September 2001: I had just completed four years as an officer in the U.S. Army and was starting the grad film program at Columbia University in New York City. I had resigned my commission in June of ’01, and a week into my first semester at Columbia the 9/11 attacks came. I figured I’d have to put my desire to make movies on hold and head back into the Army. The call didn’t come, and I continued on in film school, watching many of my friends who stayed in receive orders to deploy to Afghanistan and then, in 2003, Iraq.

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