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The following passages are excerpted from the chapter.

". . .As the day of the deadline for Saddam to leave Kuwait approached, I sensed an increasing personal tension. The closer it came to January 15, 1991, the more it seemed evident that Saddam would not leave on his own. And my marines on the border of Kuwait and offshore were more and more on my mind. I was becoming obsessed with what I knew they were about to see and hear and feel. All that ever was around me in Vietnam, I imagined around them. And the distinction between me and my fellow marines in Vietnam and these marines in the Gulf became less and less apparent. It was as if some strange umbilical cord had reconstituted itself, connecting me and my memories with them and their now.

I had yet to spill this shit from my mind, and now, in likely monumental proportions, it seemed that a fresh supply was about to be created."

". . .The days were a blur to me; I was totally immersed in the war. It seemed a part of me. And memories of Vietnam, of battles, of fire missions, of patrols and sleeping in the rain were filling all the voids between television news updates.

I was walking one day down the long central corridor in the building where I worked. Passageways split off periodically from the main hallway. The ceiling was unusually high, perhaps 15 feet or so. It had at one time been part of a manufacturing area, where looks didn't matter much. An assortment of pipes and conduit crisscrossed the upper several feet. A great deal had been spent on remodeling, but rather than installing a drop ceiling, the decision was made to leave the old factory 'charm' visible. Then (I suppose in an effort to make it not so offensive) a series of baffles was installed that blocked much of the view of the ceiling and the hanging intestines of the place. The baffles were rectangular panels, several feet wide and high, surfaced in a rough fabric. The panels were hung from the ceiling, positioned every few feet down the length of the corridor; I could just reach their lower edge.

As I entered the corridor this day, it looked as it had the past hundred times that I had walked its length. Several fellow employees were there, some going my way, others coming toward me. Abruptly, instantaneously, it was no longer the hallway at work. It was a path through dense trees in the jungle. The passageways off to the left and right were intersecting trails. The pipes and the hanging panels were not those things at all; they were vines and tree limbs hanging beneath the canopy. And the people around me were all in combat gear. It was so goddamn real. I was so shocked by what I suddenly saw that in turning swiftly I fell against the wall. The impact knocked me back to the present, but my heart was racing and sweat covered me. And as quickly as the jungle came, the jungle went away."