Here's a video that my friend Sally posted on her facebook this evening. Since I keep up with absolutely nothing beyond xkcd, I hadn't realized that Taylor Swift had anything new out. But I love her.
Musically, I wouldn't say that this is Taylor's strongest effort--it follows pretty much the same formula as most (if not all) of her other radio-release songs in terms of everything from riffs to construction. However, the subject matter doesn't quite follow the usual formula, and though I'm not sure how much she creatively participated in it, I like the video. Not that I have a problem with TS's usual "high school love/heartbreak, also I'm really cute" content/video combination, but it was nice to see her put together a song and film a video addressing more serious and meaningful subject matter: namely, learning to live out a life that wasn't modeled by one's parents. Part of the reason for the divorce epidemic in our society (and for a lot of other issues) is that one big way to make sure a child internalizes a behavior is to model it. Children of smokers tend to smoke. Children of abusers tend to abuse. Children of divorcees tend to get divorced. This is not to imply that getting a divorce is the worst thing a person can do, that there are no good reasons for divorce, or that getting a divorce is on the same level as abuse; rather, this is to say that a child who grew up in a family system that ended in divorce has not seen what a successful lifelong marriage looks like, and so does not know how to construct such a relationship in his or her own life. Additionally, such a person absorbs on a subconscious level the idea that when things go wrong, relationships end. Or, as Miss Swift put it in "Mine,"
I was a flight risk with a fear of falling, wondering why we'd bother with love if it never lasts.
yeah i love her.
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