CBC thought-train of the week

Okay, I listen to a lot of CBC podcasts, but I like them, and then I don't have to listen to my own thoughts as I clean toilets and mop floors. Much of the time the podcasts direct my thoughts toward certain things. Sometimes I tell you about my thoughts, sometimes I keep them to myself. I will share this one.

DNTO this week was about repetition. One woman talked about a book she read over, and over, and over again, and why she liked to read that book. I have a book that I have read many, many times; The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery. I don't even know how many times I have read this book, but I am on my third copy. This is one of the few books I brought with me when I went to Korea, and I think I read it three or four times in the time I was there. I think I like this book so much because I identified with Valancy. There was the Valancy that everyone knew, and there was the Valancy that she knew was there, but was too afraid to let out. One day she decided to stop hiding the real Valancy, and she started to say the things she always thought, and she did what she wanted to do no matter what her family thought. She started living life instead of watching it. She had fun. And she found her blue castle, the place where she knew she belonged, the thing she had been looking for her whole life but couldn't find. She was finally happy. I love this book. The thing is though, I haven't read it in quite a while. Almost two years in fact. I don't think I need to. I found my blue castle. I'm not there right now, I left it, but I know it's there and I will find it again. My blue castle is waiting for me.

Changing

I was listening to a DNTO podcast recently. As if often the case, it got me thinking. This probably isn't the goal of DNTO, it is a comedic program after all, but it got me thinking anyway. The question they asked that episode was whether it is posible for people to change. My initial response was, of course it's possible for people to change, look at me. Most of you would say that I am definately different now than I was before I went to Korea. I would have said that too. But I'm not so sure now. I certainly behave differently than I did before. There are things I do now that I never would have done before. But am I really that different? I think the core of who I am has not changed at all. I think this person that I am now has always been there, waiting inside, for me to let her out. I just didn't know how to let her out. Now that I have let her out, I am so much happier than I was before. Robin now is the true me. I never really was the real Robin before, and I wasn't very happy. I don't think it is possible to be happy while not being true to who you are. I think I was just pretending to be happy before. Certainly, there were happy moments, but I don't think I was truly happy. Sometimes I feel the old Robin coming back to the forefront, and I don't like that. It scares me because I know what being old Robin was like, and I didn't like that at all. New Robin is so much better. But are old Robin and new Robin really different or does old Robin hold new Robin prisoner until she can escape? I know old Robin isn't completely winning because I wrote this. Old Robin never would have let other people into her thoughts.

I will stop refering to myself in third person now. I know it's been a long time since my last post, and then I have to go and post something overly serious like this. I will be more trivial and funny next time. Unless, of course, I listen to DNTO again. Those CBC programs are deep sometimes.