All I Want For Christmas

An Abundant Olive Harvest

Reading for pleasure is a great balance to some of the "heavier" books I have been making my way through. One of those pleasure books is The Lady in the Palazzo: An Umbrian Love Story" by Marlena de Blaisi. The story is about a couple who are looking for a home in Umbria - a place to restore and make their own. It's a delightful story about food, and relationships. The author begins the book by describing the festival of St. Anthony in an Umbrian village. It is celebrated in the town plaza with a huge bonfire, enormous quantities of food and an invitation to all of the surrounding villages to come and feast. There is even a raffle and the drawing for the winner of the prize is done with great ceremony.

"The Bishop, divested of his official purple in favor of corduroy pants and down-filled vest, is calling for attention. The drawing of the winning ticket for the evening's prize is near. A wheel-barrow -- a glossy black number, on loan for the evening from the ferramenta, the hardware store -- is lined with a tablecloth, faded yellow and nicely ironed. It is precariously stacked with salame and prosciutto and cheese, necklaces of dried figs and bay leaves threaded on kitchen string, pomegranates, persimmons still on their leafless branches. Nests of homemade pasta wrapped in kitchen towels are leaned up against the dried kind in paper boxes. Breads, cakes, jam tarts, biscotti shed sugar over all of it. And there are jugs and jugs of housemade wine. Each item is a donation from a villager, his "tariff" for the evening. Additionally, the villagers each buy a raffle ticket... I like that nothing in the wheelbarrow is separate from the other things, how the fruit lies on the unwrapped cheese, how the cakes totter as they will, the whole of it an artless study in abundance.

Another study in abundance is the winner. He is a small, round boy with great chestnut eyes and red blooms over his olive cheeks. He seems shy at first, puling at his mother's hand, wanting her company as he goes to claim his prize. Noting his hesitation, the bishop steers the barrow to the boy, and the crowd screams its approval. The boy's brown -mittened hands take over the cart and, after some small consulting with his mother, he pushes it about the piazza. Having decided to distribute his riches to the crowd, he asks people to choose what they'd like. Sometimes, the boy stops to tell someone how to cook a thing, how to slice it, what to serve with it...

Of his preening mother, I ask his age. He will soon be ten. She is flustered and teary, pulling at her sweater, running a hand through the curls of her thick black hair. No one, least of all she, will talk about the circle of grace just closed by her son here in a small town in Umbria by the light of Saint Anthony's fire. (The Lady in the Palazzo: An Umbrian Love Story, Marlena de Blaisi, pages 17 and 18)

The pictures of abundance described by de Blaisi in this section of her book are what I think of at this time of the year. We are the recipients of this "wheelbarrow of abundance." Our task is distribution. I hope this Christmas you will consider ways to share the abundance in your lives with others. Like everyone, I love to receive gifts; but I know that I do not "need" anything. My life is full of treasures beyond measure in my family, and friends. The incredible beauty of creation is like opening a new present each day. So this year what I want for Christmas is to carry my wheelbarrow of abundance around to give to others.

I have some suggestions if you are looking for ways to empty your wheelbarrow. I just received a part of a pig from a friend. It is a gift through Heifer International. The pig will be a "living savings account" for a struggling family somewhere in the world. You can access their gift catalog of animals at http://www.heifer.org/ or by clicking the link on the right side of this page.

Habitat for Humanity is another way to share the abundance in your wheelbarrow. Donations can be made to their program called "A gift from the heart." These donations will be used to build affordable houses for people all over the world, including the places where you currently live. It is a wonderful organization found at http://www.habitat.org/ or by clicking on the link on the right side of this page.

Lastly if you are into planting things you might want to plant an olive tree at Daher's vineyard near Bethelem in Israel. These olive trees will greatly increase the value and quality of the Nassar family land and offer a greater means of income for them. You can read about this project at http://www.fotanna.org/. Just click on the Projects: Land and People window to learn about the olive tree project and others. This link is found under Friends of the Tent of Nations at the right side of this page.

Whatever abundance is in your wheelbarrow this Christmas I urge you to share with any of these worthwhile projects or your local church's outreach or local food pantry. In these days of world wide financial crisis most of us in the western world can still consider ourselves blessed with abundant resources. Fill up your wheelbarrow and start sharing.

Meal Shared at a Palestinian Home in Israel