The Birmingham News -- Three weeks ago, Ryan Winslow's parents and younger sister saw him leave Camp Lejeune, N.C., for a seven-month tour in Iraq.

But the 19-year-old Hoover resident's tour only lasted three weeks. On Saturday, a roadside bomb killed Winslow and three other Marines riding in the Humvee he was driving along a road in Al Anbar province.

On Monday, in front of his family's Bluff Park home, a Marine helmet covered in desert camouflage and two military canteens hung on a stake. A dusty brown pair of Winslow's military boots stood at the base of the stake, alongside a small U.S. flag, and three plastic wraps of roses lay before the display. A card on one of the wraps bore the words, "Semper Fi." Inside the house, visitors were coming and going, friends of Winslow sitting in one room with photographs and mementos from his past. In the other, his father George, wearing a red T-shirt with the yellow letters USMC, was telling some other visitors how his son had died.

"Probably never knew what hit him," the elder Winslow said.

His mother Marynell, wearing a Marine Mom T-shirt, was answering yet another phone call.

"It's something you never think is going to happen," she told the caller. "Ryan, you know, never did think it was going to happen."

Pfc. Ryan George Winslow was the 41st Alabama service member to die in the Iraq war. Described by friends as someone whose principled point of view was respected and who had the knack of settling down simmering arguments, he attended Hoover High but found it hard to fit into its vastness and rules. He passed his high school equivalency exam, took some criminal justice courses at Jefferson State Community College, then joined the Marines in January 2005.

The Marines gave him discipline and drive. He also thought his experiences in the Corps would help him in a law enforcement career, preferably in SWAT or narcotics work.

"He didn't want to be on patrol writing tickets all day long," his mother said. "He wanted to be where the action was and that's where he ended up with the Marine Corps."

To be a Marine, Winslow had to change. Overweight, he watched his diet and started running, losing 50 pounds before he entered basic training at Parris Island.

When his family came to see him before he deployed to Iraq, his mother was struck by the way he seemed at peace with what he was about to do.

"He wasn't afraid," she said. "If that was what he was called on to do, he was ready to do it. He felt prepared. He felt his platoon was prepared."

In Iraq, Winslow was part of the 2nd Tank Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force. On the day he died, he was on patrol, looking for roadside bombs.

Shortly before the bomb blew up Winslow's vehicle, the Humvee ahead of his own - driven by his good buddy Lance Cpl. Charles Hayes from Iva, S.C. - was directed to sweep the left side of the road. Winslow's vehicle stayed to the right, and it was a fatal course.