I have a sepia-toned memory that resurfaces around this time each year, when the days are still too hot to think about fall, but when talk of the new school year is beginning to enter our conversations.

At the end of every summer, my mother would load us children into the family van to go shopping for new school clothes. It was an annual pilgrimage we eagerly embraced. We tried on everything in the store, left the dressing rooms in disarray and happily carted home our bags of (judging from pictures) ill-advised choices.

I realize this is no longer a custom for kids, particularly since most now wear uniforms, but school clothes shopping for us was up there with decorating the Christmas tree and dressing up for Halloween. It was an annual rite of passage meant to shake off the summer sand and usher in the new school year. It was how we knew the time had come to start downshifting into a different mode.

I’m reminded of all the traditions we share as families and as a community – those markers of time that tell us where we are on the calendar and when it’s time to shift gears. They’ve been largely absent (or, at very least, murky) for some time, particularly for students. Truth is we don’t know what this school year will bring, because last year was such a navigational blur. A year without clear benchmarks.

In this month’s back-to-school issue, you’ll find echoes of that spirit: an intersection of reflections, anticipation and uncertainty. We hope the coming school year brings back some of those clear touchstones that ground you as a family, and that your children will remember them onea day, fondly, in sepia tones.