As a lifelong fan of Taylor Swift (I saw her perform when she was doing small shows in parking lots– how things have changed), I rarely write about her. Enough people already do. But when she announced The Life of a Showgirl earlier this year, I enjoyed seeing everyone make their own album cover inspired by hers. I thought I’d use it as inspiration for this year’s travel review!
The Life of a Showgirl was meant to give us a look behind the curtain. What goes on backstage/in hotel rooms versus the performance we see on screen/in stadiums. Whether or not the album achieved this, or is relatable at all, is a discussion for elsewhere, but I do agree with something Taylor said about it in an interview. She said that we are all living public lives now with social media. I think that’s true. We have the highlight reels that we upload for all to see on the internet, and then we have our real lives, what goes on behind the scenes. Reel versus Real.
So for this year’s review, I thought I’d tell you about The Life of a Travel Girl. You’ve already seen the good stuff–that’s easy to post. As I take you through where I went, you’ll get a look at what was going on behind the camera. The grief, rage, fear, and guilt that felt extreme. A more complete look at the journey that was 2025.
January: 🎶 “I might have drowned in the melancholy.” –The Fate of Ophelia 🎶
As someone who travels quite frequently, I always stay home in January. It gives me a break after the end-of-year rush to slow down, do a month without alcohol, and get my routines off to a good start. I usually quite enjoy the quiet winter days at home reading and relaxing and having minimal things on the to-do list. Resetting.
This year was dark in a very different way after the inauguration. It wasn’t the cozy, peaceful dark that comes with short days and snow. It was horror-film-coming-to-life dark. Everything suddenly felt scary and small. I was mourning what could have been. Fearing what was to come. Winter, and its sorrow, felt like it would never end.
February: 🎶 “Redefine all of those blues.” –Honey 🎶
I went to visit my cousin in California at the end of Feb. This is something I try to do at least once a year, either at her house, or sometimes we meet somewhere else and plan a small trip. This visit took me to Santa Cruz, and it was a getaway I needed more than I realized. Seeing family, being back in my favorite state by the ocean, and getting some sun did wonders for my mood.
We went to one of my favorite places of the whole year, Margins Wine Cubby. I’m now going to annoyingly make her take me there every time we’re in the area. I just loved the space, the conversation with strangers we had over delicious wines, and the fact that it’s a female-led team.
There was more magic for me in Santa Cruz. My cousin wanted to go whale-watching, something I’m always down for. We did not expect to end up in the middle of a massive pod of HUNDREDS of dolphins, which is extremely rare. The blue waters transformed my blue mood into awe. Thanks nature for that reminder of beauty!
March: 🎶 “Cause I thought that I’d never find that beautiful, beautiful life that, Shimmers that innocent light back, Like when we were young.” –Eldest Daughter 🎶
The eldest daughter got one year older. I celebrated my birthday with a perfect day in Chicago, shopping for stationery for my new hobby of junk journaling, perusing bookstores and art markets, and having a bottle of wine at a book bar. I felt so grateful to be there with someone who sees the real me and loves me for it. Someone to talk about dreams and books and life with. Who doesn’t think it’s stupid that I want to write a gothic novel one day, who brainstorms ideas with me instead.
Read more: My bookish birthday haul from 4 spots in Chicago 🙂
April: 🎶 “It’s you and me forever dancing in the dark.” — Wood 🎶
If you’ve heard this song I think you’ll appreciate how hard (lol) it was to pick a G-rated lyric. Absolutely love this for Taylor. Full transparency: April was a more chill month and this song was the last one left, so I had to use it here. But the word dark is definitely fitting.
I reconnected with one of my besties from college and got to stay in a gorgeous hotel for one night. Highly recommend a solo night at a fancy hotel! It was amazing to see her and catch up, but some of the conversation was sad. In the 10 years since graduating, some of us from our college house have built beautiful lives with homes, marriages, kids, travel, while others have been dealt darker cards–severe mental and physical health issues, divorces, etc. Experiences that are harder to share and explain online.
I was also struggling with my body image this month, like the worst I ever have. I’m not sure why. I weighed the same as I’ve weighed many, many, many times in the past 20 years since becoming a woman. Later in 2025, a friend of a friend passed away after battling an eating disorder for years. It’s so rough to be in a woman’s body these days, especially in this new Ozempic era. I’m feeling better now thankfully, but that was a dark period where I can’t pinpoint what caused it.
