Finished: The Things They Carried (O'Brien). Very powerful book about a writer's experience as a soldier in the Vietnam War. I can't explain how this book moved me. There are just some people who get a free pass forever, from me, and the youngsters who went over to fight for God knows what in that war are some of those people. All our military people who have defended our country or put themselves in the line of danger over in a country far from home are those people. My dear friend Leslie, who is a lady of complete grace and exuberance for life is another of those people. She lost her daughter last year after a nearly year long illness. How she gets up every day and puts one foot in front of the other and lives her life...how she still cares so much for other people, I don't know. Free pass forever. Anyway, wow, this book really brought out a lot of emotions in me. I can't even imagine the horror, uncertainty, fear, questioning, of being in a war like Vietnam. The Things They Carried is the story of one platoon of young men, and how they lived, how some died, how they handled things (or didn't) after the war, and how they became brothers and coped during the war. This is Tim O'Brien's story and he tells it so well. He didn't want to go to the Vietnam War. He was all set to go to grad school at Harvard, but he was drafted, so he went. I liked this early statement that he made in the book about how the politicians, etc., made the decision to enter this war, yet were themselves far removed from it: There should be a law, I thought. If you support a war, if you think it's worth the price, that's fine, but you have to put your own precious fluids on the line. You have to head for the front and hook up with an infantry unit and help spill the blood. 

This was one of those books that was hard to put down. Every word made such an impact. I hate quoting only a few passages, but here are just a few snippets taken from several pages that show just a tiny bit about The Things They Carried:

First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried letters from a girl named Martha, a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping, so he kept them folded in plastic at the bottom of his rucksack.

The things they carried were largely determined by necessity. Among the necessities or near-necessities were P-38 can openers, pocket knives, heat tabs, wristwatches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy, cigarettes, salt tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches, sewing kits, Military Payment Certificates, C rations, and two or three canteens of water. 

Henry Dobbins, who was a big man, carried extra rations.

Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried tranquilizers until he was shot in the head outside the village of Than Khe in mid-April. 

Dave Jensen carried three pairs of socks and a can of Dr. Scholl's foot powder as a precaution against trench foot.

Kiowa, a devout Baptist, carried an illustrated New Testament that had been presented to him by his father, who taught Sunday School in Oklahoma.

Until he was shot, Ted Lavender carried 6 or 7 ounces of premium dope, which for him was a necessity.

Because the land was mined and booby-trapped, it was SOP for each man to carry a steel-centered, nylon-covered flak jacket, which weighed 6.7 pounds, but which on hot days seemed much heavier. 

What they carried was partly a function of rank, partly of field specialty. 

In addition to the three standard weapons--the M-60, M-16, and M-79--they carried whatever presented itself, or whatever seemed appropriate as a means of killing or staying alive. They carried catch-as-catch-can.

They carried all they could bear, and then some, including a silent awe for the terrible power of the things they carried.

They shared the weight of memory. They took up what others could no longer bear. Often, they carried each other, the wounded or weak. They carried infections. They carried chess sets, basketballs, Vietnamese-English dictionaries, insignia of rank, Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts, plastic cards imprinted with the code of conduct. They carried diseases, among them malaria and dysentery. They carried lice and ringworm and leeches and paddy algae and various rots and molds. They carried the land itself--Vietnam, the place, the soil---a powdery orange-red dust that covered their boots and fatigues and faces. They carried the sky. 

For the most part they carried themselves with poise, a kind of dignity. Now and then, however, there were times of panic...

They were tough.

They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing---these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangible weight. They carried shameful memories. They carried the common secret of cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide, and in many respects this was the heaviest burden of all, for it could never be put down, it required perfect balance and perfect posture. 

I'm once again so impressed that this was one of the books that my son read in his high school English class. I'm so impressed by his amazing teachers who insisted they read books like this! I only wish I read it sooner.