This morning when I walked downstairs I saw the porch light was out. Double checked the switch, sure enough the bulb was out. I made a note to change it, and as I started my day I thought about the lightbulb that had been in the front porch lamp. It had been there almost five years.

Sunday morning, November 29, 2009 four officers from nearby Laked PD were in Tully's Coffee, getting ready for the start of their shift. A man overcome with evil walked in and murdered them, then walked out and disappeared. He would die three days later after a massive manhunt when he tried to kill another officer. A month earlier two Seattle officers were shot, one killed. A month later to Pierce County deputies were shot and one was killed.

Shock does not begin to describe how we felt as individuals and a community. I don't pretend to imagine how other officers and their families felt. One of the fallen officers went to school with my wife. The scene of the murders is on the way we drive our kids to visit their grandparents. It was a bad time for police, it was a bad time for everyone.

Can't make it better. Can't make it go away. Can't give parents back to their children. Can't fill the arms of family. Can't make a community feel safe and whole.

People started putting a blue light in the window, private expressions of memorial for the officers down, gratitude and sympathy for those still on the job. Drive around town, and there were blue lights shining all over, There were no blue light bulbs in the stores, they were sold out. I sprayed a lamp with blue paint, and it let out a weak blue light. Later on I found a blue bulb, and replaced the first one.

Months passed. The horror of that dark season faded. The coffee shop reopened. Later the name was changed to Blue Steel. Summer came and went, kids went back to school, rains returned, life went on, and soon it was a year gone by. I left the blue lamp on the porch. More years passed, and still the lamp shone. It felt wrong to change it, to turn it off. I left it be, and decided when it burned out I would put a regular bulb back.

Sometime last night it burned out. Nearly five years gone by. And I think today of those moments gone by. The horror unleashed when a man who did not care for life turned his evil loose. The reminder that the best trained and armed may fall to hate, or fate, or bad luck. The knowledge that the fighting spirit of one of those officers who could not save his own life at least wounded the killer, maybe saving other lives. The thought that as we shuffle toward elections and emphasize our differences, that when it counts we are really much more alike than not. Fear and pride that I count among my friends some who wear the uniform and face the darkness. A lamp burned out, but memory lives on.

A white light shines on the porch again.

http://www.odmp.org/agency/5962-lakewood-police-department-washington
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakewood,_Washington_police_officer_shooting

A good read, indeed.   Thank you for sharing it.   And reminding us all of the common thread of our humanity despite our often petty differences.