Who we were is a book about people at war. About voices, names, and call signs. About Dali and Ruta, protesters and pacifists, the living and the dead. Stories about Avdiivka, Lviv, Odessa, Kherson, and the Black Sea. Reflections on literature and painting in the war zone, on memory, dreams and dreams, fatigue and illusory reality, the smell of war and the constant "Groundhog Day", changes in the minds of people who are between the world of the dead and the world of the living. About the air that you breathe and can't breathe enough, and the clear and clear sky, where the stars are in the palm of your hand. Valery Puzik combines documentary accuracy with artistic reflection, captures memories, dreams, conversations and feelings that, like fragments of reality, form a mosaic of the experience of Ukrainian soldiers, artists, and volunteers. This is a story not only about the struggle, but also about internal metamorphoses — from youthful dreaminess to war-hardened, from call signs to trying to regain a name.