To be clear, Taylor Swift and Joe Alwyn didn’t break up on Easter weekend but we found out about it on Easter weekend, and the finding out part of it all is part of the story. This is the artist known for her Easter eggs, leaving clues for her fans all over the place, which is why they’re now pointing to the fact that at her last show, she sang “The 1”, a breakup song, in place of “Invisible String”, as a sign of what was about to be revealed. 

 

It was ET that broke the news on Saturday – that after six years together, Taylor and Joe had amicably split and that there’s no drama here. Other media outlets are chiming in with consistent reporting, from Page Six to TMZ to PEOPLE… 

But on that note, PEOPLE just had a story two weeks ago about Taylor and Joe and how they’re “great together” and that he is “super supportive of her career” and that he would join her own tour whenever he can. But now we’re finding out that their breakup supposedly happened a few weeks ago so, clearly, PEOPLE didn’t know what the f-ck they were talking about at the time because it was evidently over around the same time-ish as their story about their relationship being solid. 

My point is, unlike how it was when she was in her 20s, Taylor has learned how to keep her sh-t on lock, and over the last few years, and particularly in all the years that she and Joe were together, there were almost no leaks about her personal life.

 

Every pregnancy/engagement/pregnancy/wedding story never went anywhere, and as we just saw with PEOPLE’s report, nothing is getting out there about her personal life unless she wants it to. 

So consider the timing of this news. Taylor is currently on her The Eras tour – and it just so happened that this weekend was free, she had no scheduled shows, so she didn’t have to be on stage when the story was breaking. Which is excellent timing for something like this to break, so that she doesn’t have to face it in the immediate and it gives the story time to settle, and other stories to move to the forefront in the gossip cycle. 

This is what legitimises the breakup for me – the fact that the revelation appears to have been so conveniently scheduled according to her tour calendar. And that there’s a distraction in place to move past it. Taylor was seen in Liverpool this weekend, apparently shooting a new video with a Batman theme. 

 

Taylor’s evidently not wallowing in heartbreak so, for many of her fans who were all like, NOOOOO, Taylor and Joe together forever!, it’s like an order from their leader to move on with their lives too. 

 

As for whether or not it’s true that this is actually an unmessy breakup… if it was messy, I would imagine we would hear about it eventually. Because she’ll tell us, eventually, in her songs. That said, it’s not entirely unheard of for someone in their 20s to no longer be with the same person in their 30s. Many celebrity couples have travelled this path before. Gwyneth Paltrow and Ben Affleck. Winona Ryder and Matt Damon. Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling. Nelly and Ashanti. Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield. Taylor’s moving into another era now. Single in her 30s, we’ll see what that looks like.