Garden like a......punk

This year maybe the 40th anniversary of punk, but according to an interview with the Independent back in 2010, John Lydon aka Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols, is more likely to be doing a spot of gardening these days than taking drugs.

The thought conjures up an interesting image - the bad boy of punk wielding a trowel in a vision of domesticity somewhat at odds with the image we are used to, the deranged and comical trade mark scowl temporarily replaced by a serene expression.

It wouldn’t be the first time, and won’t be the last, that the subtle pleasures of gardening have been discovered by someone reaching a certain, comfortable, point in their life. The nurturing of seedlings, misting of leaves and general pottering with secateurs in hand are a caricature of retirement we’re all familiar with.

We wish him well growing the “jasmine and bouganvillea and other things that bring in the hummingbirds” but quietly hope that he tackles horticulture in the same way that he did music back in the 70s - by throwing out the rule book and just having a go.

Please Mr Rotten don’t hanker after a textbook pruning technique, perfect propagation or an immaculately manicured lawn.

There is, perhaps surprisingly, something would-be gardeners can learn from punk philosophy. Just get stuck in and do it your way. You don’t need someone else’s say-so and it doesn’t matter what the neighbours think.

Maybe it’s not that hard after all and anyway mistakes are the best education.

A bit of this attitude might be liberating for the many who assume that they can’t garden and will kill everything they touch, just because they do not have the ‘knowledge’ and green-fingered wisdom attained with age or obsessive practice.

So here’s to not a bit more anarchy in the UK’s gardens.