Snow!

OK, not really. It's too early for snow. But do you know what this is? It's a cotton field! On my way to and from the beach I passed numerous cotton fields this trip. I can only tell which ones are cotton fields in early October because that's when the cotton bursts from the pods and is ready to be harvested.



In 1997, my college roommate, Kari from Norway, and her/our friend Helge (also from Norway, who was also with us at UW)came to visit me in Charlotte. Sadly I was unable to take time off from work while they were here because my boss's father died - like the day they got here - and it was not exactly a time that I could beg off work. I know - sounds harsh, but I was really between a rock and a hard place. Did I spend time with my friends who came halfway around the world to see me? - or did I remain a faithful soldier in my boss's army? I did what I felt was right and stayed by my boss's side, although I was so torn and upset about not getting to spend time with my friends who had come all that way...but how can you really turn your back on one of your other best friends (who also happens to be your boss) whose parent has just died - much less tell her you were struggling with such a decision? So I stayed back.



Now wait just a cotton pickin' minute. How does that relate to a cotton field you ask? Well, Kari and Helge had planned to go to the beach (with or without me) while they were here. When they got back to Charlotte after a couple days, they brought me a handful of white fluff. I didn't know what it was right away, because it was so out of context (i.e. it wasn't in a plastic bag). But when I finally figured it out I was like, "you guys picked this out of someone's field?" I was concerned I had failed to properly brief my foreign friends on the ins and outs of trespassing in the South, compounded by the fact that I had not been able to accompany them. They didn't know that they could have been met by a hostile farmer with a shot gun - ya know?



But this afternoon on my way home from the beach I decided I'd find a field that was right by the road, where I could jump out of the car, snap a few pics and snag a cotton ball or two - just like Kari and Helge had. I knew there was a field bordered on one side by a church parking lot on Highway 218 in Mint Hill, so that's where I pulled in and took these pictures, just as the sun was starting to go down. No shotgun-wielding-ministers in sight!