In Kindergarten, I was the odd kid (surprising, I know) who detested finger painting and preferred to play noughts and crosses by myself or reading. Growing up I used to read the atlas at night, learning where all the countries were.
As a primary schooler, I was the girl always in the library going through Nancy Drew books at light speed, the girl who never felt life was better than when she finally cracked 70 out of 70 on the yearly spelling tests. Seriously I almost cartwheeled around the library when I found out how to spell "seismograph" in an encyclopedia by accident one day, and knew I could rock it out at the next test. (BTW I say almost cartwheeled, because in true nerd sense, I've never been able to do one, I used to gaze at every other girl who'd spend recess doing handstands with jealousy.) When I could choose a book to buy on a family trip to Adelaide, I asked for one on Greek Mythology, which was followed by several more, and I spent so much time reading them.
As I got older, I was one of those teenagers/uni students who was going to save the world. The kind of girl who was going to name her future daughter Christabel (after Christabel Pankhurst, the suffragette), and wrote countless essays on social movements etc. I prided myself on being an intellectual (whether I actually was or not, I'm clever for sure, but certainly have always held an self inflated belief about my genius) and being someone that really cared. Things like my pro-stance on gay marriage and my intensely strong opposition to capital punishment were created and/or strengthened during those years or my very early twenties. I was going to get a PhD and I'd read history books for fun. I even had a favourite French language poem!!! (Demain Des L'Aube by Victor Hugo - still like it.)
I'm sitting here at the moment, flicking between reality tv shows on Foxtel, wondering what happened to all versions of that girl. The girl sitting on the couch, blogging, seems to have had all her intelligence and drive, and has been replaced by a girl that checks TMZ every morning to see what celebrities have broken up overnight, only reads light hearted chick lit about Shopaholics or PIs, and gets withdrawal symptoms if she doesn't watch Judge Judy every day. Why has my brain decided it's more important to store obscure song lyrics from 1986 or who won the last ten Eurovisions, rather than what year the Russian Revolution was? (I can remember the players (for some reason I was always fascinated by Kerensky) and the months of the Revolution, but the year had been forgotten.
My dad, who's is the number one influence on the beliefs and behaviour
of the younger Courtney, stared at me with a mixture of bemusement and
horror when I was able to identify all the characters on an ad for Dog
The Bounty Hunter.
I'm not sure if it's just that as an adult, my brain is a lot more spent during the day at work, so when I get home, I just want to relax and switch off by watching/reading feather light entertainment. Is it natural to lose your passion for broadening your mind as you get older and your brain is tiring easier? Am I just genuinely kind of simple and amused by really basic things, and not clever enough for intelligent discussions? I don't know. It's probably a combination of them all.
This is all said, apart from moment where I do lament my lost brain power, I'm actually not too unhappy with being easily amused nowadays. I do enjoy just relaxing and giggling my way through bad tv, voicing my rather fervent opinion on twitter on which Masterchef contestant I either love or loathe, or just letting my brain unwind. It's just interesting to think about how much I've changed.
I do think I might go find my Greek Mythology Encyclopedia though, it's been a while since I followed Theseus through the Minotaur's Maze. (Oh and again it's lucky I don't have kids, my poor imaginary daughter if she wasn't named after a suffragette, she may have ended up named after my favourite Greek Mythology characters - do you think Andromache is too much?)
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