Sergeant Alex Fuller hailed from the depressed coastal town of New Bedford, Massachusetts. His brothers and sister did stints in prison; he sold drugs himself as a teen, and barely earned a GED.
Then he found a home in the army. He excelled, he loved it, and even made sergeant in record time. Most of all he was my friend. His story didn’t end well, of course. On January 25, 2007 his body was shattered by a massive improvised explosive device (IED) in East Baghdad, Iraq. He was 21. His 19-year-old wife was pregnant. His family buried him on Cape Cod. Such is life.