Taylor Swift in Vancouver

Last night I took my kids (+1) to the Taylor Swift concert in Vancouver.  She was playing the second of two sold out nights, and I'm sure you can credit her ability to fill arenas to her much improved stage presence since her early tours.  The music's always been fun, but now she looks like she's the one in charge and not just somebody who's been shoved into the spotlight.  Long review cut short, it's a great show.  Go see it if it comes to a city near you.

Now my son didn't want to go to the show.  He claimed that Taylor wasn't his kind of music, and that he didn't know any of her songs.  Unfortunately for him I've been known, on occasion, to drag my kids to things that I think they might enjoy, even if they are resistant.  There just might be some life lessons to be learned.  Taylor is getting older (she's 21 now) but most of her music seems to be about high school romance.  It's aimed at her target demographic, teenage girls, but watching last nights show, I couldn't help but think that there's some lessons in here for the boys too.  So for my son's sake, here are some of the tips that I hope he learned from last nights show.

Son, don't be distracted by the pretty package.  A little smoke and mirrors can make things look better than they are.  Sure, Taylor's a beautiful girl, but you're going to meet hundreds of beautiful girls over your lifetime.  Once the fun of hearing your friends say "You're with her?" wears off, you're going to want something a little more to build on.  It's OK to let the pretty girl turn your head, but sometimes that's as far as it needs to go.

A girl with a little confidence is an amazing thing.  I'm not talking the real cocky "I can get anybody I want, why should I be with you?" type, just a girl who doesn't need you to tell her how beautiful she is every 5 minutes.  Of course, you should still tell her (yeah, I know, it doesn't make sense, trust me on this one), you just don't want to be her sole source for self-esteem.

It's quite often the little quirks that make a girl stick out in your mind.  Things like koi fish on her guitar, or writing the number 13 on everything.  It's a uniqueness that comes from her set of life experiences and not something that she read in a fashion magazine.

Dude, your mother might argue this point, but believe me this is half based on my relationship with her.  A little bit of crazy is a good thing.  This is a tricky one, because you definitely don't want to go too far down that road, but prim and proper just isn't that exciting.  Your life will be a lot more fun if you find a girl with a little edge to her.

The bad news is that no matter how hard you try, you're never going to live up to that romantic ideal that teenage girls seem to have.  Do your best, and try to try to be her Romeo, but romance novels are filed under fiction for a reason.  Still, if you don't put in the effort for romance, you'll never get what you're really looking for....

Yeah the fireworks.  I know it seems like a lot of work, but when it all falls in to place, it really is incredible.  It's like no other feeling in the world, and yes, I'm including that time you got to level 65 on Call of Duty zombies.  Seriously, it's that good.

I don't know how much of this you got on your own from last night's show, but I wanted to make sure to pass on this fatherly wisdom to you.  Let's face it, after this all I've got to do is teach you how to play video poker and I'm pretty much out of knowledge anyways.  There is one thing bugging me about last night though.  You said you didn't know any of Taylor's songs.  I thought maybe I'd draw your attention to a photo from your award winning science project of two years ago.  Care to explain?