Nothing seems straight these days.

Aside from Jerry’s dying in the hospital just as we were ready to leave after his heart surgery and recovery, other things aren’t quite lining up, either.

I first noticed it in my kitchen. 

In those early days of wanting the kids nearby, I offered to make supper for us all. Keep it simple, they said. So I did. But even though I followed the instructions on the package, I couldn’t even get a frozen pizza to turn out right. It came out of the oven nowhere near thin and crispy or even thick and puffy.

No, this meat lover’s pizza was hard and crunchy. Not an appetizing choice. Even the cheesy bread was dark and crusty. What was going on?

A week or so later, I wanted to bake something for our neighbor who was recovering from knee surgery. Lemon bars- cool and zingy- would be perfect, I thought. But even though I followed a recipe I’ve used for years, the bars ended up thick-crusted and glompy. I pulled out the best ones from the middle of the glass baking dish and hoped they’d suffice.

I’ve given up on cooking and baking. I’m now looking for dump-in-layers recipes- when I do cook.

A recent blueberry-lemon trifle went well! But it isn’t just cooking or baking: Time isn’t lining up straight, either. Sometimes, the time in the day drags on way too long, with days feeling more like weeks.

At other times, while I’m getting ready for an event, time slips away from me. I keep thinking I have one more thing to do, just one more, before I leave the house. Then, before I know it, I’m late. I’ve been tardy to more events in the past few weeks than I have in the past several years. Sadly, I’m getting pretty good at texting a “Sorry- running late!” message. 

A few weeks ago, I hosted a group of friends for a book study. “All you have to do is provide the space,” I was told. Normally, I’d have been whisking food out of the oven as people walked in, perfect timing for sharing a hot meal together. But that day, I was still taking out trash and bringing in ice from the garage. I’d spent too much time lollygagging in the garden, cutting flowers for a table bouquet and then arranging them. Where had the time gone?

Then there’s parking. One of my sons brought it to my attention first when we parked at a store: “Mom, I think you’re over the line here.” I got out of the car to look. Yep.

I was not only over the line, but lined up catty-wampus, too. How did that happen? I shook my head and got back in the driver’s seat to inch the vehicle straight again.

And it didn’t happen just once. Again and again, even when I tried to take pains to line up straight, invariably, when I got out of the car, it would be crooked in the parking spot or hugging the line. 

Maybe it had to do with vertigo.

Even my walking has been off in the past few weeks.

Over the past several years, I’ve had a few bouts of debilitating room-spinning, often associated with sinus infections. Even with my eyes closed, it seems like the space I occupy is whirling around me. Of course, that’s extremely nauseating, especially for a person who doesn’t even ride the teacups at the state fair. A fellow Herb Society member told me about mullein-garlic oil, and used together with the Epley maneuver, the vertigo would eventually resolve.

But ever since I had a massage a couple of months ago, I’m experiencing a sickening dizziness whenever my head tilts to the left.

Sometimes, it happens with no movement at all! I can be lying in bed perfectly still reading on my Kindle, and my eyes will suddenly hyper-focus and the room will start expanding. 

Throwing a foot on the floor in a desperate attempt to stop the whirling world has no effect.

Of course, it doesn’t. 

Walking the dog each morning looks more like a drunken stroll as I wobble along the street with a hiking stick in one hand and a leash in the other.

Some days, it seems everything is out of alignment.

“If isn’t one thing, it’s another,” we used to say during a rough patch. That phrase certainly holds true for me right now.

Is that just the way grief goes? 

Burning food, losing track of time, constantly being late, losing my sense of alignment, feeling the world spinning out of control?

“Let go joyfully. God is making space for a new you,” my book-study text somewhat glibly suggests. 

I guess it must be a place where I don’t have to cook or be on time, park correctly, walk upright without a cane, or even have my head on straight. 

I look forward to getting there.