Tolkien wrote some wonderful books. The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit must take first and second place. But vying for third is surely his short work called Leaf: By Niggle, about a very ordinary man, an artist, called Niggle, whose life is full of procrastinations, and of unfulfilled hopes, and of regrets. Like noticing that his neighbour’s roof-tiles are loose and in danger of falling off, only to ignore them, until a huge storm blows them off, lets in the rain, and causes his neighbour’s wife to get pneumonia. If only I’d done something! If only.

Regret is a difficult customer to navigate in life, especially when something important – usually someone important – is lost. And super especially when the result is final, and where one has to live with consequences that are long, hard, and painful.

Two things have curbed my descent into self-loathing. One is this sentence from the very heart of a book called Lamentations: “His compassions never fail. They are new every morning.” Such a healing word, for as the dawn breaks on every new day, there is always fresh mercy to draw on. The second is from that book called Revelation: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes.” Tears from the sorrows and disappointments and regrets of this life, all soothed and wiped away. And not just dabbed and dried, but replaced with fulfillments that cause tears of joy, as Niggle wonderfully discovers at the end of his days.