In the spotlight

Guest Speaker

Sometimes my life can be rather routine, sometimes things get exciting, and at the moment I seem to be going through an exciting phase. I was recently contacted by a local gardening club, who incidentally happen to be the longest running English language gardening association in the whole of France, to see if I would give a short talk to the members at their Annual General Meeting. As I read the email, I could feel my heart rate increase as my eyes widened and that tingle of panic mixed with excitement took hold in my stomach. I am quite a shy person, happy to share my French village life via my blog and regular column in the Deux Sèvres Monthly magazine, but not really used to speaking in front of an audience. However, I feel it is a good thing to step out of your comfort zone every now and then and if I’m honest, I do like a challenge.

Yesterday afternoon saw me ‘preaching’ the benefits of growing and eating courgettes (zucchini) to twenty enthusiastic gardeners with happy, smiley faces. They welcomed me into their meeting, they listened and they even had a few questions that I hope I was able to answer for them. They were so friendly I have decided to become a member and am looking forward to taking part in their monthly meetings, horticultural days out, summer bbqs and Christmas meal. I’m also hoping that over time I will be able to convert any non-courgette growers to become fans even if it means giving away seedlings. Yesterday, as well as coffee and chocolate biscuits, I was also lucky enough to win a new trowel in the monthly raffle, which I promise wasn’t fixed even though I managed to draw my own ticket.

Thank you to the members of Les Jardiniers du Sud-Ouest à Chives for being so welcoming. If any of my local gardening friends would like to join in the fun I can let you have the membership details.