This Viral Photo of a Firefighter Helping a Kid After a Car Crash is Today's Reminder There's Still Hope for Humanity

Boston Globe. Getty Images.

If you were anywhere around south eastern Massachusetts this past Saturday, you know it was the worst sort of weather we get here. Not warm enough to be rain. Not cold enough to be light, fluffy snow. That wretched in-between type of precipitation where everything gets buried in a thick, heavy, wet slurry. Where every shovelful you try to lift feels like it's mashed potatoes and your snow blower doesn't throw the stuff as much as it oozes out of the top like a frozen mudslide. But one of those days that's in the Bottom 5 of the year, without a doubt.

Like the delicate, pampered little puss boy that I am, I stayed in all day. I might have left the house to take trash out, but I'm almost positive I never went beyond my property line. Because any time during a State of Emergency when the authorities announce "Non-essential personnel are directed to stay off the road," I hear that as, "Jerry Thornton, stay put and watch TV. No one needs your sorry ass getting in the way." And they never have to tell me twice.

Other people aren't so expendable. Fortunately for the rest of us, there are people who make it their duty to go out during the worst of the worst and do important - make that vital - things. Like this firefighter from the town of North Attleboro:

Source - A Massachusetts firefighter bravely rescued a mother and her son from a snowy car crash - but what he did next truly made hearts melt. 

During a heavy snowstorm on Saturday evening, David Testa, of the North Andover Fire Department, responded to a collision at the intersection of Essex Street and Great Pond Road. 

Testa quickly hopped out of Engine Two and discovered a mother and her son inside the vehicle. Thankfully, they were not injured in the crash. 

While the three of them watched on as the mother's car was towed away from the scene, Testa took off his turnout coat and wrapped it around the child. …

'I walked up and I asked his mother how she was and how he was and he said "I’m great", so he had a nice positive reaction,' Testa told WCVB5. 

'He was actually wearing a Marvel coat that night so I talked to him about some superheroes he liked.' 

The irony that David Testa and the boy talked about superheroes should be lost on no one. Given that the best version of the best superhero of all time involves a first responder doing this very thing:

"Shouldn't the people know the hero who saved them?"

"A hero can be anyone. Even a man who can do something as simple and reassuring as putting a coat around a young boy's shoulders to let him know the world hadn't ended."

The best part of this story is obviously that the kid in the photo didn't lose anyone the way the little boy in Jim Gordon's precinct did. So he got an infinitely less painful lesson in what it means to be a hero. A desire to help those in need. Self-sacrifice when it's required. And kindness. Simple, human kindness, even to total strangers. If that family's luck continues, he'll hopefully never forget the lesson and want to grow up to be somebody else's superhero. 

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go back and watch that Batman scene about a 100 more times. Or until I stop shedding a single manly tear every time Commissioner Gordon has his big revelation, whichever comes first. While I do, let's just take this story as a reminder that no matter how tempting it is to lose sight of this fact, good humans still have the bad ones way outnumbered. And there are more blessings left in this world than we give it credit for. I'll get back to what's awful and ridiculous about everything going on around us. But first I'm going to sit here a while and feel good about this.