Lone Rain Cloud at the Sun Beam Convention
Dame Margaret's Takes an Unpopular Stance Against Some Popular PDAs
As you are likely aware at this point, Taylor Swift and Chief’s tight end Travis Kelce are (1) dating and (2) made a particularly big show about it at her concert in Argentina this past Saturday. To recap:
She pointed at him while singing about how she loves the players.
For her one of her two surprise songs, she not only played one of her most romantic songs, but also
had the audience members’ light up bracelets glow red and yellow during it– Chiefs colors.
In her closer, instead of being “the guy on the screen”, karma was “the guy on the Chiefs / coming straight home to me.”
And, of course, as soon as she got off stage, she did a full rom com run to smooch him:
In general, people have been losing their minds over this. In a nice way. Anne Helen Petersen– in addition to writing a great, insightful essay on why she thinks people are responding to this so positively– rounded up a handful of particularly fun reaction TikToks that capture Trayvis Fever. But, to my mild chagrin, the response I found myself identifying with most was this Threads post by Jenna Vorris:
I know this response is uncharitable. Particularly after watching TikToks that compare leaving a building with her last boyfriend to leaving a building with this one, I cannot begrudge Taylor this delight at finding a partner who basks in her fame rather than feeling diminished by it. I also recognize that there’s no opting out of the publicity for her. As this summer’s Matt Healy debacle demonstrated, her dating choices will become part of her public narrative whether she wants them to or not. So, her euphoric embrace of a man who’s both willing to run the gauntlet of very public dating and capable of doing said run with excellence makes undeniable sense. Speaking as someone who may presently be possessed of a boyfriend I would rom com run to smooch, I wish everyone who wanted a partner could have one who made them so giddy it’s tacky. Or, to quote Taylor Allison Swift herself, I almost do.
The thing is, the social media semantics of dating stress me out so much that I can barely bring myself to own the existence of my happy relationship here. In the twelve years I’ve had an Instagram account, I’ve seriously dated four people: one year in, my present boyfriend has yet to appear on the grid, the one before him never made it at all, and I shared a combined five photos of the remaining two, only one of which was unambiguously romantic. This reticence to share my romantic life has myriad roots, some of which were specific to each relationship. But one strand has been constant: my discomfort at encountering the blinding intensity of people’s delight at romantic success. Even when that delight is pure-hearted and generous, just people thrilled that someone they love has found someone who appreciates them, the sheer volume of it unsettles me. It’s an inescapable reminder that I live in a world where for a lot of people, my status rises when I have a romantic partner, and falls when I don’t.
Which is to say: I could be America’s Sweetheart Taylor Swift, at the absolute pinnacle of my remarkable career, but until someone’s willing to hold my hand in public, I haven’t really made it. I am glad that Travis Kelce does not feel diminished by Taylor’s fame but, if I were Taylor, I would feel diminished by Trayvis Fever. The Eras Tour is on track to break pretty much every record a tour can, but I fear when it does, this unprecedented professional accomplishment, for which Swift has worked so hard, will be much less heralded than her luck in landing a man around whom she can comfortably wear high heels. I hope that doesn’t bum Taylor out too much, but I have to own that it puts my nose irretrievably out of joint.
If Trayvis is your emotional support parasocial relationship, I don’t want to take that from you– I’m jealous of it, and I wish I could partake. As this tweet shared by Caroline Moss reminded me, as a culture, we have been starved for cinematic depictions of hot couples with insane chemistry, and I am so glad to see so many hungry friends finally eating again, so to speak. I am just going to have to get my high from forcing my boyfriend to watch Starstruck with me instead.
XOXO, Your Favorite Curmudgeon — Dame Margaret
Dames Nation: Keeping It Classy-Fied!
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A Handful of Things We’d Like To Share
How Siskel & Ebert Brought Movies To The People by Matt Singer for Literary Hub
Dame Karen wrote the slightly unhinged The 50 Best Christmas Songs of All Time to Make the Holiday Season Cozy & Bright for Wide Open Country and is particularly proud of the photo she found to accompany “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer”
Click, Pray, Chat by Erica Berry for Dirt
Last week, Dame Margaret was on, like, 16 different podcasts:
Pop Culture Happy Hour (talking about Quiz Lady— she recommends!)
Extra Hot Great (talking about The Buccaneers, which she enjoyed with reservations!)
Harry Potter and the Sacred Text (talking about how our moms taught us about resentment)
Hot & Bothered (talking about what makes Persuasion special)
and finally Material Girls (talking about, you guessed it, Taylor Swift).
Please listen to as many of them as catch your eye.
When the Best Gift Costs Nothing at All by Anna Diamond for The New York Times
This collection of posts about Dame Margaret’s favorite Hermés shopper, George Santos.
Dame Margaret, I understand your (and many people's) reservation about Taylor and Travis. I'm in the happy but able to scroll on and not dwell category myself. But I have to disagree: Taylor has gotten so much publicity about the success of her tour that no relationship can overshadow it, imo.
I've seen articles that she's 'saved' hotels and restaurants in the cities in which she's played. In my city of Minneapolis, they weren't going to run public transportation after her concerts (and Pride was also going on at same time) until outcry forced them to add it in. I think Michael's stock is also up because of all the friendship bracelet making. Between her, Beyonce and Barbie, it's been a successful year for women in entertainment!