It happened again this week.

A man came to my front door and introduced himself as David Acunto. He is a police officer in the city where we live and he is running for re-election on the city council. He gave me a flyer which included this picture of him in uniform.

My first thought was – “How great to have a police officer on the city council!”

Then he pointed to the Thin Blue Line Flag we have hanging on our front yard light and said, “Is your son a Police Officer?”

Fortunately, this was not a day where my emotions were running high so no tears started rolling down my face when I told him, ” My son was a Phoenix Police Officer who was killed in the line of duty.”

He immediately said, “I’m so sorry” and reached into his pocket to get his business card.

“Please take this. My cell number is on it – call me if you ever need anything.”

Over these last 7 years since Davey was killed, I have heard these exact words from hundreds of law enforcement officers. They always include their cell phone numbers because they mean it. They would show up. He never asked when my son was killed – because it didn’t matter that it was 7 years ago.

Fallen but never forgotten.

Last year after my husband had by-pass surgery, a retired law enforcement officer and his wife mowed and trimmed our yard for 12 weeks as my husband went through rehabilitation. I mowed it the first week and – wow – I was glad when they offered. I haven’t mowed grass since I was a kid and I hated it. Our calendars were also filled with doctor’s appointments and more procedures so it was awesome to check mowing the lawn off of our long list of things to do.

Another very special thing about this was, if Davey was living close to us, it would have been him mowing our yard. So this really felt like Davey’s Blue Family was stepping in for him and taking care of us at a time we could use some help.

Davey would have loved that. It was reported in the Phoenix newspapers that, a couple of hours before he was killed, Davey called up one of his Brothers in Blue who was sick to set up a time to mow HIS yard.

If you ever need anything.

Miss you, Davey.

Love you.