Someone, please help me get these Taylor Swift songs out of my head. It’s not my fault, it’s my tween, Hailey. She plays the pop sensation on a constant loop; those perky, sticky lyrics follow her into the car, ring from her cellphone, hum from her showers, frame all her play dates and parties, leak through her now almost always closed door.
Meanwhile, Hailey can’t hear a word I say—requiring me to repeat even the simplest instruction so many times, it feels like my mouth is moving without making sounds. How is a boring, hardworking mother supposed to compete with this slick conspiracy of good looks, pop hooks, millions of dollars, and girlish fun?
Even when my daughter’s gone, the songs persist. Like a cult victim, my lips move involuntarily, accompanying tunes that won't stop circling my mind. What’s a mother to do?—other than passive-aggressively eat an entire jar of her children’s Flintstone gummy vitamins?
I started noticing Hailey’s Taylor Swift obsession when she was ten, but she was probably a follower as early as six or seven. I clearly remember the day I went into Hailey’s room (her door was always open then, her “knocking rule,” not yet in place) and noticed a new wall decoration.
It wasn’t just some normal, kid’s bedroom display of posters or fan magazine pages; it was an intricate collage of beautiful women sporting a Barbie fashion parade of trendy outfits and hairdos.
At first, I didn’t realize it was all the same person—what with the hair being so many different shades and lengths—but, on closer inspection, I realized all the women had the same doe eyes and vulpine features.
It was a collage of Taylor Swifts—every Taylor artfully integrated into the next, each image cut out, paper-doll style, with the loving precision of a stalker or serial killer, not missing the wispiest strand of hair or the flimsiest fold of gossamer gown. This was the work, not of clumsy scissors, but of a sharper, more precise instrument— an X-acto knife or razor blade.
Though every nuance of the star’s contours was worshipfully rendered, all non-Swift-related background material had been ruthlessly excised—sky, buildings, other people. While there were easily several college tuitions worth of designer outfits on display, Hailey favored close-up cut-outs of Ms. Swift’s face (in a wide array of sizes, from poster-scale to no bigger than a grape) as if trying to burrow into her mind.
Each time I entered Hailey’s room, the collage had spread like some crazy cancer, each image a malignant cell, taking over the wall behind the bed, then spreading to the next wall, then the next.
Jokingly, I suggested that Hailey paste some teeny Taylor faces into the eyeballs of the bigger Taylors for a deconstructive effect. Unamused, Hailey labeled me “a hater.” On her door appeared a No Trespassing!!! sign.
I still went into Hailey’s room, but only to put clean clothes in her dresser, a task I performed at NASCAR speed, owing to how spooked I was by all those eyes watching from the walls (and eventually Hailey’s headboard, armoire and desk).
This many-headed Taylor mostly smiled brightly, but sometimes her plush, impish lips pouted or curled into a nonthreatening snarl as if to showcase her wide range of facial expressions. However, even Taylor’s perkiest smiles began to seem smug, at times, even sinister, as if to say, “I smell like ball gowns and Prada, unlike you, with your whiff of cooking grease and long division!”
After another blithe remark on my part, Hailey banished me from her room entirely, cast me out with the same cruel insouciance as when she tossed all her My Little Ponies into the basement, along with their pricey pony accessories—their tiny hairbrushes and disco roller skates, the entire pony castle ramparts. There her ponies remain, their candy-sweet eyes permanently staring up from the damp dungeon of a cardboard box labeled Chairitee in Hailey’s crude and childish hand.
Out of habit (from when I used to freely enter her room to read to her or chat and giggle) I still occasionally absentmindedly entered Hailey's room, which she occasionally absentmindedly forgot to lock; and got a terrible shock when she screamed in that edgy, high pitched voice of hers, “Get out!” When this happened, it was as if all those Taylor Swift heads started screaming, “shake shake shake it out, get, get get it out, GET THE FUCK OUT!”
When I complained about the Taylor situation to a friend, she scolded me. She informed me that Taylor Swift was a feminist icon and billionaire who trademarked her own image and catchphrases and runs her own business. “And even the world” I added.
“You should be thrilled your daughter chose such a creative role model,” my friend continued, “at least Hailey is expressing herself through art with those collages, unlike my Emily, whose worship of Kylie Jenner has her swapping an interest in aerospace engineering for an obsession with Tik Tok twerking and makeup tutorials.”
Well, isn’t it true that there’s always someone who is way worse off than you? I realized then how lucky I was to have Ms Swift as a role model for my daughter, whose fashion sense was already way more advanced (and expensive) than my own. I vowed to conquer my selfish jealousy and made up with Hailey by procuring costly Eras Tour Concert tickets. The No Trespassing!!! sign came down.
So forget about rescuing my daughter. I’ll happily settle for some help dislodging this song that’s kinda stuck in my neural track, like when you get a nut particle lodged in your molar.
Still, sometimes, when I’m in my daughter’s room and forget to avert my eyes, I could swear those Taylor Swifts are smirking, rather than smiling, as if to say, “Face it, bitch, I own your daughter.
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