The last word: No longer a soldier

I'm home from Iraq in one piece, writes Matt Gallagher, but I'll never be the same

A soldier returns home safe and to a loving fiance, but he can't escape the tragedies of those who didn't share his lucky fate.
(Image credit: Corbis)

I’M ONE OF the lucky ones. War destroys without regard to what’s fair or just. This isn’t a new or terribly profound revelation, but witnessing it, and sometimes participating in it, makes it seem like both. In a professional military, the entire point of training is to minimize the nature of chance in combat. But all the training in the world will never eliminate happenstance in war, or even render it negligible.

I returned from Iraq with all of my limbs, most of my mental faculties, and a book deal. I wake up every morning in an apartment in New York City. I’m working toward a graduate degree. I have a beautiful fiancée who reminds me to slow down when I’m drinking. And every day I feel more and more detached and removed from the Iraqi dust lands I promised myself I’d shed like snakeskin if I ever got back home.

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