Dear reader, I don't usually go down the path of copy and paste when I write up my blog entries but the following is an edited re-post of an article I wrote in March 2012 after the death of a young boy in unfortunate circumstances. In light of the events of the last 24 hours in Victoria, I felt the basic message needed revisiting.

There are few absolutes in life. Certainly we are born, live our lives and eventually die. In between birth and death, we do the important things like grow up, form relationships, work and pay taxes, breed and watch our children grow up and live their lives.

All of this, of course, happens in an ideal world and we would all like to live in such a utopia. Unfortunately, we live in reality where the only definite absolutes are being born and dying. What happens in between these two events is left up to genetics and fate and sometimes neither of these situations works out to be a good deal.

Generally, when someone dies they have lived a pretty full life. They're adults who have lived long enough to have enjoyed a life full of experiences that we would consider normal – the simple things like dating, courting, marrying, having children and getting grandkids - a kind of immortality you might say. These are the big events in the average persons life. Of course, there are those who walk a different path and achieve other forms of greatness through sporting, political or artistic achievements.

I am always saddened when I hear that a young person has died. I am 48 years old now and if I were to die tomorrow, people would be sad (I hope), but at least they would know that I achieved something in the time I was alive. It may be insignificant, but at least I had the opportunity to gain and enjoy some of the unique experiences growing old brings. I would hope that my friends would be sad for a couple of weeks but then get on with their lives.

I also believe that no parent should outlive their children – ever.

There are a lot of people in mourning at the moment over the senseless passing of Luke Batty, an 11 year old boy in Victoria who was killed by his own father on Wednesday. People who didn’t know Luke, but are parents themselves, understand the pain that this boys family is going through. I’m not a parent and I am saddened by it myself.

The reason that I am saddened by this meaningless death is because Luke was only 11. Unless he was an exceptional boy, he had little opportunity to gain any life experience beyond being a child. There is no way of knowing what his life would become. Whether it be a sporting star or some kind of academic, the potential that was locked inside of him is gone. This really does go for any young person who dies prematurely. Whatever potential they have is lost.

Words and hollow platitudes will never fully give closure to Lukes family, but they will always have those 11 years to look back on and remember him. They may take some small comfort in the fact that his 11 years were probably happy ones, but their lives are now changed forever. As for the rest of us, well we will probably forget about Luke in a week or so as more important things happen in our lives.

I have many friends who have children at various ages. My message to them is to love them more every day, listen to what they have to say, accept that they may not live up to your expectations or plans for their futures and love them unconditionally. No matter what they do with their lives, where they are in the world or whatever age they live to, they will always be your little boys or girls.

Later days.