I try very hard not to focus on everything that was lost when my son, David Glasser, a Phoenix Police Officer, was killed in the line of duty on May 16, 2016.  I try to be grateful for everything I had before his death and also grateful for everything I have now.

But May is a very hard time not to think about all I have lost.  May is filled with Fallen Officer memorials, Police Week and his End of Watch.    I can’t help but wish that the last 3 years were just a nightmare that I could wake up from instead a nightmare that I have had to live through.  It’s impossible not to mourn for all that will never be.

I’ve experienced several deaths in my immediate family of people I loved that were older – my mother, my father and my oldest brother.  Davey’s death has been much harder because he was so young.  When he died, so did all of his future and all of his dreams.

His ‘could haves’,

‘would haves’,

and ‘should haves’ are all snatched away……from him and from all of the rest of us who loved him.

Davey was such an awesome son!  He was always there for our family- caring for us and loving us.  He was supposed to be there for his dad and I as we grow older – being Mr Responsible and making jokes about old people.  He was supposed to be our daughter’s forever friend – concerned about her and being her family after Dave and I are gone.

Davey was a great husband and father.  My two little fatherless grandchildren are the most painful part of this tragedy for me.  Davey only had the chance to be a father for 5 years and he was already an expert – loving them and setting high expectations for their character.  He should be here for their first days of kindergarten, their high school and college graduations, their weddings and his eventual grandchildren.  All of that has been stolen from him.

Davey loved people and they knew it.  He had more friends than anybody else I’ve ever known.  People automatically gravitated to him because they could tell that he liked them. He enjoyed inviting people over to his house -making great memories of happy times.  He was constantly planning the next good time and recruiting all kinds of people to be a part of it.

Davey’s love for people extended to the communities he served.  He told me several times that he worked in the highest crime areas of Phoenix because he wanted to put people in jail who needed to be off the streets so those communities would be safer.

This city lost a lot when he was killed.

Now his love for people lives on in the David Glasser Foundation.  And we have awesome memories of his 34 years here on earth. That will have to be enough.

Miss you, Davey.

#8144loveyou