To hear his father tell it, Geoffrey S. Morris was the kind of kid who didn't have a lot of direction but was smart enough to know it. The kind of kid who decided against playing football his senior year in high school because he wanted to have fun, but understood it was time to become a man. So he joined the Marine Corps. "Sometimes it takes years or decades before your children grow up and show you the maturity level, that it's not all about 'me,'" Kirk Morris said. "Geoff was not like that any more. It was 'us,' it was 'we.'" Pfc. Morris, 19, of Gurnee, Ill., died April 4 when his vehicle was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade in Anbar province, Iraq. He was based at Camp Pendleton, Calif. Morris said his son firmly believed in his mission. "It meant a lot to him to be a defender of his country, but also the defender of the right of the Iraqi people to choose their government and how they want to live," he said.

— Associated Press