Mastermind

One more Taylor Swift song because I'm in my Midnights Era

This week I read the amazing article featuring The Eras Tour by Taffy Broadesser-Akner, My Delirious Trip to the Heart of Swiftiedom.

This sparked a discussion of what era we are in; I turn 36 next month and it has been such an interesting experience to grow up with Taylor Swift. I became a true Swiftie around the Fearless era when one of my best friends in college used to have us act out Love Story every time we rode in my car. In summer/fall 2010 I played Speak Now on repeat as I tried to deal with the aftermath of my broken heart when I moved to a new city and 5 hours away from the only boy I had ever loved (the one who every song had been about).

In 2011 I sang “Love Story” at karaoke on my first date with the man who would become my husband in 2014. In 2012 I was dating my new boyfriend and I had a new album to listen to with Red. As I listened to that album, half of it resonated for me with Nemat and half resonated for my first love. In 2013 I saw my first Taylor Swift concert, The Red Tour, in my hometown the night before I left on a cruise to the Bahamas and Key West with my future husband. 1989 was my favorite and pure fun album; the only associations I had with this album were going to a concert with my sister and mom and dancing the whole time as it became apparent my mom did NOT know all the lyrics. When we left the album at her house, she sang “Welcome to New York” as my parents prepared to move to NC to be near her daughters and grandkids during the pandemic.

I was a new mom when Reputation came out and other than recording video of my baby dancing to it, I still kept listening to 1989 as “lullabies.” When the 10 minute version of “All Too Well” came out I was all in again, and then began my Swiftie conversion on my kids. My then 4 year old began requesting “All Too Well” as a bedtime song, and he asked if I knew other songs. “Wildest Dreams” from 1989 became his favorite. In kindergarten, he heard “You Belong with Me” performed at the school talent show, and it became part of our bedtime song rotation. This summer I got an Apple Watch, and the Taylor Swift spotlight dance workout had several Midnights and Lover songs and they knew those after a few weeks of me continuing to try to perfect these dances.

We got a minivan in the first month of back to school and suddenly both my kids, now 4 and 6.5 years old wanted to listen to all the Taylor’s Version albums. Speak Now, Fearless, Red, 1989 have all been on repeat for 3 months. I am taking them to Eras movie after seeing it with my mom and sister already and they are listening to Midnights and Reputation this week.

I decided I am in my Midnights era. “Mastermind” is now my favorite song.

Once upon a time
The planets and the fates and all the stars aligned
You and I ended up in the same room at the same time

And the touch of a hand lit the fuse
Of a chain reaction of countermoves
To assess the equation of you
Checkmate, I couldn't lose

What if I told you none of it was accidental?
And the first night that you saw me
Nothing was gonna stop me
I laid the groundwork, and then just like clockwork
The dominoes cascaded in a line
What if I told you I'm a mastermind?
And now you're mine
It was all by design
'Cause I'm a mastermind

You see, all the wisest women had to do it this way
'Cause we were born to be the pawn in every lover's game

If you fail to plan, you plan to fail
Strategy sets the scene for the tale
I'm the wind in our free-flowing sails
And the liquor in our cocktails

What if I told you none of it was accidental?
And the first night that you saw me I knew I wanted your body
I laid the groundwork, and then just like clockwork
The dominoes cascaded in a line
What if I told you I'm a mastermind?
And now you're mine
It was all my design
'Cause I'm a mastermind

No one wanted to play with me as a little kid
So I've been scheming like a criminal ever since
To make them love me and make it seem effortless
This is the first time I've felt the need to confess
And I swear
I'm only cryptic and Machiavellian 'cause I care

So I told you none of it was accidental?
And the first night that you saw me
Nothing was gonna stop me
I laid the groundwork, and then saw a wide smirk
On your face, you knew the entire time
You knew that I'm a mastermind
And now you're mine
Yeah, all you did was smile
'Cause I'm a mastermind

Today in my journal writing class, we were told to play the first 30 seconds of a song and write about how it made us feel. I had last played “Mastermind.” When I heard the line about all the planets, fates, and stars aligning, I remembered the moment I was sitting in family law class and mentioned randomly meeting my boyfriend, now husband. At the time we had been together for about 1.5 years. Justin Ramey mentioned how fate and the stars aligned to bring us together in that bar. My professor had been talking about couples separating at the 7 to 10 year anniversary time when they have young kids and re-entering the dating pool. She commented when you’re young, it is easier to meet people out. Now that we are at the 9 year anniversary mark, I steadfastly believe part of our meeting was fate. We were meant to be in that room together at the same time.

Nemat specifically mentions the time his hand brushed mine as I flipped the page of the karaoke song list. I don’t remember this touch, but he said it sent an electric shock through him and made him make note of me. I’ve told the story before where he didn’t talk to me much the night we met. He sent me the Facebook friend request the next day like was still common after meeting someone new out. I didn’t necessarily think on this first night that I wanted to be with him romantically.

The message request was the chain reaction of counter moves. Certainly I was calculated, but maybe not quite the mastermind described in this song. I mostly commented on his music posts. In May he talked about women responding to being ignored, and I set in motion then my goals for him to think of me in the way he was mentioning other women he met in Chapel Hill. I was quite the Facebook stalker, and I did a lot of investigation into his past. Luckily back then I only had to look at Facebook and Google, and it was nowhere near the level of public information I would need to wade through now.

On May 5, 2011, I was looking for Nemat when I went out. He wrote on a comment to me on Facebook to say he was going out the previous night, but I was in the middle of exams. I could only go out on Friday. I was sitting in the corner booth with two friends from law school and a college classmate of my friend Lincoln. I will never forget the moment I saw Nemat walk in, look around, and leave. I had only met him once and followed him on Facebook, but in hindsight it feels epic. I know he was looking for me, and he didn’t see me because I was in the corner. That night I left with someone else, and I continued to see other men in the interim.

He didn’t contact me again until June 13, 2011.

He asked me to go to beach music. I wasn’t quite sure it was a date because he kept mentioning how his lawyer friends would be there and I could do networking. I had honestly told him my grades on my finals were bad and he suggested I take my mind off of it on our date. He messaged me his number the next week on the day of our date. When he appeared at my door, I thought I didn’t remember him being this hot, I was very nervous and texted my sister from the car with an Ice Princess quote. I said, “I don’t know why I’m doing this; I don’t talk to boys. Or people.”

I called Nemat an asshole on our first date because he said he had told another woman he loved her recently, but when she said she wasn’t interested he was immediately over it. “How Long” by Ace played as he leaned nonchalantly against the light pole and said he told her he had enough friends. He didn’t need another friend. We ran into his mother and aunt, and for a few months he tried to act like this counted as me meeting his family. In hindsight, it was interesting to hear my MIL say she hadn’t seen him in a while when I now know they lived across the street from each other.

We had a great first date, we went to Beach Music, followed by trivia at Vintage 301, followed by karaoke at Green Burro, the place where we had first met in April. Nemat sang “Fallin' in Love” by Hamilton, Frank, and Joe Reynolds that night. He has since admitted he had never heard “Love Story” when I sang it. I kissed him first after he said my name and asked if I wanted to go out again as I was exiting the car. He stayed at my apartment overnight. When he left the next morning, I told him I really liked him, and he looked surprised as he said from next to his car, “I really like you too.” I was laying groundwork when we started dating. I can’t say with certainty when exactly I knew we would get married, but I certainly knew I wanted him to be mine. And I know that he always knew how much I loved him long before I could say it to him. The last line is my favorite: “All you did was smile, because I’m a mastermind.”