"The Lord God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." ... Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh."
Genesis2:18, 22-23

Today Karen had her follow-up MRI. Our Neuro Oncologist sent us to an MRI center in San Francisco because there were no openings for another month at UCSF. She had 4 scans done, one brain scan and then one each for the three sections of her spine (Cervical, Thoracic and Lumbar). For those of you who don't know what an MRI is like here's a little taste. The MRI machine is a huge electromagnet that has electricity running through it at all times and is extremely loud. So loud, in fact, that you have to wear ear plugs when you are in the machine.

Imagine the sound of a fax machine hooked up to the sound system at an AC/DC concert, mixed with a jack hammer being used 6 inches from your head, punctuated by R2D2 screaming and the obnoxious banging of woody woodpecker hopped up on steroids.

Here’s a picture of an MRI machine for those of you who has never seen one.The patient lays down on the bed which then moves the patient into the right position in the big donut shaped electromagnet. At that point the concert begins.

In addition to the obnoxious loudness, one of the main discomforts of the traditional MRI machine is that it is extremely claustrophobic. Each scan takes between 40 minutes and an hour, and while you are being scanned you can't move at all. If you move while the scan is taking place you don't get a gold star and a smiley face from the MRI technician. In fact, he has to do the scan over again.

Laying in bed may sound like an easy task considering we spend about eight hours each night slumbering away, however, there are a few important differences. The biggest difference is that while we may not be aware of it we are constantly moving throughout the night, sometimes violently (very violently as many wives can attest who have been accidentally socked in the nose in the middle of the night by her husband’s wayward elbow).

Additionally, it is very unusual for someone to get four scans in a row. "Very unusual" means they’ve never let anyone do it before. In fact, the radiologist almost didn’t let Karen do it. He actually sounded annoid that Karen even wanted to atempt the feat and skeptical that she'd be able to finish. That is a really long time to lay motionless in a loud enclosed space. In the end all the scans took more than four hours. I don’t think many people could have done so well in this unusual MRI marathon. To lay motionless for that long is more like something you’d have to do to become a Samurai warrior or Army Ranger sniper, not when you are a 5 foot 4 inch mother of three.

After the MRI was over I took Karen to Kincaid’s. This is the restaurant where I first told Karen I loved her, and we’ve shared a number of other great moment’s there since then. It’s located in Jack London Square (Oakland) and sits right on the water over looking the Marina.

As I sat across from Karen sharing a quiet moment and a glass of a refreshing California Riesling, I was trying to synthesize all the thoughts and feelings that kept popping in and out of my mind. For a while all I could really focus on was her striking blue eyes. That, by the way, was one of her features that I remember thinking a lot about the first few years we were getting to know each other.

Finally it dawned on me what the idea was around the edge of which my thoughts had been flirting. It wasn’t a totally new thought to me. In fact it was an idea that I’ve considered a number of times before. But the truth of the idea stood out more starkly and clearly than when the thought had come to me in the past (this often seems to be the case when the same idea is seen in the light of a new experience).

I realized afresh how different I am after being married to Karen for 8 years and how different my life is today because I chose to marry her and not someone else. To a significant extent I am the man that I am today because Karen is my wife. God has used her as the biggest and most important instrument in my life to sharpen and mold me. I am very thankful for the life that I have been given and Karen is responsible for much of the life I am now enjoy. I shudder to think what my life would be like were she not a part of it.

In Genesis we are told that God made Eve to be a helper suitable for Adam. She was to fit him perfectly in his calling to subdue the earth to the Glory of God. It is not enough to realize that women are suitable for men in a general sense. It is also central that we realize that each particular wife, given to a particular man, has been given because she is specially suited for him, to be a helper in his God given calling. Not only has Karen been a great help to me in terms of my secular vocation, God has used her in my life to mold and shape me as a person, so that I am more effective in all of the callings God has placed before me. I look different, talk different, listen differently, think about things differently, have different priorities and in so many other ways am different than I would have been had I married another woman. She fits me perfectly, better than a hand and glove, because unlike a glove she makes my hand so much stronger, more efficient, more tender ...

Because of Karen I have learned how to be decisive, I’ve come to appreciate that the small things are actually big things, she’s shown me what it looks like to passionately desire God to remold us into the image of Christ, I’ve been privileged to observe first hand what it looks like to live a lifestyle characterized by endurance, I’ve seen and received by association the blessing that accompanies a good reputation and I know what it feels like to walk into a room and feel honored to be seen with someone truly special.

It also says something about Karen that for the most part the changes God has wrought in me through her occurred not because she’s talked a lot about them, but because I have seen these attributes modeled in her life. I could write for quite some time listing the many things that I have learned from Karen and I know that there are many more ways she has effected me that I am not even aware of yet.

One of the reasons I look forward to growing old with her is that I am confident God will show me many of the other numerous other ways that God has already shaped me through her. Though a residue of vanity in me groans when I imagine the wrinkles, back problems and various invasive and undignified probing that accompanies growing old, I am in the last analysis really looking forward to getting old and saggy with her. I know that each day that I am blessed to fall asleep beside her, that is a day that I am made a better man because of my time with her.