School picture day was this week, which means in about a month we’ll receive an overpriced packet of photos and I’ll take down the old photos hanging in the kitchen and put up the new ones.

I don’t want to take down last year’s school pictures in which my oldest has a cowlick, and an ugly shirt. My youngest’s hair looks good but he’s wearing an old fleece that proclaims OLD NAVY in giant letters.

I was gone for school picture day last year. My grandma had just received a terminal diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, and as soon as I heard the news I knew I needed to go see her immediately.

I did not get to say goodbye to my grandpa; he died in the hospital before I could get out to Washington to see him. I did say goodbye to my dad, and was there for the last, awful forty-eight hours with him. I am glad I was there at the end–it was the right thing to be there–but those are hours of his life that I would rather forget.

I didn’t want to miss my grandma, but also didn’t want to come out when she was not herself. I think I booked plane tickets within two days of her diagnosis, and was playing board games with her at assisted living within four days.

My husband stepped up to the plate at home, didn’t hesitate at all when I said I wanted to visit my grandma right now. He’s the one who works full-time, he’s the one who is busy, but he never complained about being left holding all the household responsibilities with about two days of notice.

But he did forget it was picture day, and I don’t think either of us even realized until the pictures came back weeks later and I started laughing at the sight of my oldest’s cowlick. My husband was horrified.

“Ugh, these are terrible!” he said. “I’m so mad I forgot about picture day; we’ll have to do retakes.”

“No!” I pleaded. “No, we can’t do retakes! I love these! Every time I walk by them I’ll remember that I got to visit my grandma when she was still well and that my husband stepped in and took over everything without complaining!”

I begged, and the kids whined, and we managed to convince him to skip retakes. So for almost a year now I have been walking by these school photos and feeling both amusement at the cowlick and gratitude for that last game of Quiddler with my grandma.

I don’t want to take these pictures down.