He thought of all the ways that so many people felt about life. Life was a matter of regret--how could it be anything else? We knew that we would lose the things we loved; we knew that sooner or later we would lose everything, and beyond that was a darkness, a state of non-being that we found hard to imagine, let alone accept.
In "The Department of Sensitive Crimes," Alexander McCall Smith reflects on the pervasive sense of regret that many individuals associate with life. The protagonist contemplates the inevitability of loss, recognizing that every connection and cherished experience is temporary. This understanding casts a shadow over joy, as the certainty of losing what we hold dear weighs heavily on the heart.
Moreover, the notion of a blank void or non-existence post-loss becomes a daunting thought that is difficult to grapple with. The struggle to accept this reality adds depth to the characters' experiences and resonates with a universal aspect of the human condition: the difficulty of confronting mortality and the transient nature of happiness.
