Flags at Half-Staff -Honoring All Who Have Perished from COVID-19

Half-Staffing Flag Notification:

"Honoring All Who Have Perished from COVID-19 in the Land of Lincoln"

Greetings My Neighbors,

For many years now, Dennis Paterka and I, both of us veterans who reside on Chicago's Northwest side, have posted half-staff flag notifications like this one, lowered and raised neighborhood flags accordingly, conducted community flag ceremonies on Memorial Day, Veterans Day, and Patriots Day, and handled flag disposal and flag folding for our NW area neighborhoods, city and suburbs alike, many times now.

Today's half-staff posting is something different however, something worth paying extra special attention too. It is a half-staff notification with no end date (they always have an end date) and with no list of names (they always have the person or people listed who are being remembered and honored). This time around it is different. We have not seen this before in our lifetimes.

This time around we are very much still in the midst of a passage through a period of widespread and tremendous pain, suffering, and death with no known end in sight and no known count of those we will one day remember by name ready to be carefully gathered and spoken out lout. All that is yet to come, but it is not for now and not for today.

Still, hope abides because while we may not have done so, our flag has been here before. Indeed, it is just at times like this that when we might otherwise just pass it without much notice or thought, that our flag flies to show to us that through the dark of the night in which we now find ourselves there is an other side to all this and that we shall pass through it. Those two things are absolute certainties. And this means there is a third certainty for us too, as a people, as a nation, as a community, and more importantly as a community of communities - that the day and time will indeed come when we will come out of our shelter, together, to raise our flag to full-staff once again. In much anticipation of that then, we look forward to seeing you all, in the ways that we will be able to assemble, then and there.

Questions, as always, on proper flag etiquette, flag folding, or disposal, please reach out...Jac Charlier at jac.charlier@gmail.com.

Half-Staffing Flag Notification:
"Honoring All Who Have Perished from COVID-19 in the Land of Lincoln"

Thursday, April 16, 2020

Notice from Governor JB Pritzker that all person or entities covered by the
Illinois Flag Display Act are to fly the United States flags at half-staff in honor and remembrance of:

All Who Have Perished from COVID-19 in the Land of Lincoln

Please immediately lower the United States flags. The full notification can be read here: http://www.illinois.gov/news/P...

As always, if you cannot lower your flag to half-staff, you can place a black ribbon across it that runs the length of the flag as shown in the picture.

KEY: COVID-19 Coronavirus COVID19