same time mesmerized that Taylor somehow helped me deal with crap that I didn't want to deal with.)
And then, RED. My college roommate, Megan, and I skipped classes to go get it the morning it came out, and I listened to the CD all the way to King's Island with my now-husband the first time we ever hung out. She rocked my world with her pretty duets and her new beats and her deliberate lyrics. She also sang me happy birthday, which I wasn't mad about.
As if she wasn't real (and cool) enough, she then decided to make 1989, which is basically her diary of the "new style of music" that she had "woken up every day not wanting, but needing to write." She's changing and becoming the person she wants to be, and she's telling us all about it with sick (newer) beats and raw honesty in 1989.
I'm not as weirdly obsessed with Taylor Swift as you may think based on this post. I just really like when people are honest -
when they tell what they're doing
and who they are
and who they wanted to become but didn't
and where they wanted to go and went
and of the love and joy that they desire and occasionally obtain
and of the hurt and sorrow that brings them down, reminding them of their humanness
And she's not stopping anytime soon (or at least I hope so)
There is this one song - Out of the Woods. I didn't get it at first, but it really interested me.
She sings:
Are we out of the woods yet?
Are we out of the woods yet?
Are we out of the woods yet?
Are we out of the woods?
Are we in the clear yet?
Are we in the clear yet?
Are we in the clear yet?
In the clear yet? Good.
I don't know Taylor, but I like to read the little note she writes on the inside of her album cover. Here is an excerpt:
I wrote about looking back on a lost love and understanding that nothing good comes without loss and hardship and constant struggle. There is no "riding off into the sunset," like I used to imagine. We are never out of the woods, because we are always going to be fighting for something.
After about 30 listens and reading her note, I realized that she's talking about a relationship of extremes, of seasons - a relationship that goes from the exciting OH MY WORD I LOVE YOU, LET ME KISS YOUR FACE to the heartbreaking I'm leaving you because you weren't good enough to fight for.
Even the fabulous Taylor Swift admits that we always think we have a chance at love, but we're really just "two paper airplanes flying." We think that we have the ability and potential to reach great heights, to fly in the clouds. But we're really just replicas - just paper-crafted creations. We really don't have the potential to reach anywhere but down; to fly anywhere but the carpeted floor two feet away from the take-off. We're never really out of the woods.
Depressing.
It is depressing. It's sad to think that our relationships, jobs, husbands, kids, dinners, cookies, brownies, bodies, grades will never measure up. They won't be what we conjured them up to be - heck, they won't even come close. We are mere replicas of what we were created to be. Taylor is yearning to be out of the woods, and so am I. So is creation. So is everybody.
We all want to be in the clear.
I don't know about you, but the longer I'm in these woods, the more I realize that I can't get out on my own. Even with my Katniss-like skillz, I would not be able to get out of
We can't get out of the woods on our own. We can't make it to the clear. No matter how hard we try, we can't rid ourselves of the poverty, sex trafficking, unrealistic expectations, selfishness, gossip, complaining mouths, complaining hearts, suffering, confusion, doubt, death.
We need a Rescuer. We need Someone willing to come in, wade through the brush,
My hope is in the fact that Jesus is going to redeem - that He will set the slaves free - that he will set the world right. He promises to, and I don't know how he's going to, and sometimes I don't trust that He will, and sometimes I just can't see how the suffering that I see and the suffering that is hidden from my eyes could be part of His plan.
But I hope.
Because He's been Faithful, and He'll continue to be Faithful.
He will...lead us out of the woods (SORRY I HAD TO)
And I want Taylor to know that.
I want everyone to know that.
I want everyone to know Him.
Jesus.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, [i]in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons,the redemption of our body.
For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.
Romans 8:18-25
