"The olive tree is surely the richest gift of heaven."
Pliny the Elder
In my garden on a mountain slope in Cape Town grows an unruly olive tree.
Planted by the original owners of our home back in 1948, for the past 78 years it has stretched upward, unpruned and untrained, as it tries to outcompete an enormous yellowwood and wild fig, to reach the golden Cape Town sun.
Most of the olives are beyond our reach. But every year, my family and I manage (with great effort) to pick and prepare up to 10kgs of olives.
The olive is one of the oldest and most sacred fruits in human history.
Revered in ancient Greece, the olive tree was a divine gift, symbolising wisdom and peace. Homer called olive oil "liquid gold," recognising both earthly value and divine essence.
In the Bible, the olive branch becomes the ultimate sign of reconciliation, the dove returning to Noah with a leaf in its beak marks the end of destruction and the beginning of new life. Olive oil, too, played a sacred role: for consecration, the anointing of kings, and the healing of the sick.
Yet the olive, in its raw state, is so bitter that it is inedible. Pluck one from the tree and taste it… it is sharp, bitter, even hostile...
Before it can be eaten, it must first undergo brining in salt water, a slow, deliberate leaching of bitterness, a fermentation that cures and transforms the olive into something flavoursome, complex and nourishing.
This process can take weeks or months. The olive is cut or cracked to allow the salt water to enter, and then submerged.
There is something in that patient, deliberate work that feels familiar. Much of what I do in my work as a graphic recorder, drawing out meaning and distilling the complex until it can be seen, is really another kind of brining.
Life exposes us to suffering, disappointment, pain, trauma, anger, disillusionment, and the sting of betrayal. And in response, we often carry bitterness… resentments, remorse, regret…
Transformation demands brining.
Forgiveness, surrender, immersion, healing, grace…
...before the fruit can come to the table.
