The whisk isn’t to the right of the stove top, the bowls are in cupboards rather than on a shelf, and most of my baking ingredients are on a lazy Susan in a low cupboard. Everything takes a bit more time than it did in my old kitchen. I know that it’s a temporary issue, but it vexes me.

The same thing happened when I returned to my home in Massachusetts. A new fridge and countertop dishwasher has changed the layout of the space, and utensils and ingredients have been relocated to incorporate the difference. The issue isn’t in either kitchen, but in my own expectation that things remain unchanged. Such small differences in the grand scheme of things – inconveniences, not true hardships.

Until I stop seeing the new spaces as a distorted version of a previous arrangement, I won’t really see them for what they are or what they could be: opportunities to make putting food on the table a new adventure. And a small glimpse of a grand truth: all things change in this ever-expanding, God created universe. I can marvel at it, or resist it. My choice.