I watched a police officer stop his vehicle in the middle of an intersection near my house this morning, flip his lights on, and jump out of his SUV. My heart caught for a moment—what’s going on? But then I noticed the huge branch that had been lying in the road (Irma cleanup will be an ongoing process around here for a while). The officer grabbed it and tossed it out of the way of passing cars. He ran back to his vehicle, hopped in, and pulled out of the intersection. The light turned green, and traffic resumed.

It’s insignificant—it’s barely even a story. But I drove the rest of the way home wiping tears from my eyes.

The news this morning wasn’t the kind you want to wake up to, not ever. I drive by Pulse once a week or so and still can’t fully comprehend the horror that happened there last year.

This morning I scrolled through reports from Las Vegas on my phone while my 3-year-old watched Wild Kratts in the living room and my 9-year-old ate a waffle at the kitchen counter, and then I had to keep moving. There were lunches to make and kids to get to school. Kids who are growing up in a time when mass shootings are a thing.

So maybe it’s not that weird that a police officer pausing on his route to toss debris out of the road made me cry.

Tears bring me to the feet of Jesus.

31 days of paying attention is a month-long mission to document and give thanks for the everyday, mundane, and beautiful. It’s a series I’m writing for Write 31 Days, a yearly challenge in which bloggers pick one topic and write a post on that topic every day in October. Thanks for reading along! 

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