Olive Trees

12/24/2007

Los Arcos – Logrono, Spain

Today I passed fields full of olive trees, in between few abandoned houses. Kilometers and Kilometers of olives trees. They are full of beautiful ripe olives, ready to be picked. Finally it is sunny after two days of rain, and birds are everywhere, hiding between the branches or flying and playing, all singing so happy. Peace is around me, no urban noises, no cars, no airplanes, no people talking, no tic tac of watches or clocks, only the sound of the wind, and the birds, sometimes I can hear a dog barking far away, and I can hear the sound of my steps. I feel I am part of a beautiful orchestra.

Olive trees. They are the symbol of peace. And here I can feel Peace.

                 Following Saint Francis's Footprints, 2009 - Olive Trees in Trevi

Once in a while I can hear hunters shooting far away, the peace is broken, this beautiful harmony get destabilized for a while, the birds get scared, but then… it all comes back.

Here I start to think that peace is a gift that we, humans, have lost. We are the ones that disturb it, destroy it, and break it. We are the one that cannot live with the harmony that surrounds us.

How can humans claim peace back?

I start to think at A Bridge of Roses, even if it is a project founded to help educational projects, it is also a project for peace a project to bring peace, to claim peace.

                       Camino di Santiago, 2007 - Olive Trees in Los Arcos

And the peace that I feel here, in this moment, between the olive trees it is the reward for having claimed my peace back.

This is it, each of us has to stand up and claim peace back. We should stop delegating others to work for it, but be part of the process instead. Peace can be restored, and yes it all starts with us. In us!