A miracle unfolding

In this article I am going to talk, quite literally, about a fig tree. First, however, a little context. My house features two courtyards. The plants and trees in the northern courtyard are always a month behind those in the southern one, which allows me, simply by moving from one to the other, to play with time. When the house was built, a wild fig tree native to the Malaga hills was left untouched. There it remains. It must be around a hundred years old and takes up a large portion of the southern courtyard. I often have my breakfast in its shade.

I write these lines during the hottest August on record. Or so they say. The fig tree is an emblem as mythical as it is fertile. This year, mine has proven especially so. In the depths of the summer heat, it is responding to the generous winter rains. In June, it yielded a bountiful harvest of early figs, and now it is preparing the main crop. My neighbours are quite stuffed with early figs, and once these mature, I am unsure what I shall do with so many. Gathering them from the ground, collecting the leaves in November, and pruning the branches so they do not reach the roof of the house - what a task the Lord has set us! Others for far less would have cut it down. For now, however, here it stands, and I hope it will remain for many years to come. At least for as long as I live, for beyond that I can promise my fig tree nothing.

Now, as summer fades, I look forward to enjoying the long-awaited Malaga winter, playing with time between two courtyards or between early and late figs - measures of time tailored to older souls, far more human than those modern water-clocks (tick, tick, tick) that impassively measure time in seconds, minutes, and hours. I look up and a canopy of leaves and figs shelters me from a sun that is already showing its strength. I close my eyes and take a brief nap, leaning back in a wicker chair. A blackbird wakes me; I stand up and pick the first fig of the season. The heat is pressing, yet the fig is cool and damp. To my palate, it tastes of morning dew. The fig tree survives for many years, produces abundant fruit, sprouts vigorously even under difficult conditions, and has accompanied Mediterranean civilisations for thousands of years.

Given such a history, it is easy to understand the mythical stature of the fig tree. Yet there is another, more sophisticated reason that makes it fascinating. It belongs to the Moraceae family (mulberries, for example) and within it to the Ficus genus (like the weeping figs in Malaga's Parque), with the common fig (Ficus carica) being the most prominent member. What is most surprising, however, is that the 'fruit' of the fig tree is not a true fruit at all, but rather an extraordinary structure housing flowers within its interior, its pollination dependent upon a minute insect known, not by chance, as the fig wasp (Blastophaga psenes).

The female wasp enters the false fruit through a small opening, depositing the pollen carried from another tree onto the female flowers. Biologists refer to this as mutualism. The mechanics grow more complex depending on the species, but this is neither the place nor am I the person to beat around the bush. My intention with this article is simply to convey to the reader that enjoying a fine moment sometimes requires nothing more than the shade of a fig tree. Especially if, looking up past the blackbirds feeding on the figs, one can imagine that where nothing meets the eye, one of nature's 'magical' encounters is taking place - a bond between plant and pollinator that has evolved over millions of years.

It is a true miracle, albeit a natural one that demonstrates how, contrary to the grim, reductionist interpretations of evolution once held by certain sociobiologists, evolutionary theory has embraced so many instances of mutualism, symbiosis, saprophytism, and protocooperation that what was once considered exceptional has now become the rule and the best explanation for how we arrived here. Such is the case with my fig tree and its wasp.

No, this is no dream from a brief afternoon nap. Yet had it been one, and were I possessed of that veil of ignorance John Rawls demanded for impartial judgement, this dream of co-evolution between wasp and fig tree would have arrived as a revelation, obliging me to rethink many of my moral prejudices. As indeed has happened. No, it was not a dream. It was science. The understanding of phylogeny and other disciplines has provided me with sound tools for moral justification, but above all, for deriving greater pleasure from the world around us. In this instance, because while resting in the shade of the fig tree and tasting that fig infused with morning dew, I was also partaking in all the mysteries of nature that science gradually unveils. Fernando Savater put it pithily when asked what purpose culture serves: to have a grand time without spending much, he replied.

So the next time you walk through the countryside and encounter a fig tree, particularly if it grows wild, slow your pace, tip your hat if you wear one, and give thanks to God if you are a believer, or to nature if you are not. Beneath its dense shade, you may imagine how, just above you, a genuine miracle is unfolding.