on one of my favorite hillside walks yesterday i came upon this orange-smash colored metal truck right out of a toybox filled with the brightest lively load of freshly picked/plucked/gathered-up-from-the ground-where-they-fell-after-the branches-being-shaken olives.
these are the "first raccolta", the first harvest, and they mark a very special time here in tuscany. you can smell the green, no? that kind of fresh-cut grass, crushed dandelion weeds underfoot staining your bare feet kind of green...well now, imagine that when you drizzle some olive oil on your boiled cauliflower, or over your plate of pasta with rich meaty tomato sauce, you taste just a hint of that vibrant color? that's the fresh pressed first olive oil that comes from these little emeralds, and it was only yesterday that i understood why.
it's like the green electrified me, and suddenly in the next little field i passed i saw the tiny green shoots of grass of its lush carpet was just the same hue, and then all along the stone wall to my left between the stones and pebbles were fuzzy fluffy hairy tufts of moss in this same bright green.
when i saw these, i realized that it was this color that had mezmerized me into incredulity just the week before in the transluscent bottle of oil sitting up on the glass counter in my tiny corner organic food store. so as soon as i hit the door after descending from the hills, i grabbed my wallet, rushed across the street, and felt it was a little sign of destiny that the very last of these homemade & homegrown bottles was waiting there, because i was at last capable of appreciating it.
it is another reminder that when we cultivate the artist's eye, seeing is tasting.
