I'm assuming this was in the Army...tell us about your
Dream. No wonder you can't get to sleep at night,
Zammy. 
Love you too,
A
...and you thought I forgot about this.

Oh no, it's been mulled over quite a bit.
Last night visiting with Vegas helped. I suppose sometimes it helps to talk with someone who's been in similar situations.
The Dream that has been re-occurring has been one of violence. We had cleared an area, yet this man appeared out of nowhere behind me. I heard him, and training took over. I reacted, turned, and shot him at close range.
It's that look on his face, the look in his eyes, that draws my attention.
I can't figure it out.
I dunno....
Can violence ever enlighten? And if so, when, if ever, is it the correct tool to use?
With every horror one experiences serves some positive end I feel. At least one must search for some new strength or tool or purpose for any suffering and horror they endure.
I have spit the brain tissue of the guy in front of me out of my mouth when he took a round to the head. By the time I was 25, I had seen many people die, some quick and easy, some screaming in pain, for God or their mothers. It made little difference really.
This put me in touch with my absolute mortality very quickly and profoundly. Yet, I feel the question everyone who experiences when such an event occurs (after the period of elation of having survived) is "why him and not me"?
Even a fatal car crash can raise this question in one's mind and spirit, or having a friend with a terminal disease.
The bottom line is we are all quite mortal; we may all grow old and die. Our youth is quite fleeting. It has been said, "It is a shame that youth is wasted on the young."
I did not waste my youth, I paid a heavy price for some of the things I did, and some of the decisions I made.
But we are all the product of our past in a sense. It is how we deal and process it that counts.
For example at 25, feeling the rest of your life is just going to be aftermath as I once did, is not a healthy mental state and drives one from the path of enlightenment. However, accepting one's personal mortality brings one much closer to that path.
z