Jason Merritt/Getty ImagesTaylor Swift is blessing the March cover of Glamour with her beautiful image, and she's offering up more dating advice. This time it's about navigating the dangerous and confusing world of answering texts. How long do you wait to text someone? How long do you wait to text someone again? What if they don't answer? What if they answer with only one word? What if the only thing they send back is a weird emoticon that sort of looks like a wink but its tongue is out? Is that a licking wink? What does that mean? We're already getting anxious. Help us, Taylor!
Actually, Taylor has been asked about her dating life and her rules on love pretty much every single time she's done an interview. And since Taylor hasn't responded to our request to co-write a relationship advice column à la Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, then we're just going to have to make do with what we have right now. And what we have is a list of all the things she has said about dating, exes and relationships over the past couple of years.
Print this out and consider it your love manual direct from Swifty herself (with some of our own thoughts and advice sprinkled in there):
February 2013: "I never chase boys. They don't like it!"
Lesson: Let them do the work.
March 2009: "In fairy tales the bad guy is very easy to spot. The bad guy is always wearing a black cape so you always know who he is. Then you grow up and you realize that Prince Charming is not as easy to find as you thought. You realize the bad guy is not wearing a black cape and he's not easy to spot; he's really funny, and he makes you laugh, and he has perfect hair."
Lesson: Watch out for anyone that uses more expensive hair products than you. And definitely don't date someone who wears a black cape.
November 2012: "[Guys] can be a part of your life but never let the guy be your life. They can live in your world, but never make the guy your world. Knowing who you are and being independent and strong will be attractive to the right guy."
Lesson: Girl, get a life outside your significant other. There are other things to do besides watching him sleep and scrolling through Pintrest looking for the perfect wedding dress. They'll like you better if you don't do those things. Or at least do them on the sly so they don't notice your crazy habits until it's too late.
November 2013: "I only write songs about crazy love. If I go on two dates with a guy and we don't click, I'm not writing a song about that. It didn't matter in the emotional grand scheme of things. There's a lot that goes on in daily life that isn't really worth turning into a verse and a chorus."
Lesson: Just becase they bought you coffee or said they had a nice time after dinner or favorited one of your tweets, it doesn't mean that this person is your soulmate. Don't turn nothing into something.
January 2012: "If someone doesn't seem to want to get to know me as a person but instead seems to have kind of bought into the whole idea of me and he approves of my Wikipedia page? And falls in love based on zero hours spent with me? That's maybe something to be aware of. That will fade fast. You can't be in love with a Google search."
Lesson: Don't fall in love with someone based on their Facebook, Twitter, etc. However, it's definitely possible to be in love with a Google search because we looove this with our whole heart.
April 2013: "Relationships are like traffic lights. And I just have this theory that I can only exist in a relationship if it's a green light."
Lesson: Date with purpose, date with dignity. Sorry if you're color-blind.
November 2012: "All you can do is be honest and real with him as you get to know each other. Deciding not to play games is the best way to go because it keeps things simple: If he messes it up by playing around with your heart, you'll know he doesn't deserve you. You were real with him, and he didn't return the courtesy. Someone else will!"
Lesson: Quit playing games with my heart! Blast that Backstreet Boys classic at someone's face so the message really gets across.
September 2013: "Here's what I've learned about deal-breakers. If you have enough natural chemistry with someone, you overlook every single thing that you said would break the deal."
Lesson: If the person you like has really weird habits or is generally awful, it's totally normal to fall for them if they're super-hot. Unless they are amateur jugglers. Never date an amateur juggler. Professional juggles are OK.
January 2012: "If you need to put me down a lot in order to level the playing field or something? If you are threatened by some part of what I do and want to cut me down to size in order to make it even? That won't work either."
Lesson: Don't let someone cut you down. Or threaten to cut them back, literally and emotionally.
October 2013: "I think that you can love people without it being the great love."
Lesson: Casual dating is OK. Just wear a condom.
December 2010: "I'm the kind of person who needs all her time to be worth the energy. Let's say I date a guy who really does nothing but damage me. And you've spent time, you've spent effort, and you've put everything into trying to make that work. And it didn't. So you write a song about it. It was worth everything, if you write a song about it."
Lesson: If you can make money off your relationship troubles, it's totally worth the heartache. Start a blog! Design your own iPhone cases and sell them on Etsy! Also, don't date someone not worth your time.
October 2012: "The way I look at love is you have to follow it, and fall hard, if you fall hard. You have to forget about what everyone else thinks. It has to be an us-against-the-world mentality. You have to make it work by prioritizing it, and by falling in love really fast, without thinking too hard. If I think too hard about a relationship I'll talk myself out of it...I have rules for a lot of areas of my life. Love is not going to be one of them."
Lesson: Rules be damned, just do what you want. Forget this whole post about advice. Just go out there and love your ass off.
Thank you, Taylor. Your words are so wise and we will cross-stitch them on pillows for the rest of our lives.