Driving an hour may seem like a long distance for a music concert, but for many Taylor Swift fans, an hour drive is not far at all. Many fans want tickets so badly that they are willing to fly just to see her. 

“Taylor Swift has been and still is one of my favorite artists, so I have always wanted to hear her music live,” says Nonnewaug sophomore Grace Walkup. “I had always just listened to it by myself and I really just wanted to go and see her live.”

Many Nonnewaug students went to a Taylor Swift concert while she was in the area — Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., and Metlife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. — but some, like junior Skylar Chung, went very far to see her. 

“My friends live in Georgia and their dad works with something to do with the arena, so they got us tickets,” says Chung, who saw Swift at Mercedez-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. “Then me and my mom decided to go down.”

For others, the ticket purchasing process wasn’t that easy. Fans had to get verified and be placed on a waiting list.  

“You basically had to be a verified Taylor fan, and then only certain verified fans got onto the waiting list, and thankfully my aunt got on the waitlist so she was able to get us tickets,” says Walkup. “But she was in line on Ticketmaster for hours. Thankfully, we got good seats [at Gillette Stadium]. It took a while, but it was worth it.”

Seeing Swift in person was an emotional experience for many of those in attendance.

“I was really excited. I started crying, and I think [it was] just because I had always listened to her music and I had always thought about her and how much I connected to her lyrics,” says Walkup. “Then actually seeing her for the first time was just really exciting and very emotional.”