‘It became a 10-act masterpiece’: What seeing Taylor Swift live on the Eras Tour for the first time meant for this long-time fan

Waking up this morning, I still couldn’t believe that last night wasn’t, as Taylor Swift sings in “Cruel Summer,” simply a “fever dream high.”
I have often joked that being a Swiftie is the closest thing I have to a religion. After last night, I don’t think it’s a joke anymore.
When she took to the stage for the first song of the evening, “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince,” Swift sang, “It’s been a long time coming,” and for me that statement could not have felt any truer.
I discovered Swift’s music when I was 13 (appropriately) with “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” and “Love Story,” and I was immediately entranced. I spent the next few days familiarizing myself with her entire discography and was amazed at how not a single song struck me as anything less than perfect.
Yesterday — 10 years later — I saw her live, for the first time, on the Eras Tour in Toronto.
In retrospect, falling in love with Swift’s music was inevitable for me. As a young writer, I always admired songwriters with strong lyrics, and Swift, in my opinion, is the greatest lyricist of a generation. In fact, as a high-schooler I would tell all my friends that her writing was so great, it would one day be taught in school. How prescient was I? 
To paraphrase “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” she puts narcotics into all of her songs.
But last night was not just about Taylor Swift the songwriter, it was about Taylor Swift the performer.
Although I had never experienced her live before, I’d seen videos of previous tours, every award show performance, the Eras Tour film and at least 50 grainy YouTube livestreams of the tour over the past two years. And as magical as each of those viewings were, none compared to the absolutely hypnotic experience of seeing Swift in person.
From the moment she stepped on stage, she was able to engage each and every one of the more than 40,000 fans there. Then it became a 10-act masterpiece.
During “Cruel Summer,” the queen of bridges asks the crowd if they know the bridge before she starts singing it. And of course, the entire stadium shouted along with her, “I’m drunk in the back of the car …”
It was surreal.
After she finished the “Lover” era songs, the big Lover House behind her burned down and everybody lost their mind. We knew it was coming, but when it happens in front of you, it’s still a surprise.
There’s something about the way Swift can instantly transport you back to each of her eras. As soon as the “Fearless” era began, I felt as though I were seeing a 20-year-old Swift performing. 
I was particularly excited when she started singing “You Belong with Me” since I was wearing my “Junior Jewels” shirt, which she wore in the song’s award-winning music video. My T-shirt had been signed by members of my university’s Taylor Swift Society last summer, and I was glad to bring a piece of them to the show.
“All Too Well (10 Minute Version)” being on the set list shows you that Swift understands her power — very few artists can perform a song for 10 minutes knowing that the audience will sing along. Then again, very few artists can perform for more than three hours confident that the audience will remain engaged throughout.
Swift is very clearly aware of her talent. In “I Can Do It with a Broken Heart,” she sings about how she puts her best foot forward, regardless of what’s going on with her personally — “You know you’re good when you can even do it with a broken heart.”
There is something special about singing along to “But Daddy I Love Him,” a song that specifically calls out the holier-than-thou fans who want Swift’s entire public life to be laid bare for them.
“I’ll tell you something about my good name / It’s mine alone to disgrace / I don’t cater to all these vipers dressed in empath’s clothing,” she sings with her fans. For some, this could be a moment of reflection so that they can stop “sanctimoniously performing soliloquies (she’ll) never see.”
A big part of the Eras experience — or any Taylor Swift concert, for that matter — are the traditions: the fist raise during “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince”; the “Fearless” hand heart; the claps during “You Belong with Me” and “Shake It Off”; the loud and long cheers  as the “crowd goes wild at her fingertips” after “champagne problems”; the phone flashlights held aloft as Swift sings about her grandmother “marjorie.”
Not to mention the other chants: shouting, “1, 2, 3, let’s go bitch,” during “Delicate”; screaming, “You forgive, you forget, but you never let it go” during “Bad Blood”; or singing, “Taylor, you’ll be fine” during “Anti-Hero.”
Every one of these chants and traditions reminds you that being a Swiftie is so much more than just individually loving Swift and her music — it’s a community centred around her.
As glad as each of these made me, I won’t pretend I wasn’t a little sad when I was the only person in my section doing the “Blue Jays” chant during “Blank Space” — which began during the 1989 tour. At that moment, I felt like I was there not just for myself, but for all the OG Swifties — keeping a part of our culture alive, and hoping the newer fans pick up on it as well.