After I came back from my first deployment, when asked what I did in "the war," I said that I assembled and fused bombs. Laser guided bombs. Satellite guided bombs. Small bombs. Big bombs. Bunker buster bombs. If it explodes, I probably built it at some point.

But I quickly learned that answer usually killed the conversation - it even ended a few first dates early. It was an awkward thing to bring up in casual conversations. No one ever knew what to say. So, I eventually learned to be vague, and say something non-specific. Usually they wouldn't ask any more questions.

I don't often talk about what I did, or exactly how I feel about it. And in truth, I feel conflicted. I know that sometimes I helped save American lives by doing my job well. Our guys. My friends. And that makes me proud.

But that doesn't change the fact that I contributed - however indirectly to human beings vanishing from the earth in a moment of sheer agony. Their breath sucked out of them before they were incinerated in a fiery explosion.