The Life of a Showgirl Part 3: Work
She was a menace
“They gave her the keys to the city” - The Life of a Showgirl
The Ice Inside My Veins
A lot of people can sing and dance. But the showgirl in the song The Life of a Showgirl, Kitty, has something extra.
She makes everything look easy: “zero missteps” and “glowing like the end of a cigarette.” So it seems like her life is easy, too. But really, she’s “a menace” who “sold her soul.” There’s “pain hidden by the lipstick and lace.”
Success is a double-edge sword. People build you up to tear you down: “they gave her the keys to the city, then they said she didn’t do it legitly.” To make it in a world that will “leave us for dead,” we gotta fight for our lives: “Honey, I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time” (Look What You Made Me Do from reputation).
And that’s just the fight to get on stage. You gotta fight to stay up there, too: “all the head shots on the walls…are of the bitches who wish I’d hurry up and die.”
You have to be really tough to handle that. In the song, Kitty doesn’t warn off the little girl from being a showgirl out of meanness. She’s worried the little girl is too soft to handle the hustle: “you’re sweeter than a peach.”
More than grit, you have to love what you do. Or you won’t have the stamina to keep going in the face of failure.
Now I Know the Life of a Showgirl
When Swift sings, “You don’t know the life of a showgirl and you’re never ever gonna” I think this is what she’s getting at. The life of a showgirl isn’t the stage. Just like the life of an athlete isn’t the big win, or the life of an actor isn’t the red-carpet, or the life of a lawyer isn’t the moment the verdict is read.
The life of anybody with success isn’t the glamorous moments. It’s the relentless and exhausting work it takes to get there.
I think a lot of us would love to be on stage at the Eras tour. How fun! But how many of us want to call up carnivals and ask for a spot to sing our songs? Lug around equipment, call record labels, keep going despite no no no….for years? That’s what Taylor and her family did!
And Swift doesn’t stop working once she’s made it. Maybe half of the Eras Tour doc is Swift practicing on a keyboard or guitar backstage. She’s not doing anything special. She’s just practicing…endlessly.
The gold-medal sprinter Allyson Felix echos this same sentiment. Felix talks about “what everyone saw: the medals, the glory the ‘perfect’ moments.” But no one saw the training “year after year, injuries, doubt, always showing up.“ Consistency, not perfection, is the real life of a sprinter. Felix talks about how the win won’t change you, but the journey will shape you.
In the Eras Tour doc, Swift says, “people will be jealous of what you have. They will never be jealous of what you did to get it.” If we want to make it in any profession, we can’t just fall in love with the show. We have to dedicate our lives to the grind.
But this song doesn’t just offer a warning. Swift also gives a promise.
If we keep trying and if we do finally make it…there’s nothing better: “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The Life of a Showgirl Part 1
The Life of a Showgirl Part 2
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