There's a basic rule of social interaction that says the more geographically isolated you are the greater the chance you will know the neighbours. Thus, if you live in a scattering of homesteads in bleak North Cornwall you will be fully informed of the ins and outs of the lives of every Tom, Dick and Jethro for miles but if you're in a block of flats in London you won't be able to name a single fellow resident.
The example doesn't even have to be that extreme. You can walk quickly through several thousand shoppers in a modest city such as Exeter without a single nod but a stroll through your village can take an age as you can't pass the half dozen you'll meet without a lengthy gossip with each.
This is not always a good thing – when you're trying to get rid of some evidence, say, or conducting an affair with that woman down the road – but by and large it's better to be part of it all than alone.
To confirm this positive feeling I see that this week we are celebrating World Hello Day, during which people across the planet are expected to meet and greet at least ten strangers. You may get some funny looks – even thumped or arrested – but at least the thought will be there.
The annual event was cooked up about 30 years ago by some well-meaning but rather naïve Yanks who saw it as a way of bringing world peace, particularly in the Middle East. You have to give them full marks for persistence but events in Gaza over the past few days alone have proved how singularly unsuccessful the campaign has been.
However, there are many who would like to see, in some form at least, the principles of World Hello Day spread out across the whole winter ahead.
According to a report from Age UK, one in four people aged 65 or more in the South West are getting no help, support or companionship from those living nearby. Spouses have died, children have moved and there is no one else.
The dangers of this are all too clear, specially in colder weather. Many just can't afford to switch the heating up a notch and the consequent increase in health problems can mean heart attacks, strokes, respiratory problems and pneumonia. As many as 25,000 could die needlessly. But it's not just physical problems that loom, with the charity listing depression as one of the major dangers. A problem that can so often be cured by a visit and a smile.
"As we experienced as a nation this summer, it feels good to come together and help each other out," said the charity's director Michelle Mitchell. "Small things and a friendly face make all the difference."
There's a simple remedy, then, one costing just a small amount of time and effort but I'm afraid that like the dreams of those "Hi there, stranger!" Americans, Age UK's plea will come to little. The reason being that more and more of us are choosing or being encouraged, even forced, to lead lives of isolation.
Thanks to all those wonderful computers many are being asked to work from home, for example. This may cut down on carbon footprints but robs those involved from workplace banter and comradeship. You can't even chat up the girl in the next office so you're forced to use a dodgy dating site. Others are forced to move miles from home to find a job with family and lifelong friends left far behind. And never forget those – in the Westcountry most of all – who have seen communities change and now find themselves aliens in the very places they were born and bred.
All these folk have had remoteness thrust upon them but what really annoys are those who opt for that situation.
Those who you never see in the pub or Post Office, that couple who bought the nice house along the way ten or more years ago but you still don't know their name, those who you've tried to break the ice with but they just don't want to know. All you will catch is a glimpse of them as they open the door to receive the van driver and groceries they have bought online.
Good luck to them, I suppose – we all have the right to take voluntary exile if we choose – but those who do have to remember that they are robbing others of something too. The shop that needs the trade, that glum looking chap in the street who could do with a smile and that old person whose life could be saved by having just a little company.