Half mast

As I was driving around today, I could not get the tragedy that happened yesterday to stop running through my mind-I'm quite positive I will never be able to. The flags that were all flown at half mast were reminders over and over again. It got me to thinking about those parents, brothers, sisters, friends-that will be burying their loved ones this week. While the nation is mourning for them, the symbolism of the flag being kept at half mast is overwhelming. I feel as if the United States has become a community rather than a giant conglomeration of people who are different, just in a days time.
There is no doubt in my mind that during this coming year (ordered by Obama until December 18, 2013 at sunset) every time I see the flag at half mast, I will not only think on the senseless tragedy that has taken place, but mourn for the victims of the families and friends that have been effected. I feel united as a country in mourning for the life that has not only passed, but what their lives would have become.

In researching the term half mast, (which I wrongly called it half mass), I learned why the flag is flown in this manner. While I understood that it was a uniting symbolism in the mourning of loss, I did not understand that the flag is raised to full mast, then lowered. This is to symbolize the flag of death or loss flying at the top. What a tragic reminder.

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