May: 🎶 “I hope I get what I want, cause I know what I want.”–Wi$h Li$t 🎶
Taylor Swift spoke about writing this song in an interview and described thinking about what her “happy place,” inspired by the concept in Happy Gilmore, would be. It’s one of my favorite songs on the album because it’s so darn catchy. And as a lifelong Happy Gilmore lover, I appreciated that inspiration. It made the song more charming and fun to me, versus a statement on feminism the internet was trying to turn it into.
If I had to describe my happy place, it would look a lot like May 2025. I spent a week in a new place with new friends. I had some solo days in Hawaii next to a pool with nothing on the agenda except books and cocktails and fresh seafood. And then we had my mom’s 60th birthday party (80s themed) where so many people came together to celebrate.
Despite everything going on in my life and in the world, I felt safe with all my loved ones. Moments of joy were created by community. By touching grass. I started to understand ways I could soothe myself through the fear and anxiety I’d been feeling for 6 months since the election. I got off Instagram. I got outside more. I tried to focus on what I had each day instead of what was being taken away. I have to hold out hope that one day I will get what I want because I definitely know what I want.
June: 🎶 “Whose portrait’s on the mantle? Who covered up your scandals? Mistake my kindness for weakness and find your card cancelled.”–Father Figure 🎶
We did a weekend trip in Brown County for my niece’s birthday in June, and it was so much fun! We booked one of the coolest Airbnbs I’ve ever stayed in, a huge cabin complete with a game room and movie room and treehouse. We explored Nashville, IN, a bit. I would love to go back and spend more time there, checking out the town and doing some nearby hikes. I loved the independent bookstore we stumbled into so much, Naughty Dog Books.
Around the same time, I had someone ask me for quite a large sum of money, with good intentions of how to use it to be fair. But the more I thought about it, the more pissed I got at his audacity. This is a very misogynistic man. I know how you feel about women, so why did you come to me? Ask my brothers, they’re the men in this family after all. Rage.
July: 🎶 “Shiny wood floors underneath my feet, Disco ball makes everything look cheap, Have fun, It’s prom.” –Ruin the Friendship 🎶
Luckily I don’t have any romances I regret not going after in life which is the theme of this song. I chose it because it’s the song on the album about high school, and I spent a July weekend in Virginia with all my best friends I went to prom with! I’m so grateful to still have the same girls by my side all these years later. No one knows me like they do, and when we get together, I can remember who I was as a child. My silly nature, my innocence, all my hopes and dreams. I love tapping into that part of myself and that I can access it by spending time with them.
But again, there was a dark side to July. At the beginning of the month I woke up to get ready for work and of course started mindlessly scrolling on social media. While half awake, I saw the shocking news that Diogo Jota and his brother had died in a car accident. Jota was one of my favorite players on my favorite soccer team. He wasn’t even 30 years old, and he was gone.
I was crying about Jota’s death in my car on the way to work and saw smoke in the sky ahead. As I drove by, flames burned through my tears, and I could see flashing ambulance lights in the distance. There was a massive fire burning down a home–it must have started recently because fire trucks weren’t even there yet. I found out the next day at work that inside that burning home was the father of one of my coworker’s children. He didn’t make it, and I saw it as it was happening. It was a devastating day.
Read more: How The World’s Sport Became Mine, Across Decades
August: 🎶 “It’s actually sweet, All the time you’ve spent on me, It’s honestly wild, All the effort you’ve put in.”–Actually Romantic 🎶
If you’ve heard this song and know some Taylor Swift lore, you know how to decode this song. It’s not about romance, it’s satire about unhealthy obsession. I spent August planning my upcoming trips for fall, but instead of feeling excited I just felt guilty.
I always make travel a priority in my life. That’s because I realized many years ago that one day it might not be available to me. I always meant that in terms of health– maybe one day I wouldn’t be healthy enough to travel the world. I didn’t want to wait to do it until retirement for that reason.
Now I feel like I have to travel while I can, while women still have freedom to move around and access their own money. Rights are being taken away left and right. Sadly, I don’t know if the freedom I had four years ago will continue to exist. Or we could end up at war, in which case vacationing won’t even be a thing anymore.
I also feel so bad planning trips when so many people don’t have the ability to move freely around this country, let alone the world. The way politicians villainize immigrants is actually romantic, isn’t it? I say with a huge eye roll.
September: 🎶 “Pain, hidden by the lipstick and lace.”–The Life of a Showgirl 🎶
I went to two new countries in September, Germany and Slovenia! It was such a great time. I’ll always enjoy seeing new parts of the world, but behind the scenes, a dear friend had passed away. I was sitting with my cousin in a wine bar in Ljubljana when I got the news. The shock and grief filled me with nausea. Guilt, that I was abroad having a drink in a charming European city and he was gone. Rage at the unfairness of life and disease. Anger, sadness, and sorrow for his best friends and family. I might have been writing about the lipstick and lace I packed for this trip on the internet, but real life was full of pain.
