vale our tree

When I started high school there was a rule only 4 girls were allowed up a tree. I live across the road from my old high school and we drove past yesterday as men were loading pieces of the thunk from our tree into a truck. It was a turpentine tree, rough bark and a smelly sticky gum. it has woody seeds that we would collect and throw at neighboring tree dwellers.  To climb it you had to hold a small branch, walk up the trunk till you put your legs over another branch and pushed up till you grabbed a high branch and climbed into the middle of the trunk or stayed sitting on the big branch. I remember starting school and walking past the tree with some girls up it and asking if I could climb up. The four of us became a group we invented nicknames. One of them is still my best friend, the other two I haven't seen since school. I think we could only climb that tree in first year after that we moved to an easier tree, one of the small leaf figs. 

There was a whole row of those turpentines planted along the boundary of the school. the grounds are now part of the botanical gardens and they removed the turpentines as they said they were coming to the end of their life, which was strange as they all looked fine. You have to get lot of permissions to remove trees but institutions just take them down. I guess no one was going to argue about it as turpentines are not the prettiest trees but they are  native and a dull colour but I liked them a lot especially the smell of them. I'm going to go and look at where the tree was, they are probably going to expand the car park, see if I can find its seeds and try to grow them. Oh well better wrap some presents it looks like rain again.