But sometimes you know exactly to the moment when it happens.

The house where our kids grew up was in Schaumburg. It was ten years old when we bought it, so it had already been somebody else’s home, and as my wife and I toured it during their open house, we wanted to see what would make us feel that this house could be home to us.

For me, that happened when the owners took us into the attached garage.

We are a bird-friendly family. We don’t put chemicals on our lawn, put out birdseed in the winter, and we are delighted when our bird friends chirp happily from the branches of our crabapple tree out our front window. But even our bird loving has limits.

Most weeknights, I’m out on the front porch catching up on the day with my husband or daughter.

The word was “sonder.”

She did not include the definition — which was either a passive-aggressive prod to get me to join the rest of the Facebook folk, or a generous compliment implying that I must surely already know this word.

It was 1970, and I was just finishing up my Bachelor of Arts degree at Western Illinois University, about to start a career as a high school teacher. I was married with a very pregnant wife, and Barrington High School, where I had completed my student-teaching, had offered me a teaching job once my degree was complete.

Given the choice, I will always choose a spanakopita appetizer or entree at a restaurant or party.

Anyway, I never made it before. It was too hard to make at home; at least that’s what I’d heard. I envisioned a scene wiping away the sweat at my temples with the back of my hand, flyaway strands of hair escaping my ponytail.

But there is one segment that always comes up short for me: the point when a family member or two describe their loved one.

Well, I can’t tell you why she was ordered to change seats, because as I write this, I am in the Free State of Florida, as the governor calls it without a hint of irony.

For our family it’s egg bread. When you’re just about out of everything, hopefully you can at least scrounge up an egg and a slice of bread. We heat up our favorite tiny cast iron skillet, dab it with a bit of butter or oil, then crack an egg and drop it onto the hot skillet.

It was a Saturday, and a small art fair and music festival was under way. I strolled past the booths of ceramics, paintings, and nature photography as John Prine lyrics echoed through the park. Savory scents of burgers and brats wafted on the air, and I ambled down to a small aluminum floating pier rocking in the salty backwaters between the mangroves and sea grapes.

I’m one of those people who struggle to keep up with the business of being human.

But that little toddler with the blonde hair is no longer around.

It took two accidental scar-kisses upon that table to remind me daily of how blessed I have been in love.

Plans for dinner beforehand were quickly abandoned, in favor of having popcorn for dinner. Popcorn and a beer, since our local movie house now sells cans of beer placed subtly on the side of the concessions area.

I don’t remember what I did for that stranger — it was some little kindness any thoughtful person would do for another. Maybe she dropped a dollar and I called out to her. Or maybe she struggled with an armful of groceries and I offered to carry some out to her car. It was some kindness so small and commonplace, I don’t recall it.

The subtext of this word, for me, instructed me on what I was not to do: I was not to let my anxiety take over moments that were otherwise beautiful.

We had taken little Jenny to the Woodfield Mall to see Santa Claus so she could sit on his lap and tell him about all the toys that were on her Christmas list.

I refer, of course, to the suit filed by the Jack Daniel’s Whiskey company against an Arizona company named VIP Products, which makes doggy chew toys.

The toy at the heart of the case is a rubber squeak toy shaped and decorated like a Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey bottle.

The nest was tucked six or seven feet up into the crook of a maple tree, and Dandy, filled with puppy curiosity, enthusiasm, and energy, would leap into the air to go nose-to-nest. Then she would sprint around the yard and do it again.

The nest was just inches higher than she could leap, so I didn’t worry that she would turn the yard into some grisly horror show of flesh and feathers.