Homes: Gardens

After being away on holiday for three of the hottest weeks in the year, we came back expecting to find the garden overgrown and the allotment looking like something from the Book of Revelations, all wilted potatoes and the wizened remains of runner beans. Yet, far from being a scene of devastation, the allotment actually looked better than when we'd left it. Even the tomatoes we'd hurriedly dug in the day before we left were standing, if not exactly tall, then at least in a vertical direction. The garden was trim and colourful' not a single plant had succumbed to the heat or the summer storms that had battered the island the week we went away, and the only thing left to do was a little light cutting back.

Is our garden inhabited by elves? Did we pay Sir Roy Strong to pop round twice a week to sprinkle our onions? Have we cunningly filled our flowerbeds with plastic flowers? No, no and again no. It just turns out that we have particularly kind and attentive neighbours, who must have watered everything almost daily while we were away.

When we started our first proper garden three short years ago, I never thought that it would turn out to be such a social pursuit. For me, and I suspect for most people, part of the appeal of gardening is that it offers a chance to escape from the world, to spend some time blundering around in a private space of one's own. And of course it does, but it's slowly dawned on me that it also leads you into meeting all kinds of people you wouldn't, perhaps, otherwise ever get to know.

Take our allotment as an example. On one side there's Roy, who's in his seventies but still tends the plot next to ours and another down the road, both of which he visits virtually every day. The large plot at the top belongs to Sue, a dedicated mum who grows vast amounts of organic lettuces and fine-looking vegetables for her family. We'd never have met either of them in the normal run of events, but they've told us a lot about the local area, and between weeding and watering we often catch up on local gossip or exchange growing tips, and sometimes plants as well.

Of course, allotments are sociable almost by definition, but the garden has brought us closer to our neighbours too. Given that famous British reticence, I wonder how many neighbours have got to know each other better thanks to a shared interest in gardening. It's one of those well-nigh universal subjects, like Felicity Kendal and the weather, that brings all sorts together, and it's certainly helped cement our friendships here, with plant-swapping and watering being just two of the practical consequences.

And it isn't just about getting to know the people next door. Visiting gardens and nurseries around the country has introduced us to some fascinating individuals, from the famous garden designer who was so posh we could hardly understand a word she said, to phlegmatic nurserymen who know more about their specialised subject than anyone else on earth' from a dowager duchess with Pekinese in tow, to ordinary Joes with wonderful gardens no bigger than our own.

So what, you might say. Well, if our experience is not unusual, and if gardening really is (as is often claimed) Britain's most popular pastime, then clearly a lot of people are talking to each other as a result, and helping each other out, too. To put it another way, gardening looks like it plays an important role in encouraging millions of people to mix - or, to rephrase that like a sociologist, in promoting social cohesion. And at a time when the glue that binds communities together seems to be coming unstuck, gardening's unsung contribution to the health of the nation is surely to be welcomed.

A garden can offer many things - an escape from the world, mental relaxation, and physical exercise. But it can also widen your social circle in unexpected and happy ways, and in an increasingly atomised world, that has to be worth cultivatings

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