How odd life is. The only constant thing about it is that it changes fast - in an instant. You can sit down to dinner, and life as you know it ends.

Much has been written about Karl Chircop and his life, his attributes, his character, his family. I cannot add more because I never knew the man. But life is full of twists, and some people enter your life in strange ways and in unimagined situations.

Back in August, Dr Chircop was at the ITU with my father - their beds were right across from each other, both lost in a deep coma, albeit of a different nature. I do not recall much from that time at the hospital. But his wife, Adriana, I remember clearly. She was dressed in white and had a heart-piercing aura of faith and hope. She came over to speak to us on the second day of my father's admittance to hospital. She spoke softly and with a strong belief in what she was saying: "God willing, they'll both make it out of here." My father was declared clinically dead the next day. Her husband died two months later.

I know what a couple of months of anguish these must have been for the Chricop family - clinging to remote, maybe non-existent signs of hope. Not daring to give up, yet knowing that signs of life have long gone. Hoping that it is just a nightmare. She said in The Times last week: "For those who are not in the situation, it is difficult to understand..."

The truth is, I think it's best to give up trying to find people who understand you. At the end of the day, nothing can alter the fact that you can sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends. Unconsciously or consciously, society bullies us into coming to terms with this ASAP. But in reality, we have to accept the fact that it may take us a couple of months, or it may take us forever to come to terms with a change. And nobody has the right to set a deadline.

Lately, in trying to make sense of it all, I've come across a term which describes how life is ugly and beautiful at the same time: Wabi-sabi.

It is a Japanese concept that speaks of the art of imperfection and the willingness to accept things as they are. It is a process.

It is about decay and ageing, not growth. Wabi-sabi requires us to slow down in order to take notice of hidden things, imperfections, the ugliness around us and the passing of time.

If you notice carefully, little children practice wabi-sabi. They look at little details in their everyday life.

They examine a spider's web full of dead flies in the doorway for hours; they comment on the yellowing colour of the pile of newspapers by your bed; they say matter-of-factly that they know you are sad because you're not wearing a colourful t-shirt, but that you look beautiful anyway.

Somehow, as we grow old, we are conditioned by society to seek perfection in everything we do.

So much so that wabi-sabi no longer comes natural to us and it takes courage and trust to relinquish the sense of control over life that we think we have.

To practice wabi-sabi means to accept nature's process, including impermanence and the absence of life.

These things could be dismissed as ugly and without value, but we have to realise that we are in a constant state of change and we must value that which is in the moment.

This very morning, I will be in a full-blown wabi-sabi situation. My family and I will be celebrating a very joyous occasion. Today, my dearest cousin is getting married - on the very day my parents' got married 34 years ago - which can only augur for a very healthy union.

My cousin and I, only a year apart, have shared an interwoven childhood, adulthood, and well, cousinhood, so it will be a very significant occasion of love. So a happy occasion, but at the same time, a sad one for me knowing that my father will not be sharing it. This, I suppose, is wabi-sabi.

At least it's reassuring to know that yes, life as we know it changes, but love makes it go around.

At this very moment - as they are pronounced man and wife - I wish Jo and Nik fairytale happiness, and down-to-earth wabi-sabi.