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I find myself overwhelmed by crowds. That’s not to say I have some kind of meltdown. I mean, my mind wanders, contemplating the likely impossibility of paths crossing with anyone you know, unless as a result of pre-arranged plans.

And yet… I once wandered into a tent amidst a sea of humanity on the hajj pilgrimage, and was immediately greeted by one of my closest friends from university.

Shortly afterwards, I’d sit down beside two complete strangers — a pair of Sudanese doctors — and discover one lived immediately around the corner of the house I lived in as a teenager.

The other of the pair lived in village of my early childhood. His children attended the schools I went to. And both of the doctors knew my mother from her days working as hospital chaplain.

In reality, we have no idea in what ways our paths might cross, completely unbeknownst to us.

We might walk down one aisle of a supermarket, and someone we know might be wandering along another, never to encounter us.

Two people might take the same train daily, carriages apart, never known to the other. They may be stuck in the same traffic jam. Or enjoying a meal out, just streets apart.

Every time I wander amidst crowds, I find myself awestruck by the strange encounters I have had in my life. Hurtling back west along the A40 this evening, passing row upon row of houses, it hit home all the more.

These crossing of paths would seem impossible, and yet they’re real. In truth, nothing is impossible. If it is decreed, paths will definitely cross, even if statistical probability seems to be stacked against it.