One of my most vivid memories is of coming back West from prep school and later from college at Christmas time. Those who went farther than Chicago would gather in the old dim Union Station at six o’clock of a December evening, with a few Chicago friends, already caught up into their own holiday gayeties, to bid them a hasty good-by. I remember the fur coats of the girls returning from Miss This-or-that’s and the chatter of frozen breath and the hands waving overhead as we caught sight of old acquaintances, and the matchings of invitations: “Are you going to the Ordways’? the Herseys’? the Schultzes’?” and the long green tickets clasped tight in our gloved hands. And last the murky yellow cars of the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul railroad looking cheerful as Christmas itself on the tracks beside the gate.
When we pulled out into the winter night and the real snow, our snow, began to stretch out beside us and twinkle against the windows, and the dim lights of small Wisconsin stations moved by, a sharp wild brace came suddenly into the air. We drew in deep breaths of it as we walked back from dinner through the cold vestibules, unutterably aware of our identity with this country for one strange hour, before we melted indistinguishably into it again.
That’s my Middle West — not the wheat or the prairies or the lost Swede towns, but the thrilling returning trains of my youth, and the street lamps and sleigh bells in the frosty dark and the shadows of holly wreaths thrown by lighted windows on the snow.
i’ve seen a bunch of stuff about taylor comparing herself to both Gatsby and Daisy in réputation… but i haven’t seen anyone talk about how Gatsbys real name is James…. and we all know why she’s daisy.
@not-a-demonphannie yeah, the fact is true, but I thought it would be a fun April fools joke to put the wrong picture! My sister thinks they look alike so I wanted to try it out!
Ever tried playing Rodrigo’s Drivers License on repeat and full volume, while actually driving/riding away from home, away from the hubbub of life. Consoling feelings creep in and take anxiety’s place. The rage and agitation, all drains away as she beautifully end the chorus with :
‘Cause you said forever, now I drive alone past your street’
