Epic Quest progress report: Today is day 42. Total words: 14,003.

Fear is a daily fact of life right now.

As we start the fourth month (for most of us) of the global pandemic, we know fear.

Fear of what we or our families might be exposed to in the days to come.

Fear of the conflicts within our family that we can’t get away from like we used to.

Fear of the health consequences of reopening our cities, states, or country too early.

Fear of the economic consequences of reopening too late.

Fear of what we’ll say if our employer requires us to return to the office before we’re comfortable.

Fear of how we’ll move forward if our employer has to close its doors, and we become part of the nearly 30% unemployed in our country right now. Or fear because it’s already happened to us.

Fear of the images on the news.

Fear that we’ll miss something if we don’t watch the news.

I could keep going all day.

But there’s another fear that’s all too real for all too many people: the fear that someone we love will leave to go about their normal life–and never return.

It’s a fear that became real for George Floyd’s loved ones a week ago when they learned he would never come home. And again when they watched the video of his death on the internet.

I haven’t watched the video. I have no idea what he did, or what he was accused of. I have no idea what kind of interaction, or what kind of history, he had with the police officer who killed him. I have no idea what kind of day that officer had had up to that point, or what he learned from the police academy or from his father or from his experience in law enforcement.

I know an African-American man was deprived of his life without due process, by a white police officer, in what has become a disturbing trend in the past fifteen years or so.

Of course, it’s been going on a lot longer than fifteen years. Something like three centuries longer. And that’s just on this continent.

But in the last decade and a half, cell phone cameras have become ubiquitous. And we’ve seen videos of many similar deaths. Enough that it’s fair to recognize that we have a serious problem: when a black man leaves his home, the likelihood that he will not return is nontrivial.

And this man’s death came at a time when we are all afraid, when many of us are out of work and have time on our hands and don’t have to choose between speaking out for justice and keeping our jobs.

So many of us showed up.

And the police, human beings who are just as afraid as the rest of us, reacted like people who are afraid. At least here in Dallas, they reacted with waves of admirable restraint punctuated by troughs of shameful excess, employing tear gas, rubber bullets, and shoving tactics that seem designed to provoke the crowd into doing something foolish.

Thankfully, no one seems to have done anything particularly foolish yet.

So far, only two people have been seriously hurt. With hundreds of people engaged over three days, that alone speaks of admirable restraint on both sides.

May restraint continue to prevail. May their voices be heard.

May our country recognize that saying Black Lives Matter doesn’t mean other lives don’t. It just means We are human like you, and we won’t be silent any more.

May the day come when an African-American man is no less likely to return home than his white neighbor. May that day come soon.

May that day come soon.