Today’s Word of the Day is limerence.  It’s a noun meaning a state of mind resulting from romantic or obsessive infatuation with someone, typically involving an intense emotional longing and a near-constant preoccupation with the object of one’s affection.  Think of it as love’s unhinged, over-caffeinated cousin who shows up uninvited and refuses to leave.

Coined in the 1970s by psychologist Dorothy Tennov, the word “limerence” has no clear linguistic ancestry, which feels appropriate for a term describing something so primal and chaotic.  It’s a Frankenstein of a word, stitched together to name the electric storm of dopamine and delusion that hijacks your brain when you’re smitten beyond reason.

Let me confess something, dear reader, because I believe in transparency, even when it’s messy and embarrassing: I am in full-blown, unapologetic hetero limerence with Taylor Sheridan.
This isn’t some casual admiration or polite nod of respect for a fellow creative.  No, this is the kind of obsessive, all-consuming fixation that makes you questions your own sanity.  It’s the kind of thing that has you Googling “Taylor Sheridan ranch photos” at 2 a.m. while your whiskey glass sweats on the nightstand.
It all started innocently enough, as these things often do.  I watched Sicario several years back, and it hit me like a tactical strike to the soul.  The tension, the moral ambiguity, the sheer audacity of the storytelling – it was like someone had cracked open my skull, scooped out my cinematic preferences, and weaponized them into a film.  I was hooked, but I didn’t yet know the name of my dealer.
Fast forward a few years, and I stumble across Hell or High Water.  Same reaction: instant love, like a shotgun blast to the chest.  But again, I didn’t connect the dots.  It wasn’t until earlier this year, after a rewatch of Sicario 2: Day of the Soldado (a sequel that, against all odds, doesn’t suck), that I finally decided to investigate.  Who was this mad genius behind these films?  Who was the puppet master pulling the strings on my cinematic emotions?
Enter Taylor Sheridan.
What I discovered sent me spiraling deeper into the rabbit hole.  This man isn’t just a screenwriter; he’s a goddamn force of nature.  A cowboy-poet with a $200 million deal at Paramount and a ranch the size of a small European country.  He’s not some Ivy League dilettante who lucked into Hollywood success.  Nope, he’s the real deal – a Fort Worth native who grew up wrangling cattle and probably knows how to castrate a bull without breaking a sweat.
It was his prolificity that rocked me.  The man churns out scripts and shows like he’s got a direct line to the Muses.  Yellowstone, 1883, 1923, Mayor of Kingstown, Tulsa King, Landman, Lioness – it’s like he’s single-handedly trying to keep the Western genre alive while the rest of Hollywood churns out shitty superhero sludge.
Here at the Safe House, we’ve been on a steady diet of Sheridan’s work all summer.  It’s become a ritual…after my day’s writing is done: whiskey, popcorn, and whatever new frontier of moral complexity he’s decided to explore.  And now, as we count the days to the second season of Landman, I find myself in a state of feverish anticipation.
Here’s the thing about limerence: it’s not rational.  It doesn’t care about logic or moderation.  It’s a wildfire, and Taylor Sheridan is the spark that has set my brain ablaze once again.  So here I am, a grown-ass adult, confessing my borderline-embarrassing obsession with a man I’ve never met but feel like I know well through his work.  For those of you who’ve been following me for a while, you know that a common complaint over the last several years has been that most of the artists I used to get inspiration and energy from are dead, and that things just aren’t the same now that, say Prince is gone.  I used to get a lot of energy from knowing that whatever I was doing, Prince was out there at the same moment creating brilliant art, and if he was staying up late working, then I needed to too.  The artists I’m referring to were like bright lights on the distant horizon, but gradually, those lights went out.  But now I’ve got Taylor.  We’re completely different writers, with completely different agendas and styles, but he is a welcome inspiration.  You may have noticed my output increasing significantly in the last six months or so, and this has a lot to do with that.  For the first time in a long time, there’s a writer I’ve never met who I’d love to go on a whiskey bender with, who’s badass enough to actually keep up.  And now I find out dude has his own brand: Four Sixes Whiskey!
It’s official…I want to be Taylor Sheridan when I grow up. 

N.P.: “Tide & Timber” – Edries Br