50 Questions to Remember Someone By

Last updated: July 25, 2026.

Snippet answer: Gentle questions for remembering someone are often easier to answer when they are small and specific. Instead of beginning with a question as wide as "what do you remember about them?", you might start with "what did they always order?" or "what did they say when they sat down?" Below are fifty questions, grouped by theme, for writing down privately or asking aloud with people who knew them too.

Some memories arrive through tiny details: the way they answered the phone, what they called the remote control, the sound they made when they sat down in their chair.

Those details can feel ordinary until they are the very things you want to name again. A question can give one small memory a place to land.

These questions are deliberately small. Ask them of yourself, or ask them at a table with people who knew them too. There is no need to answer all of them.

There's no order. Start wherever something catches.

The ones that bring back the funny

1. What did they say every single time they sat down?
2. What did they do with plastic bags?
3. What was in the drawer everyone knew not to open?
4. What did they call the remote control?
5. How did they react to a GPS telling them they were wrong?
6. What were they weirdly, unreasonably proud of?
7. What did they insist on doing themselves, despite being terrible at it?
8. What was their signature move at a party?

Their words

1. What did they say when you asked how they were — no matter how they actually were?
2. Which of their sayings do you now catch yourself saying?
3. What word did they pronounce wrong their entire life, and never once corrected?
4. What did they shout up the stairs?
5. What's a word your family uses that would make no sense to anyone else?
6. What did they say to the television when someone got something wrong?

Food and the table

1. What did they always order? Every time, the same thing.
2. What did they cook that was objectively not good, but you would still love to taste again?
3. How did they take their tea or coffee — exactly?
4. What snack did they hide, and where?
5. What did they always bring to a family gathering, invited or not?
6. What was always in their fridge that had no business being there?

Habits and rituals

1. What did they do every Sunday, without exception?
2. What time did they wake up, and how did everyone else know?
3. What did they always check twice before leaving the house?
4. What did they keep "for good" and never once used?
5. What did they do the moment you walked through the door?
6. What did they do every time they said goodbye?
7. What did they do at every birthday, without fail?

Things

1. What's the one thing in your house you will never throw away?
2. What did they wear that should have been retired a decade earlier?
3. What was their chair — and what happened if you sat in it?
4. What is still exactly where they left it?
5. What did their handwriting look like, and where do you still see it?
6. What smell brings them straight back?

The family stories

1. What's the joke your family still tells about them?
2. What story gets told at every single gathering?
3. What's the pettiest grudge they held, right to the end?
4. What did they get away with that nobody else would have?

The ones that catch you out

1. What did they nag you about that you now do without being asked?
2. What annoying thing did they do that you now catch yourself doing?
3. What did they do in public that embarrassed you then — and feels tender now?
4. What argument would you love to have with them one more time?
5. What did they do that you thought was embarrassing, and now realise was love?
6. What did you promise you'd never become, and became?
7. What did they worry about on your behalf that turned out to be nothing?
8. What's the last thing you ever expected to miss — but do?

The quiet ones

1. What did their laugh sound like?
2. What do you still do because they did it?
3. What did they teach you without ever explaining it?
4. What would they have found funny about this week?
5. What do you hope people remember about them?

How to use these

One at a time. There's no schedule and no correct order, and you don't have to work through the list — most people find three or four that belong to them and leave the rest.

If it helps, write the answers down rather than only thinking them. A sentence is enough. "One sugar, and she stirred it far too long" can hold more than it first appears to.

If it feels right, ask them out loud with someone else who knew them. You may hear versions you never had — and you may disagree about the details, which can become its own kind of remembering.

Some of these will be easy and funny. Some will stop you. Both are fine, and you can put the list down whenever you like.

Questions to ask someone about their story

If the person you're thinking about is still alive, these questions can open a warm conversation about the parts of their life you may not know yet.

1. What were you like at my age?
2. What's a story about yourself you've never told me?
3. Who taught you to cook, and what was the first thing you learned?
4. What was your first job, and what did it pay?
5. How did you and [name] actually meet — the full version?
6. What did you want to be, before you were what you are?
7. What's something you're proud of that nobody in this family knows about?

If they are comfortable with it, record the conversation so their voice and words can become part of the family story too.

A note on where to keep the answers

Anywhere is fine: a notebook, a document, the notes app on your phone. Choose somewhere you are likely to find again.

We make a guided remembrance journal built around questions like these — one relationship per edition, with prompts for their sayings, their habits, and the small everyday things that made them themselves. But the questions above work perfectly well on paper you already own, and that is genuinely the point of publishing them.

Related reading

• If you want a place to begin writing, read What to Write in a Grief Journal: Gentle Prompts by Relationship.
• If one memory leads to a recipe or family story, read Keeping Their Recipes: A Small Family Archive.
• If you want a wider remembrance ritual, read How Do You Keep a Loved One's Memory Alive After They're Gone?.
• If words feel hard today, read What to Write When There Are No Words.

Common questions

What should I write down about someone who died?

Start with the small specifics: their sayings, their habits, how they took their tea, what they often said on the phone. One sentence per detail is enough.

What questions can I ask my parents about their lives?

Ask about their life before you knew them — their first job, how they met, what they wanted to be, or a story they have never told in full. If they are comfortable with it, record the conversation so you can return to their own words.

How do I remember someone who died a long time ago?

Specific questions can feel easier than trying to remember generally. Asking "what did they always order?" or "what did they call the remote control?" may bring back a whole scene. Asking other people who knew them can add details you did not carry alone.