When I was growing up, we had a beautiful grandfather clock that my mom’s parents gave to our family. I loved the clock – to me it was the most elegant thing in a home that was more floral wallpaper meets little house on the prairie. Then one day my beautiful clock stopped counting time. No jiggling with the chains or brass weights would make it chime again. It always gave me a sad feeling to walk in our front door and see that hand-carved wood and traditional gold clock face fixed perpetually at the same time.

Time has stopped for me too. I finally realized this a few days ago after another in a series of what I think of as my “glitches”. These are tiny moments where reality and my perception don’t always line up eye to eye. Recently, my mom was planning a trip to help me out and because she loves decorating, I got excited to show her my new living room and dining room set…until I remembered that she’d spent nearly a month in my house caring for me and had most definitely noticed the new furniture. There’s been a lot of little things like this. I have a recurring slip where every time I write the date, I write the month as either April or May. I attributed this one to just “one of those things” since my brain injury.  But then it started raining a few days ago and I thought how much I was looking forward to summer. Oh, and I love the long days and blue skies of summer!

That’s when it hit me. I’m not being forgetful every time my mind points back to spring. That’s when I started losing memories. Even though I experienced going from spring to summer, and lived through every month of it, summer 2015 is just not in my memory bank. That’s not to say that I have no memories, I have some. Just not that many and not the types I’m accustomed to during the sunny season.

My first reaction to realizing that I lost my summer was just plain sadness. Sad that I missed happy hours with friends on my favorite rooftop bar, sad that I didn’t have any summer hikes or barbeques, and sad that I never made it to the farmer’s market. Doubly sad that I didn’t have one of my amazing, last-minute summer vacations. Sad that I didn’t go on my family’s 4th of July camping trip and that I didn’t race with my sister and niece in a mud run we’d planned for nearly a year. It’s a thousand small griefs for the things I missed.

And while my body’s clock might have missed an entire season, I remind myself that I’m still here and I’ve got seasons ahead of me. For that, I’m grateful.