In lockdown, are we missing the chance encounters that turn our lives upside down?

In the latest of his reflections about place and pathway, Will Gore remembers the house party at which he met his wife, and ponders how many potential love affairs are being lost right now to social distancing

Booze, Britpop, and the love of my life (AFP/Getty)

I met my wife over a bowl of potpourri.

We were at a house party, not long after starting at sixth form college. Most of the attendees were friends from secondary school, but the host was a sociable sort and had invited various others who she had met since we started our A-level courses. As far as I remember there was no particular occasion to celebrate, aside from the fact that the host’s parents had gone away.

In the grand scheme of things, it was a delightfully tame affair: maybe thirty people gathered together in a nice detached house in a small Cambridgeshire village, drinking whatever alcohol we’d either plundered from our parents’ kitchen cupboards or persuaded them to buy for us. Perhaps one or two of the older-looking among us had managed to get served in the local shop. Not me.