Time is a funny thing: nearly four decades passed can feel like an instant.
"When you look back on it from my perspective, it's happened very quickly. Like a whirlwind almost," says Tarrant County Sheriff Dee Anderson.
There's been a lot of that kind of reflection lately for Anderson. After nearly 16 years as Tarrant County Sheriff, he'll hang up his hat New Year's Eve, ending a 37-year career in law enforcement that started with Arlington PD in 1980.
"It's just been a great blessing for me," Anderson says.
At his home this week, Anderson told us he'll likely be remembered for two high-profile cases.
The first is the Amber Hagerman case.
Anderson was the Arlington Police spokesman at the time the 9-year-old went missing and was later found dead.
"I will never be affected in anything like I was affected by that," Anderson says.
He was instrumental in subsequently helping create the "Amber Alert" system, which has since saved hundreds of lives.
The other case is Ethan Couch.
Anderson was front and center in the search for the teenager who killed four people in a drunken driving wreck. He ran off to Mexico in 2015 but was brought back and eventually put in Anderson's jail.
"That’s got some irony to it," Anderson says. "I'll be gone, and he’ll still be there."
Anderson had more votes than his opponent Bill Waybourn in the March primary, but lost to Waybourn in a run-off in May. He hasn't spoken much about the election, which was contentious at times.
"What happened, happened. And it was meant to be. The future is exciting for me and full of
opportunities I want to have," he says.
So what's next for Anderson? He says relaxation and family time will take priority. He plans to spend three months doing "nothing" and decompressing. However, eventually, he says he can envision a scaled-back return to law enforcement, perhaps in a consulting capacity.
But as this chapter ends, he's emotional.
"I will always be grateful for the opportunity the voters of this county gave me and the trust they put in me to serve 16 years," Anderson says.
Sixteen years that went by in an instant.