I’ve been bumbling through these last few weeks by trying to follow a routine. After getting the kids out the door, I try to find my center, either by walking the dogs for a while or by playing the piano. Both are activities that require my concentration, but also repetitive enough that I can let my brain shut off for a while. After that, I’m usually ready to start dealing with the mountains of paperwork that come with death. The business of dying is quite the hydra. Every time I close one account or finalize one set of paperwork, five more pop up in its place.

By the time I meet my quota of migraine-inducing paper-shuffling, the dogs are ready to go for another walk, or a friend will ask for a lunch date. While I am mostly ready to just crawl back into bed and pull the covers over my head, I try to drag myself out as much as possible. Friends are good for the soul. After that, I try to finish a household task or two and then it’s time to pick up the kids and start running them to their evening activities. Then, it’s home for dinner and another dog walk, and hopefully, a few hours of sleep and do it all over again. A routine gives me some semblance of control, and on days when I don’t want to function, at least I am conditioned enough to go through the motions.

So, naturally, it was time to upset the apple cart. This year was the marching band’s once-every-five-year-trip to perform at Disney World. This trip had caused agita from the beginning. First of all, the general scheduling of such a trip during a global pandemic was insane at a high level. Thankfully, those in charge of the trip handled all of that, and I just sat on the edge of my seat waiting for the “will we or won’t we” decision. You may remember our previous trip to Disney ended with me being less than enthusiastic about the place I dubbed “Rat Land.” However, even though our band journey is going to span 10 years, this is the only trip that would feature all three kids in the band at the same time, so we were all hoping it would happen.

We were set to make the trip as a family, and then, a certain little fur ball named Henson appeared on the scene. Duncan was a handful, but being an only dog, he was at least manageable. Two dogs, one of them being a super-energetic puppy, was a lot to ask anyone to take care of, and Steve decided that he would not make the trip. While I wasn’t happy about that decision, I knew in my heart he was probably right. We still had the problem of him being at work all day, and the dogs home alone, but it would be easier to have someone walk them once a day, rather than all day.

Once everything changed, I felt pretty sure that not going on the trip would be the best course of action; however, for the boys in particular, it was a once-in-a-lifetime event, and they pointed out that it wasn’t really going to be a family trip. From the beginning of this nightmare, their friend groups have been their best source of support, and I could see how a few days of sunshine and nonstop friend activity was something that would benefit them.

That just left me. I was reluctant to leave my routine. Worried that I would miss the phone calls from lawyers and benefits personnel and the 50 other people I’ve been on the phone with daily for weeks. Nervous that the extremely tenuous bond that Duncan and I have finally started to forge wouldn’t hold up over a five-day absence. And scared to go off into the great big world without anyone at home to miss me. The alternative was sending them off by themselves, but there was no way I could consider letting them out of my sight for that long. For a family that had confidently and regularly set off on many misadventures, this was uncharted territory and we had no road map.

So we did it, and we survived. For the kids, it was a welcome break and a change of scenery that definitely did them a world of good. For me, well, I got through it. Even though I’d been to Disney a few times as a kid, the only real memories I have of it are from the trips that Steve and I took together and with the kids. It was impossible to look anywhere and not see him or remember him having fun with the kids. While it was incredibly sad, it was also hard not to appreciate them for the good memories that they were.

As I found out of the way hiding places every day and spent a good amount of time people watching, I could hear Steve’s voice in my head, providing a running commentary on all the craziness that Disney inspires in people. I found myself trying to sneak pictures of the adults who were decked out in head to toe designer Disney outfits or the 50 people having a family reunion and all wearing matching hats and shirts, getting ready to text them to him to make him laugh.

As we pulled into the driveway, at 4 in the morning, I found myself hoping just one last time that we weren’t coming home to an empty house. It’s amazing how your brain can know something is true, and still allow you to hope that it isn’t. I was also surprised when all three of the kids echoed the same sentiment: we never had to go back to Disney again. Even though they had all had a good time, and were glad to have gone, they were just as happy to close that door and look to the future.

While hanging on to and reliving old memories brings one kind of pain, creating new ones without him has its own special sadness. It’s tempting to just stay home where the memories are constant and controllable, but that’s not really an option either. Right now, it’s enough to know that we made it through our first trip without him, and wherever the road takes us from here, each of us will take him with us in our own way.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.