Fifteen years ago, Bob and I moved into this house.

We’d spent twelve years living in California together, and Bob was ready to experience seasons again. Real seasons — leaves changing color in autumn, snow in winter, the whole New England experience. He wanted all of it.

Well, he got it.

Fifteen years ago this week, we had a snowstorm that knocked out our electricity for three days right before Halloween. We discovered very quickly just how much of this house depends on electricity.

No heat. No hot water. Pretty much nothing worked. Welcome to New England.

Blankets. A fireplace. All of us snuggled together in front of it.

I’ve been thinking about those early days lately. Partly because it’s been fifteen years since that storm, but also because the leaves are changing again.

A few weeks ago I wrote about noticing a tree in town that had started turning color. One of those quiet reminders that time keeps moving whether we’re paying attention or not. Now autumn is well underway, and the changing leaves have brought a specific memory with them.

I have a video of Bob and our son playing in piles of leaves in the yard.

It was a different autumn, a few years after we moved here. We’d recently come back from a trip to Europe, and Bob was having the time of his life. I can still picture the joy on his face, the energy he had, the way he threw himself into playing with our son.

Three months later, Bob died.

When I think about that video now, I smile. It’s a wonderful memory — he was happy, our son was happy, they were having fun together, and I was lucky enough to capture a little piece of it. And I miss him. Both things are true. I can smile at what we had and feel sad about what I no longer have. Neither feeling cancels out the other.

Sometimes I think about what this house was supposed to be when we moved into it. We had plans. Children to raise. A future we expected to share.

This was the house where I thought we’d grow old together.

Instead, it became the house where I had to build a future without him. And just grow old.

I’ve lived here for fifteen years now, most of that time without him. The children have grown into adults. I’ve made new friends, deepened old ones, had experiences I never imagined, and become someone I couldn’t have predicted when we first carried our things through the door. There’s been a lot of life in this house — some of it wonderful, some of it incredibly hard, and much of it nothing like what I expected.

Yet every autumn, the leaves change again.

They remind me of Bob wanting to move somewhere with real seasons. They remind me of that ridiculous Halloween snowstorm. They remind me of him and our son laughing in the yard. And they remind me that another year has passed.

That’s something I’ve noticed about living with loss. We tend to think about grief in terms of anniversaries — specific dates on a calendar — but memories don’t always wait for a particular date to arrive. Sometimes a change in the weather brings them forward. Sometimes it’s a song, a smell, a familiar place, or something we haven’t thought about in years.

And sometimes we know exactly what’s coming.

We’re heading into a time of year filled with holidays, gatherings, and traditions. For many of us, those dates carry memories of people and lives that aren’t here anymore. We may look forward to parts of the coming months while feeling apprehensive about others, sometimes in the same breath.

I’ve written about this before, and it’s something I still find useful: when we know an emotionally significant day is approaching, it can help to think ahead about how we’d like to meet it. Not because we can plan away grief — we can’t. And not because we can decide in advance exactly how we’re going to feel. I’ve lived long enough to know that doesn’t work either.

But we can make some choices. We can think about whether we want company or time to ourselves. Whether we’d like to continue a tradition or try something different. Whether there’s something meaningful we want to do, someone we want to remember, or something enjoyable we’d like to have on the calendar. We can even decide not to make any particular plans at all. And when the day arrives, we can change our minds. Planning ahead gives us something to work with. It doesn’t lock us into a script.

I’ve been doing a lot of planning lately for 60 Days to 60 — maybe a little too much, if I’m being honest. There’s a part of me that wonders whether I’ve turned having fun into another project to manage. But I also think there’s a part of me that genuinely welcomes having things to look forward to during a time of year that carries so many memories. I’m okay with that. Those two things can coexist.

I’m not trying to keep the memories away. I don’t want to. Some of them are among the happiest moments of my life — like Bob playing in the leaves with our son.

I can’t go back to that afternoon. I can’t bring back the future we thought we were building when we moved into this house. But I can be grateful it happened. I can smile when I remember it. I can miss him. And I can still make plans for the life I’m living now.

The leaves will keep changing. So will my life. And I’ll keep finding ways to live it.

Your Turn

As the days ahead fill with holidays, anniversaries, and other meaningful occasions, take a moment to think about what’s coming.

Is there a date you’re looking forward to? One you’re dreading? Maybe one that brings up several feelings at once?

Think about how you’d like to meet that day — whether you want company or quiet, a familiar tradition or something entirely different.

You don’t have to decide how you’re going to feel. Just think about what might help you show up for it in a way that feels right for you.

And remember — you’re allowed to change the plan when the day arrives.