Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

The man said,
“This is now bone of my bones
    and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ‘woman,’
    for she was taken out of man.”
That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

• Genesis 2:23-24

Earlier this month, my wife and I celebrated, if you could call it that, our 48^th wedding anniversary.  She sat for most of her waking hours that day on a hard recliner at the dialysis center,  She keeps telling me that she will not be around for our fiftieth.  If we had a fiftieth, we would have to throw the party for ourselves.  Maybe I could bake something.

My wife, for the first 40 years of our marriage was the dynamo who kept up with everything.  I now have to call her phone because she has lost it, and yes, often she is lying or sitting on it.  That makes it tough to find in that the sound is muffled.

My wife is a Vietnam Era Veteran.  Technically, a medic, she would eventually be granted a lifetime certification as a surgical technician.  She was trained by the Air Force, and she was by the surgeon’s side as they patched wounded from Vietnam back together.  Within three years, she saw more strange surgeries than most surgical techs ever see in their lifetime.

So, my wife traveled nearly around the world, born in Indonesia, escaped the revolution to the Netherlands, and immigrated to the USA.  Then she was in Texas for her school years, then the military.  She had a full life by the time I met her, and I had hardly lived by that point.

But she made it her life’s mission to care for me and our two sons.

Now, over half of our meals are with me preparing it and bringing it to her in bed.  The tables have turned, and I cannot complain.

Even in her infirmity, she thinks of others.  We went to the local chocolatier to buy candy for the dialysis center staff and patients.

And one of the things that I remember, that keeps me forever in her debt, is that she having been enlisted, when I served as an army officer, she constantly kept me grounded.  She focused on me being a servant to my platoon.  And when I had not mentioned one of the troops or another in conversation, she would ask about them by name.  She had only met a handful of them, having several over to our home for a nice family meal, but she knew all their names, and in most cases, where they were from.  It was unthinkable for me to let any of them down because of her.

She and I have truly been flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone.  And I thank God that we got together.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.