My Music Roller Coaster

In my first entry I want to talk about a subject I don’t particularly know well, but am certainly a connoisseur. Music.

            My music taste has been quite the rollercoaster over my lifetime. The first CDs I ever owned were Brittney Spears and N’SYNC. I was your average pre-teen in the 90s.

            As I entered middle school I began to love Hilary Duff and Disney pop. I was your average teeny bobber. Those catchy tunes about adolescence were irresistible to someone going through the not so catchy phase of adolescence.

            High school made me more aware of different music genres. But I honed in on one genre only. Show tunes. I loved musicals.

             If a show had music, I had to have a song from it. My pink iPod nano music library of High School Musical was joined by songs from “No, No Nanette,” “Oklahoma,” “The Sound of Music,” “A Chorus Line,” and every teen girl’s essential soundtrack to life, “Wicked.”

            I was obsessed. No one would let me play my iPod in the car, because they knew only show tunes would show up on the shuffle. And as Sue Sylvester would say, “Just because you like show tunes doesn’t mean you’re gay, it just means you’re awful.”

            But then one day I discovered an artist that went by the very simple and real name of Taylor Swift.

            I know, you are shocked; my music taste might have even gone from awful to horribly awful. But that opinion depends on whom you are talking to. Any female under the age of 30, and maybe even some above, would agree with me, that this “country” pop princess who is famous for revenge ballads can really rock.

            Taylor is a friend to all girls. She says what we all wish we could say. She lives a life we all envy. She writes amazing poetry that puts all that envy, excitement and pure rush of living into the sweetness of a top hit song.

            She is a good role model who can stand on her own two feet as she welcomes success and critics with open arms. She can put on a killer show in a million different outfits. She can sing under a rain machine. I would say she is pretty impressive.

            If everyone were to have their own country, they would have to choose a national anthem. Mine would definitely have to be a Taylor Swift song. I think every girl’s should be.

That doesn’t mean we can’t listen to our show tunes on the weekends, sing the top 40 hits in the shower, dance to our Spice Girls, and rock out to The Killers. It just means Taylor really knows how to put the female experience into a captivating tune with lyrics that speak to us.

My own personal favorites are “Our Song,” “Love Story,” “You Belong with Me,” and “Sparks Fly.” But my national anthem is “Mean.”

Why? You ask. Well the lyrics say it all. “Someday I’ll be livin’ in a big old city, and all you’re ever gonna be is mean.”

It gives me hope that no matter how many people push me down or discourage me from my dreams, I will make it. I will be bigger than them and all they are ever going to be is mean.

I might not have ever met her, but she will always be there for me. Thanks Taylor, for all the songs and converting me from a show tune freak to a truly empowered woman.