Start a tradition with a friend. A pleasant routine could just spring up over time, or you and your friend could deliberately decide to start a tradition. Either way, make sure you acknowledge that each of you will do his or her part in keeping the tradition alive.

Whenever you get together with this particular friend, meet at the same place. It could be at a restaurant for lunch, or at a delightful park for a stroll around the lake, or at your home to listen to classical music. You might want to switch and go to your friend's house on occasion, as long as something is the same when the two of you get together, and you are aware that you are doing things in the customary way.

This idea goes back a long way for me. I go to baseball games with one friend. For a long time we went to day games. He drove; I made sandwiches. Now we mostly find ourselves at night games on Mondays. We meet at his office, he drives, and we have dinner in the same restaurant before the game. (We even try to get the same table if we can.) With another friend, I always have lunch in the same diner. (He orders the same thing every time; I don't.)

My wife and I go to a particular restaurant every year on our wedding anniversary — and never go there at any other time. And if I think about it, I have small traditions with most of my friends. It's these little remembrances and benchmarks that define who and what we are to each other.

Alan Epstein in How to Have More Love in Your Life