The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien - 1067 Words

Every one of us has experienced a strong emotional fear, and in that moment of stress, we learn more about who we are. The short story â€Å"The Things They Carried†, by Tim O’Brien, follows the lives of soldiers trying to survive the emotional and physical stresses of the Vietnam War. Throughout the story, O’Brien juxtaposes the physical weight of the supplies that the soldiers must carry with the immeasurable weight of their intense emotional experiences. The theme of â€Å"The Things They Carried† is the burden of fear, which O’Brien portrays through the counter-weight of objects the soldiers cling to for consolation and escape. Some men turn to objects that remind them of love, no matter how unlikely it is that they are loved back. Other men†¦show more content†¦Love is a powerful force, and Lieutenant Cross sometimes gets lost in his musings while thinking of Martha. O’Brien writes: â€Å"His mind wandered. He had difficulty ke eping his attention on the war. On occasion he would yell at his men to spread out the column, to keep their eyes open, but then he would slip away into daydreams, just pretending, walking barefoot along the Jersey shore, with Martha, carrying nothing.† Like any sane person in his situation, Lieutenant Cross wants to escape – to anywhere else but the war. The war brings terrible experiences – fear, death, hunger, and pain beyond imagination. The only way that Lieutenant Cross can endure these things is by escaping to an imaginary life with Martha. Although to her, he is little more than a friend, to Lieutenant Cross, Martha represents innocence, perfection, and a world free from war. While Lieutenant Jimmy Cross turns to love, other men turn to physical objects they carry for comfort. Henry Dobbins, an overweight man, finds comfort in food. Dobbins greatly enjoys eating food and uses food in the same manner that Lieutenant Cross uses love. No matter what happens each day during the war, as long as Dobbins can carry his pack and survive, at the end of the day he will be able to enjoy peaches in heavy syrup over pound cake. Dobbins also carries a heavy M-60 machine gun with extra ammo, for when the