When you put superstars on pedestals and continually see private jets, designer clothes and TV appearances every day on social media, you sometimes don't expect them to be real people with real struggles and very real emotions.
Taylor Swift may be one of the realer celebrities on social media - she often posts photos of nights in with her cats, doesn't flaunt her riches or extravagance and took a long social media hiatus when a certain Kardashian publicly denigrated her online a few years ago.
Now, as she nears her 30th birthday (and we think, a new album too), Tay has written a long essay for Elle magazine about 30 lessons she's learned before 30 and it's honestly eye-opening.
She reveals that her parents have both fought cancer, and her mother is currently fighting it again. She admits that after the Manchester terror attack at Ariana Grande's concert, she carries around "QuikClot army grade bandage dressing, which is for gunshot or stab wounds" everywhere she goes. She implies that her constant "girl gang" photos a few years ago of her model and celebrity girlfriends may have excluded many of her younger fans, who were perhaps being bullied just like she was when she was young. She makes reference to the infamous Kim and Kanye war, saying it made her feel "lower than I’ve ever felt in my life" and she still hasn't received an apology.
It's a lot of honesty from one of the world's most famous musicians.
On a lighter note, Taylor also shares what she loves to cook, that she regrets that bleached blonde haircut she got for Coachella, that she once used Sharpie as eyeliner when she was young, and what vitamins she takes.
Given we rarely get such insight into minds like Taylor's, it's a fantastic read. Check it out in full here.
Maybe her next album will have such material too!
