As I understand it, the characters on that album are just that - all characters and not reflections of her own personal stories (although clearly her own stories probably inform how she tells theirs). Both of those pandemic albums were similar in that way - perhaps in part because she was collaborating with Aaron Dessner of The National on both of them, and they weren't her usual style of songwriting. But to be honest, that's when I started to become a fan. I like this newer Indie/Alt rock influenced sound better than the older purely pop stuff, although I did get the re-released 1989 the other day and am enjoying that.

Here's a very short clip of her talking about the freedom that came from creating characters and not just feeding the tabloids her own pain.

https://www.tiktok.com/@xorcontent/video/7264576514031734049