Taylor Swift has opened up about her high-profile new relationship with NFL star Travis Kelce, proclaiming “we’re just proud of each other”.
The two confirmed their relationship in November after Swift was seen attending numerous Kansas City Chiefs games in recent months, the team for which Kelce plays as tight end.
In a new interview with TIME, who just named her as the 2023 Person of the Year, she commented on how the relationship first became public.
“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell…We started hanging out right after that,” she said. “So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other.”
“By the time I went to that first game, we were a couple. I think some people think that they saw our first date at that game? We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date.”
Speaking about how she and Kelce support each other, she added: “When you say a relationship is public, that means I’m going to see him do what he loves, we’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care…The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other.”
She also spoke about the attention she draws when attending Chiefs games. “I don’t know how they know what suite I’m in…There’s a camera, like, a half-mile away, and you don’t know where it is, and you have no idea when the camera is putting you in the broadcast, so I don’t know if I’m being shown 17 times or once.”
“I’m just there to support Travis…I have no awareness of if I’m being shown too much and pissing off a few dads, Brads, and Chads…Football is awesome, it turns out…I’ve been missing out my whole life.”
Also in the interview, Swift opened up about the huge success she has experienced in 2023. “It feels like the breakthrough moment of my career, happening at 33…And for the first time in my life, I was mentally tough enough to take what comes with that….This is the proudest and happiest I’ve ever felt, and the most creatively fulfilled and free I’ve ever been.”
She went on to discuss how her success, as well as the runaway success of Barbie, has had a positive impact in 2023. “If we have to speak stereotypically about the feminine and the masculine…women have been fed the message that what we naturally gravitate toward…girlhood, feelings, love, breakups, analyzing those feelings, talking about them nonstop, glitter, sequins. We’ve been taught that those things are more frivolous than the things that stereotypically gendered men gravitate toward, right?”
“And what has existed since the dawn of time? A patriarchal society. What fuels a patriarchal society? Money, flow of revenue, the economy. So actually, if we’re going to look at this in the most cynical way possible, feminine ideas becoming lucrative means that more female art will get made. It’s extremely heartening.”
She also spoke candidly about her life in the public eye. “Over the years, I’ve learned I don’t have the time or bandwidth to get pressed about things that don’t matter. Yes, if I go out to dinner, there’s going to be a whole chaotic situation outside the restaurant. But I still want to go to dinner with my friends…Life is short. Have adventures. Me locking myself away in my house for a lot of years—I’ll never get that time back. I’m more trusting now than I was six years ago.”
Last month, Kelce opened up about how he met Swift. He attended one of her Eras Tour dates and said that some of Swift’s friends recognised him there, and, as Kelce describes it, some of them were “playing Cupid”.
He said that Swift ended up contacting him afterwards, saying: “She told me exactly what was going on and how I got lucky enough to get her to reach out.”
He also spoke candidly about the pair’s first official date. “When I met her in New York, we had already kind of been talking, so I knew we could have a nice dinner and, like, a conversation, and what goes from there will go from there,” he said.
Earlier today, Swift was announced as the most powerful woman in media and entertainment by Forbes.