It’s hard to believe that it’s already been three years since we realized that two weeks wasn’t going to be enough to flatten the curve.

Although many things about Facebook aggravate me, the documentation of the daily odds and ends that I would never have captured or remembered to write down, or even if I had written down, gone back to read, will always make me glad that I’ve used it.

2020 was a big year for us in many ways, or at least it was going to be “until.”

Whatever our expectations were, at the time, it felt like 2020 was the worst year on record. Now, of course, I look back at those long, long days at home together as an incredible gift that I will treasure forever. So many adventures started during those dull days.

We had moved to the farm just in time. I know now that our family never would have survived those days cooped up in our old house. Even though we never quite spent all the time we should have doing the house projects we had planned, just having unlimited access to the outdoors, and more than one bathroom were key to preserving our sanity. Of course, we spent a lot of that time making big plans and throwing around hundreds of ideas for what we’d like to do with the place eventually. Plans which I’m both grateful to have had as a blueprint for some of the projects I’ve had to complete, and sad to have had put others out of my mind, as there is no longer a need for them, or they’re more ambitious than I can handle on my own.

By far, the savior of the pandemic for us was Duncan. The excitement of having a new puppy alone would have sustained us for a few months. The constant need to take a puppy outside and everyone’s enthusiasm for helping with him definitely shortened a few days.

He also ended up being extremely spoiled and used to having his people at his beck and call all day long. Months later when he had to be left home alone for a few hours, you would have thought his world ended.

Now, I realize that this time was crucial in developing his bond with Steve, a fact which made things more difficult down the road, but at the time gave him the best possible start to life he could have had. Steve was able to give him far more training and a much stronger foundation than he would have had he not been working home for a few months. All those hours of commuting went into dog training instead.

The pandemic will also always be the era of the Great Boat Project. It is yet another thing that made me crazier than anything while it was going on, but now I am so happy that it happened.

Having the opportunity to work on a lengthy project like that with their Dad and having the opportunity to use that boat for the rest of their lives, will be a gift that they will appreciate in the years to come. For me, that boat will always be a symbol of the last and best family vacation that we ever took, one that Steve had wanted to take for years.

Of course, the many headaches and bumps in the road have lessened in their severity or become fond memories. Time has a way of doing that.

It’s also amazing to me how much kids can grow up in three years. Back then, I was on the verge of having my first teenager, and now I have three. One of my favorite photo captures is Steve and G, standing shoulder to not quite shoulder, setting up their new incubator. I’d completely forgotten what a hoot livestreaming the hatching of our guinea fowl keets had been.

In the picture, Steve still has a good couple of inches on G, although A had been closing in on him at the time. Now, both A and G tower over me, and if Steve were still here, he’d be forced to look up to both of them. While I’ve had the smallest feet in the family for years, I expect to become the shortest person in the family within the next few months. I might already be, but E’s tendency to slouch has given me a brief reprieve.

Their physical attributes, however, have little to do with the growing up they’ve had to do mentally and emotionally in the last year and few months. While recent photos of them indicate some small return to their previous wackiness, particularly where G is concerned, there is still an aura of innocence about photos from just a few years ago that I know they will never manage to recapture.

The pandemic gave them a chance to hone their abilities to find their own quiet places and remove themselves from our hectic family atmosphere. This skill has come in handy in the last year, and although it’s a sad one to need, it’s been a necessary one. It’s a good thing they have it, because I only ever learned how to juggle three different sets of needs with a partner, and I’m struggling with it now alone.

As we head into the final marking period of the year, and the end of another sports season, the kids have had a chance to collect some accolades and rest on their laurels a little bit, and I’ve had the chance to sit back and enjoy their accomplishments.

Truly, I am amazed at how well they hold things together some days. I wonder if having their lives turned upside down during the pandemic helped to prepare them for another, bigger upset. I wonder if, during all those days together at home, they managed to absorb enough of Steve to sustain them now that he is gone. I wonder how they are managing to hold it all together and continue to do great things without their biggest cheerleader. I wonder how many more times they can tolerate having the carpet ripped out from under them.

One of the songs that Steve and I played at our wedding was “Bless the Broken Road,” which is about how all the twists and turns that seemed awful at the time were actually bringing two people together.

There will never be any sort of silver lining in losing Steve, but I can see the good in all the things that happened along that broken road leading up to January 2022, things that seemed awful at the time, but I can be grateful for them now.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing columnist who appears weekly in the Times News.