11th March 2019
One of the best parts of my day is when I walk out of our house and down the red earth road to Marina School every week day morning, cutting across the playing field that separates the Junior School from the High School inhaling the cool morning air and feeling so glad to be alive!
The cotton trees in the neighbourhood have suddenly sprouted green pods on their branches which have now started exploding like tiny cushions splitting at the seams and spewing out white cotton wool after a pillow fight.
And I am filled with nostalgia for a childhood spent running barefoot down the gravel lanes of suburbia in the sixties squealing with delight as the pods that grew on the cotton trees that lined Jambugasmulla Road suddenly spat out balls of soft white cotton onto the ground for us to pick up and stuff our dolls’ pillow cases with. And I’m struck by the realisation that I haven’t seen a cotton tree in Nugegoda for a very long time.
And I wonder: where have all the cotton trees gone?