Read more:
slightly overpacked: what I wore in Europe this fall.
First Timer’s Guide to Oktoberfest
October: 🎶 “This is just a storm inside a teacup, so shelter here with me my love.”–Opalite 🎶
Life was feeling very sad and scary, so we decided to escape our normal reality for a few nights. Michigan is my second favorite state, and I had a couple of spots lined up on my Michigan bucket list that we got to check out. We sheltered in some very cute accommodation, got time outside to reconnect with nature (touching grass always helps), and came home feeling grateful for quality time together. But behind the scenes, I was sick as a dog. Not ideal at all, but luckily this was a very slow-paced trip.
The rest of the month contained a wake and funeral, finally meeting a new family member, celebrating my dad’s birthday, and dressing up as Anne Boleyn for Halloween (something I’ve been wanting to do for probably a decade at this point). Life is full of ups and downs–all happening at the same time– and learning how to ride that wave is essential.
Where we stayed:
Parcel Cabins and The Woods Luxury Camping
November: 🎶 “Something wicked this way comes.”–CANCELLED! 🎶
CANCELLED! might be my least favorite song on the album, but it works perfectly for November with the wicked of it all. This month was very chill and much needed after lots of travels in September and October. I saw Wicked: For Good and cried almost the whole way through–I really loved it. I also had a nice Thanksgiving with my family and Girlsgiving with my friends. Overall, can’t complain about much at all except I did slip and fall in public (in a fancy steak house’s cocktail bar) which was super embarrassing!! You can’t win them all!
December: 🎶 “Be my NY when Hollywood hates me.”–Elizabeth Taylor 🎶
I had to use the song with a reference to New York for December since I spent 3 solo nights in NYC during the festive season this year. I live-blogged the whole trip, something I’ve never done before, which was so fun (I’ve linked it for you below). I think I’ll do it on more trips going forward. You can read about all my shoebox hotel room drama, see what shopping I got up to, and find out which Broadway show made me book the trip. I saw five shows in three days, and my theatre-loving heart could not be happier. It was a wonderful way to end my 2025 travels.
I just realized that I have not purposely taken a solo trip since April of 2023 when I went to Spain!! (I did a solo trip in Maine in October 2023, but that wasn’t supposed to be a solo trip lol.) I am manifesting a year of solo travel in 2026, and some more time in my two favorite states, Michigan and California, too.
Read more: Alone Time With Allison NYC Edition
Closing Thoughts
The recently released 6 episode docuseries about The Eras Tour made me really emotional, and I think it did a way better job at expressing the actual life of a showgirl compared to the album. I cried in every episode but especially lost it in the final scene of the final episode, with the culmination of everything The Eras Tour meant. I realized how much we all joined together in 2023 and 2024 during the tour to honor the music and each other and our own eras. We celebrated in the same physical space, exchanged friendship bracelets, smiles, understanding. Our differences meant nothing at The Eras Tour–there was no divide between age, race, size, gender, culture, ability, marital status, kids/no kids, etc. There was shared joy and nostalgia and emotional release.
Watching this docuseries at the end of 2025 highlighted the contrast from then to now and made me feel so sad. I was struck at the end of the series by the question of… how did we come together and feel so much happiness just the year before only to let hate win this year? It’s like our joy was punished with misery and sorrow–but, unfortunately, there always seems to be backlash to progress. Our first Black president that made us feel so hopeful? Nah, let’s go back to white supremacy. A sense of safety and togetherness after the COVID years? Nah, let’s go back to fear.
But in that same vein, there’s always backlash to hate, resulting in good will, kindness, and love. I have to believe that things will get better. That everyone is exhausted by trying to act like we’re afraid of each other. Like we’re so different and don’t want the same things and don’t want progress and don’t want everyone to be okay regardless of our differences. In 2026, I have to be hopeful. That’s the energy I’m bringing into the new year.
So yes, it’s been a heavy time. But… I was never lonely, and I was never hungry. A new member of our family is here. I’m with someone I love. I have a job (depressed with disposable income)! I traveled to one new state and two new countries. I made countless memories with family and friends, old and new. The Life of a Travel Girl is always more than it seems online, but when it’s all said and done, it is pretty darn good. And the show must go on…
Until next time,
Allison xx