Summer of Nostalgia
On Taylor Swift, Fall Out Boy, and Nicholas Sparks
I turned 34 in June, accepting this birthday as the official start of my mid-30s. But this summer has been more of a throwback to half my life ago, the mid-teens era – thankfully in the way of pop culture and not in the way of my uncontrollable curly hair. (I’ve almost got it fully controlled. This is the year.)
It all started back in March (Arizona’s beginning of summer) with Taylor Swift, obviously. At the opening night of the Eras Tour, I got to join thousands of others in reliving every era of her music. I time-traveled back to the first time I heard “Picture to Burn” driving around town with the older girls, to storming the Country Thunder field with my high school friends to see her open for Carrie Underwood, to my college roommates and I watching in shock as Kanye stole her thunder at the VMAs, and to so many other monumental moments leading up to this night where me and two other friends lost our mom identities for a few hours and danced like we were 22.
Then in June, Kyle and I saw Fall Out Boy in concert. Fall Out Boy! And for another few hours, I was transported back to driving through my hometown, windows down and hot summer air blowing my hair further out of control, screaming along with my best gal and guy friend to “Sugar We’re Going Down Swingin’.”
In July, Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) was released and I was sent back to my post-college year in Orlando, “Enchanted” to meet basically any guy who said hi to me then driving around the next day singing “All you’re gonna be is mean!” (I have listened to “Electric Touch,” the vault track with Fall Out Boy, at least 500 times since the release. So good!)
To top it all off, Kyle and I have been watching a different Nicholas Sparks movie every weekend this summer in preparation for me living out a teenage dream in September: to visit all the towns in North Carolina where his novels were set. The joy that rewatching these movies has brought me is insane.
I didn’t know I needed a summer of nostalgia. I definitely didn’t know I needed a trip back to my late teen era. But I knew I needed a cosmic shift to happen in my state of being.
A recent personality test at work revealed to me what I already knew to be true: my creativity personality type is “dreamer.”
“The world is a place of beauty and magic in the eyes of a dreamer. Where others see facts and figures, you see symbols, metaphors, and hidden meanings.
You’re deeply emotional and intuitive, with a vivid imagination—the quintessential idealist and romantic. The inner world is always where you’ve felt most at home. You’re happy to roam your mental landscape of thoughts, emotions, and fantasies for hours on end.”
I’ve always identified as a dreamer and daydreaming is probably my best skill, which unfortunately doesn’t look great on a resume. But each year I get older, I feel further away from that dreamer personality and start thinking more like a normal, practical person. The full-world movies I used to create in my head are harder to see. The hardness of reality settles in more, and the less I recognize the girl who declared at nine years old she was going to be an author.
I miss her.
Seventeen-year-old Michelle was in peak dreamer state. To her, I could’ve grown up to be a backup dancer for Taylor Swift or Ryan Gosling’s real-life Allie Hamilton. I would have no problem becoming an author, or playing beach volleyball in the Olympics. Because I could do anything.
Cleary, 17-year-old Meesh wasn’t all right in the head. But her head was definitely a more fun place to reside in.
Last year I saw a local middle-school art teacher, Carrie Bloomston, share her published book on creativity and talk about living a creative life. She mentioned as a mom of multiple kids, she didn’t do much art as she knew it in her current season of life but she made sure to “live” creatively. For her, that meant folding laundry outside on the driveway so she could be with her kids while they played instead of being stuck in the house cleaning.
My summer of nostalgia is inspiring me to interject that creativity and dreamer mentality from my teenage years into my current everyday life. To love deeper, play more presently, and squeeze people harder. To do more handstands in the living room and cartwheels in the park with my son. To let myself feel 17 more often – blaring Fall Out Boy’s classic single with the windows down and my hair losing control – even while living the very grownup life of a 34-year-old working mom.
What era of your life could you stand to revisit and draw from? (I assure you there’s a Taylor Swift ((or Fall Out Boy)) album to help you time-travel.) I hope you’ll find ways to celebrate your past self creatively as well.
Unleash your imagination, dreamer.
Local coffee shop of the week – Peixoto (Gilbert)
The Chandler Peixoto has been a favorite coffee shop of mine since I moved to Arizona in 2017, but last weekend hubby and I tried out the new Gilbert location for our coffee date. Peixoto’s family-farmed coffee is amazing (I know, you caught me on a rare chai day), and their new location is right in the heart of Gilbert’s Agritopia nerighborhood.
When we moved to AZ, all I remember existing in that neighborhood was Joe’s Farm Grill and The Coffee Shop (also great). Six years later, the neighborhood is unrecognizable. After our coffee, Kyle and I booped around and admired all the cool stuff that has popped up. We were tempted to stop in a brewery for a yoga-and-beer class, but ended up at Matt’s Big Breakfast – somewhere we’d always wanted to try in Phoenix but had been scared away by the constant line out the door. Then we did a little window shopping in the adorable shops. If you haven’t been to Agritopia in a while, I definitely recommend checking it out!
Parenting tip I tried: Use your “strong voice.”
Whining: We’ve all heard it, we all hate it. No matter how many times you tell a two-year-old that whining won’t get them what they want, they will continue to whine. Why? Because it will indeed get them what they want.
I got this post from Lovevery about using your “strong voice” delivered to my inbox this week, and it came at the perfect time. The idea is to ask your child to try asking for something again, but say it in your strong voice. And of course you make the idea of a strong voice sound like something really cool they’ll want to try.
This hasn’t eliminated the whining by any means, but I’m happy to say that Leo is taking to it. He resonates better with the idea of using his strong voice better than with me saying “please stop whining” or “how do you ask for something?” He actually changes his voice and asks again, sounding more like a human with a simple need rather than a desperate child who won’t survive unless he has cream cheese on his waffle.
Parenting a toddler is a long game. Expect yourself to repeat “use your strong voice” anywhere from 5 days to 5 years.
Taylor Song of the Week
“Bejeweled” has been a constant replay for me this year, especially when I began my new job. Taylor has said that this song is about having confidence to write pop songs again after her Folklore and Evermore eras, and for me, this song helped me have confidence to go back into the office culture post-pandemic.
But this week, Leo has learned three lines of “Bejeweled,” and he has asked for “Taylor” every morning on our way to daycare. It has finally happened – after 9 months of nothing but Taylor in the womb and 2.5 years of hearing me sing along, my child is finally a Swiftie! Leo’s favorite part to sing is “make the whole place shimmer!” That might be due to me playing the song every morning I come out of my bedroom dressed for work – it is my walk-up-to-the-plate song, if you will.
What I’m Reading: A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham
This was my book club’s pick this month, and while I want to recommend it, the other gals brought up some huge flaws and grievances that make me hesitate.
Here’s why I liked it: It is a suspenseful murder book without gruesome, gory details. It’s a whodunnit that will keep you turning pages but not keep you up at night. That is hard to find in a thriller, so if you’re sensitive like me and want to push your limits a bit, this book is a safe space to do so.
But be warned, 4 out of 6 in my book club hated it….
Thanks for reading! Go make the whole place shimmer.
