Humbled by the Souvenirs of War I usually forget about most dreams right after I wake, but I never forget the ones that involve combat. I collect those dreams and save them, locking them in a fortified mental safe I rarely open because the images may turn into nightmares. The war dreams are the pictures I never took. They are the souvenirs of war, the thoughts that continue to humble me. Some people might think that remembering such experiences would have destructive side effects. But for me, the dreams are a reminder of how valuable life is. Driving Into War: March 24, 2003 As our convoy of Marines from of Regimental Combat Team 1 pushed forward, I saw an Iraqi man in the distance walking alone on the side of the road. He was wearing what looked like a long red and orange scarf. But as our truck drew closer, I realized that it was not a scarf. The man was carrying a dead body over his right shoulder. The body was covered in blood that was dripping onto the man's calves. The dead man had dark eyes, a scruffy black beard and a bullet hole through his shoulder. The man carrying his body gazed right at me, as if he wanted to hurt me in some way. He spit on the ground and adjusted the body over his shoulder. At that moment, I realized that, to him, I was the enemy. I was thinking that both of them could have been in the Iraqi military and just changed out of their uniforms. It was the first dead body that I had ever seen. As we drew closer to the battlefield, I could smell it in the air. It smelled like some weird combination of burned flesh and gunpowder. I could hear and feel the pounding of artillery hitting the ground. I didn't know if the Iraqi Republican Guard or the United States-led coalition forces were doing the firing. In the distance Cobra helicopters were hovering like a pack of black crows, firing rounds from the sky. They looked like dragons breathing fire on a medieval town. We were getting closer to war. Reality began to sit in. Gharraf: March 25, 2003 After driving through the night, at daylight we crossed a bridge over the Euphrates River. The water was pitch black. There were blown-up Soviet tanks facing to the south, surrounded by beautiful palm trees. I began to see disabled vehicles, some military and some civilian, on both sides of the highway. I even saw a disabled Abrams tank, something that my ignorant mind at the time thought was indestructible. I began to hear popping in the distance, like the noise you hear down the block on July 4. But this popping was not fireworks; it was bullets and grenades. We were moving through the city of Nasiriya. The winds began to pick up, and sand clouded my vision. Nature was getting involved with the war. My ski goggles were shattered by the sandstorm. Near the front, Marines were in the prone position, shooting into the distance. Those Marines had dark stares on their faces, stares that came from an overload of horror, excitement, adrenaline, lack of food and lack of rest. It was a stare I was beginning to develop. Field grade officers had their 9-millimeter pistols drawn, radios in their other hands. I saw a machine-gunner firing .50-caliber rounds from on top of a Humvee into a cement building. Enemy muzzle flashes popped up from the windows. The concrete blocks were turning into rubble. All of a sudden, things slowed down. We were under attack. I could hear rounds whizzing by. Marines yelled, "Contact front, contact front!" We were taking small-arms fire from about 300 meters to the west. I could hear the sound of bullets ricocheting off our vehicle. I could see the muzzle flashes directly ahead. The Marines to my right and left looked at me. We confirmed with that look that the moment was real and that it was time for us to attack the people who were trying to kill us. As we jumped off the truck, my heart was beating abnormally fast, pounding like a drum. But strangely my breathing was smooth and calm, just as the marksman instructors at boot camp had trained us. Inhale, exhale, focus on the front sight tip, slow, steady, squeeze. In a chaotic moment, the first time I was a target, I reverted back to that training. And the training is what kept us alive. We landed feet first in mud, about 15 inches of it. It was thick like cement and smelled of feces. For a second I stood there. I heard a zipping noise go right past me and then I saw a spark. I was being shot at. I freed my right foot from the muck and began running for cover. I fired rounds while on my stomach. I pushed myself up with my left hand and rose from the prone position. I was knocked down by the wind. I got up again, moved two feet, and fell again. I was back on my stomach with no cover this time but with a panoramic view of Marines engaged in the firefight. I saw one Marine fire a grenade into the window of a cement building. I saw team leaders yelling at Marines. I got back up, grabbed my black ammunition bag full of 7.62 rounds and began moving toward the sound of the guns. I began to get angry. I was mad at the weather, mad at the people who were trying to kill me, mad at the people who were trying to kill my comrades. I got up and began to fire. I looked into the iron sight of my rifle, focused on a muzzle flash and repeatedly pulled the trigger. And then, suddenly, my executive officer yelled, "Cease fire, cease fire!" The firefight was over. I was tired. My heart was beating rapidly and I wanted it to beat normally. There were Marines lying on their stomachs all around me, their weapons facing out. I couldn't help but notice that there were smiles on their faces. One would think they were sick to be smiling after a gun battle. But it was the first time many of them had seen combat. We had been training for months for the moment that had just passed. The training proved good because we had survived the test, the test of real bullets. "Clifford, you all right?" my squad leader asked. Calmly, robotically, looking off into the distance, I replied, "I am good to go, Sergeant." The rest of my squad were standing in a tight-knit circle, trying to keep warm. We had all made it. Andrew Clifford was a machine-gunner in Iraq in 2003, part of the first Marine Corps infantry reserve unit to deploy. He received a master's degree in public administration from Golden Gate University in 2012 and currently works as a police officer in San Francisco.