I looked at my son playing in the water at Golden Bay while I was on the sundeck chair sifting the sand for microplastics. Tiny bits and pieces emerged from the sand and the beach I believed was quite clean, showed not to be what it appeared to. It rarely disheartens me that there is so much to pick up, I just do it and always have in mind that it’s one piece less for the sea. It’s like I am on autopilot.

My mobile beeped and I saw that I had received a message. I smiled and stopped what I was doing - it was a photo of me that my daughter had found when she spent the summer at my parents’ house in Sweden. It was me as a child, on a beach abroad picking seashells. We still have those seashells at my mother’s house, in glass jars. Such precious childhood memories! There are two things that have shaped me into becoming the one I am today, the travelling as a child and the forests of the northern countries.

While I am still in a state of total nostalgia, my son appears next to me smiling the biggest smile I’ve ever seen and proudly says “mum, look what I found!”. He opens up his closed hands and the thought of a possible shell, or a crab or whatever sea life, turns out to be a handful of plastic. He is so happy about the find, because “now no turtle will eat it”. He asks me to bin it so he can go back “hunting for more!” I smile as a reflex, he makes me so proud and he knows it. My first born, growing up to become a responsible and aware young man.

The memories of my childhood brought back by the photo, the thought that I want my kids to have the same experience I had and seeing my son in front of me chasing plastic made me realise they never will have the same. It became overwhelming and I felt the tears coming and for the first time I realised that no matter what we do, the children will have to fight this for a long time, even when we are gone. It will be the fight of their lives, for their lives.

I always wonder, do the world leaders don’t have these moments of despair? Do they ever shed a tear or two when their children are swimming amongst the plastic in our seas? Do they ever think about possible solutions that can be put in place today to prevent their children picking plastic instead of sea shells?

The state of the sea is bad all around the world and the debris travels, so it’s hard to blame a few countries only. However, in Malta the issue is very concentrated since we are a small nation as well as highly overpopulated. The issue simply becomes so visual and kind of thrown in your faces.

I know that not many understood the issue of plastic back in the 1960s when it was created, likewise for the cigarettes, it’s human to make mistakes. What I can’t get my head around is the fact that when something turns out to be so bad for us that it might eventually kill us, we still turn a blind eye.

Now you might say that the government has schemes coming to sort our waste and a deposit on bottles which will increase the recycling rate. I am totally in favour of both of those schemes. The question is, could we do more? Are the politicians around the world doing what is needed for the environment, which indirectly is needed for the survival of the human race, or are they doing what they can to be re-elected again? No more, no less. In Malta this issue is very present and I am so sick of it. If you go into politics you should do so with a vision to actually do good for the commons, not the few. If that means that you won’t be re-elected, then so be it. We need politicians with a backbone that leads the people and motivates them. We need politicians that can explain why single use plastic needs to be banned today, not tomorrow, and that can explain it in such a way that everyone understands that this is the only way.

Thought of today. What memories of the beaches will be saved in glass jars the coming generation? What will our generation be known as? The generation that screwed it up, or the generation that solved it all? We have a choice to make and we better take a decision now. Let’s fill that jar with hope.