French Dirt: The Story of a Garden in the South of France

I just finished French Dirt: The Story of a Garden in the South of France by Richard Goodman. It is a lovely little book about gardening, human relationships and our connection to the earth. Goodman use of simple prose makes this book easily accessible. Valuable life lessons are tucked into his luscious stories of melon seeds, his early childhood memories of gardening, or his zealousness at planting.

Some that struck me:

"Why would I ever deny myself my precious mistakes?"

"But I learned something more important from him...that there is a difference in nature between what grows purely wild and what has been tamed. And that gardening is a collaboration."

"He and I had now a failure in common. Mine stung. His damaged. But the point - what he showed me - was to accept it quietly. With nature, it was nothing personal."