Life truly is a fickle thing.  It is capricious and unpredictable.  It doesn't follow a set playbook - it is fair but equally unfair.  And sometimes, it can go away without the slightest of warnings.

Portuguese footballer Diogo Jota in many ways had the world at his feet.  Liverpool FC's number 20 had just been a part of Liverpool's title number 20. He was a player loved by the supporter base so much that they even had a special chant for him:

 He had just gotten married to his childhood sweetheart, and for all intents and purposes it seemed like life couldn't get much better.

Yet all of this evaporated in an instant in the early hours of Thursday morning. Diogo Jota and his younger brother Andre Silva, who is also a footballer, were involved in a car crash on a Spanish highway.

The Lamborghini that they were in suffered a tire blowout, careened off the road, and caught fire, killing both of them.  Jota was 28, his brother was 25.  It is understood that they were driving up to Liverpool, after Jota had minor lung surgery and was told that he could not travel by air.

In the first instance, the news is a tragedy.  To see any young life ended in such a sudden and tragic manner is nothing short of deeply saddening. 

But an incident like this is, sadly, also a reminder to all that life is unforgiving and unfair.  Why should two young lives - and so many other young lives like them across the globe - be taken in such a cruel and sudden manner?  This is, unfortunately, the nature of life.

It is a lesson to all of us that we should not take life for granted. Nobody knows how much time they have left - some may be lucky to live a long and healthy life, some may be less so and have their lives cut short by tragedy.

This is the unifying factor of the human condition.  Even here in Malta, a tiny speck on the world map, we see people with full lives ahead of them pass away in tragic circumstances.  Tragedy doesn't discriminate: it can come for those who are young and old, for those who are rich and poor, for those who are famous and those who are nearly anonymous, and for those who live in any place on the planet.

If there is any lesson on a human level that one can take from tragedy it is to take nothing for granted.  Not even life itself.  One day we are here, the next day we may not be here.  Use the time we are given to the full - do not let a moment go by, do not fall into the trap of leaving things for 'later'; because for all we know, 'later' may be too late.