Pulse - We Will Not Let Hate Win

Today marks the one year anniversary of the deadliest mass shooting in American history. In the early morning hours of Sunday, June 12, 2016, a man walked into the Pulse nightclub in Orlando and unleashed a barrage of gunfire from a SIG Sauer semi-automatic rifle and a Glock semi-automatic pistol. Forty-nine people were murdered, as they hid and ran and fell to the floor.

For the last year, I have wanted to write about that unthinkably tragic night at Pulse, but I have never known what it was I really wanted to say. All these months later, just this morning in fact, I finally realized what's behind my lingering compulsion to in some way document the events of that night --- I simply need to make sense of it. Upon further reflection, I also recognized the ongoing impossibility of that task. No matter how badly we need to, we simply cannot make sense of the inherently senseless. And so I can say only this: one year later I think often about those who were killed and injured, I still imagine the horror they endured and the courage they showed, I still regret the unimaginable pain their friends and families must feel, and like so many others, whenever I think of Pulse, I still sting and burn and rage. 

I hope you will take a moment today to look at the faces and read the names of those who were killed that night. We will not let hate win.

Courtesy of http://www.wftv.com/news/photos-victims-of-pulse-nightclub/339403857

Courtesy of http://bnonews.com/news/index.php/news/id4565