It takes more than will power to stop thinking of someone you have
loved and lost.  I could see that in the slump of his shoulders and
the way his feet were set close together.  He had tried, in a burst
of energetic resolve.  But it would take more than that, to stop.
Whatever new beauties he would discover in the world would still, for
a long time and maybe for his whole life, not be quite enough to keep
his memories away.

~Josephine Humphries

At first, we have no choice but to think almost constantly of the one
we have lost.  An hour does not pass that we are not aware of our
loss - remembering the person, recalling episodes and moods of our
life together, thinking of what can no longer be.

Then maybe one day we are startled to realize that for several hours,
maybe even a full day, our thoughts have been elsewhere.  We are
beginning to heal.

But we do not need to worry that we will lose the memory of those we
love.  What we need to remember, we will.  And sometimes when "new
beauties" come, the memory of the loved one shines even more
brightly - as we imagine sharing this new joy with the one we have
lost.  There is pain in this, but perhaps there is also a refreshed
sense of the loved one's being.