Last week my Instagram algorithm welcomed me to the app with the announcement viewed around the world: Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are engaged.
I scrolled through the photos on the post of staged shots in the flower-filled garden and thought, “awh, that’s nice for them”.
And it wasn’t long before my feed was filled with celebratory reactions and excitement, with posts and clips of podcast hosts, pop-culture journalists and fans poring over the news.
I don’t profess to be a diehard Swiftie, but I am a fan, and what I admire most about Swift, apart from her lyrical prowess, is her savvy in every decision she makes as an artist.
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From buying her own recording masters to ensuring her crew are well-paid on tour, nothing goes on in the Taylor-verse without her say-so, and the engagement announcement was also carefully orchestrated – allowing fans to be a part of it without her and Kelce having to share the “real” proposal, which happened earlier.
I recently watched (some) of the episode of Travis and Jason Kelce’s New Heights podcast, on which Swift announced her upcoming album, The Life of a Showgirl. It was my first time to see Swift and Kelce interact and to get a sense of them as a couple. What made their relationship ring true to me was how mundane, in the nicest way, it was to witness, with him making love-heart eyes at her while she talked about her love of baking sourdough. It was utterly believable ... and quite dull.
And quite dull, to anyone outside of us and our parents, is exactly how I thought the news of my engagement to my partner would appear to everyone else.
Although it was lovely to make a commitment to each other, I saw it as something that would only be important to us, like the colour of the curtains in the sittingroom or which type of milk we buy.
After the proposal we called our parents, I put a message in a group chat of my oldest friends, and we told everyone else in our lives incrementally.
I was surprised at how mortifying it was to tell people; it was akin to saying, guess what, we finally did it, we took the plunge and bought a cordless vacuum. It was baffling how genuinely excited people were about such a personal development. I got a lot of “well dones” and I thought, for what? Was I being congratulated for being deemed worthy to be chosen by a man?
I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d fallen into the trap of the patriarchy by being so conventional as to get engaged. I bristled at the pats on the back and the implication that, like a Jane Austen character, I was fulfilling my destiny as a young woman.
[ There is no winning in the engagement ring OlympicsOpens in new window ]
When I look back at other small achievements in my life, like getting a master’s or having something published, those close to me shared congratulations, of course, but nothing like the reaction to a ring on my finger, and from the women in my life in particular. I don’t mean to be flippant about the outpouring of support – it was lovely – but I can’t help but question it.
One person said to me that people just love the optimism of it, and I can understand that when there is so much in the world to be pessimistic about. But I do wonder, as a younger couple agreeing to get married one day, are we justifying the decisions made by couples that have gone before us? Why is it that society still breathes a collective sigh of relief to see us partner off?
Swift has written and sang about love and relationships in ways that have become more nuanced throughout her career, and it makes sense for her fans to be invested in her personal life, and to be excited about her engagement. But as a record-breaking artist that has reached the pinnacle of success in her field, getting engaged is probably the least interesting thing she has ever done.
[ Taylor Swift has been writing love stories her whole lifeOpens in new window ]
Would Swift retiring to a home filled with her beloved cats and her countless Grammys not constitute just as much of a fairy-tale ending as marrying Kelce?
It’s a love story, baby, but why do we care that much?
