LIFE 'ROUND HERE: OIL
how expensive it is, how little money I make, and how those two things aren't really related
Has anyone seen the price of extra virgin olive oil this week? Someone in the group chat rightfully laments. A woman working a bar complains, Olive oil used to be €2 and now €10??? I can’t make a tortilla with sunflower oil! That’s disgusting! OO is essential to Spain— it’s farmed here, produced here, and a staple to pretty much every typical Spanish dish, but extreme weather conditions are causing a drought of the liquid gold. As olive groves dry up here in Spain, one of the largest producers of OO in the world along with Greece and Italy, I can’t help but think of how they’ve already been decimated in Palestine. Entire ancient olive groves eliminated as quickly as entire lineages who cared for them. It’s hard to fathom, really. To claim a land as your own and then proceed to violently render it utterly useless is a tale as old as time colonialism. But land cannot belong to anyone. The natural world is not ours to own, though we create Whole Wide Wars pretending it is. Those who love the land, tend to it, protect it, and live in reciprocity with it are the ones who should have access to it. I’ll die right here, on this hill, but not before planting an olive tree in hopes of a better tomorrow. Unfortunately, and to quote Josie Duffy Rice (writer with focus on the American criminal justice system), people like certainty more than they like hope.
Fortunately, I am not one of those people.
Maybe in the states you’re happy to pay $10 for a bottle of extra virgin olive oil but that’s nuts here. To put things in perspective, I make about €14 a day (I’ve been told by people who have done the math), though perhaps my job would be considered anomalous. It isn’t much but, in classic Lex fashion, I’m not in it for the money. No, no, no honey, I’m in for the benefits. Take away my affordable olive oil, okay fine! I’m not Spanish! Yet! But I have great insurance (now!) that I can use to go to the doctor (for free) if I end up harming my health by switching to lard (I’m Mexican!) or some awful refined vegetable oil (I’m American!) for my cooking. You know I can write platitudes about how there are many types of currencies, so I won’t. The point is to say that I prefer to prioritize my sweet sweet Time (+ how and with whom I spend it) above all. So I’ll take €14/day if I can finish my time exchanging labor for a livable wage at 1 or 2 PM, walk home, make a fresh lunch, support my bestie in her personal work grievances, then walk the river behind my house until I get hungry again. I know my wage sounds insane to fellow Americans reading this but don’t worry about me, babes— my bases are covered. Teeth cleaning? Free. Eye exam? Free. Doctor visit? Free. Prescription? €5. Bottle of wine? €3. Beloveds? Close. Dinner? Homemade. EVOO? €5 million.
I worked on a family’s olive farm once in central Spain. Just once, I’m no expert. If you know enough to coerce me into a third layer of questioning, I’ll surly fumble. But I can attest to the demanding physical labor and love and time and appreciation that goes into it. Farming, man, it’s literally god’s work!!! I can tell you about additional things: plating garlic on a surprisingly warm winter day. Jarring homemade jam with the patriarch, Jorge. Impressing father and his aerospace engineering son with my beginner’s luck at some table game they introduced me to, but these types of memories are only fun for the parties that were involved. And plus, that would be considered LIFE ‘ROUND THERE.
TLDR: Warm memories on a chilly olive grove with two strangers who took me in on Christmas and made me feel like family. I do wonder how their olive trees are doing. Them, too.
