Curt Lemon Short Story

“Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to.” Curt Lemon, Norman Bowker and Tim O’Brien have their own stories about how they were cowards and courageous during the war. These three men knew if they did not do what they did, they would have been cowards. It would have made them feel embarrassed. The first story is about Curt Lemon during a visit with the dentist (O’Brien, 82-84). He pulled off dangerous tricks in his past and he would even make up stories which caused him to think of himself as the tough soldier (O’Brien, 82). One day during the war a dentist came to examine the soldiers teeth (O’Brien, 82-83). Lemon was scared of the dentist, in-fact he did not mind blood or pain, it was just that he had bad experiences

Bowker could not recover from it, he would slowly drive the seven mile loop around a pond that was in his hometown every day (O’Brien, 131). He could not get Sally Kramer, his high school crush, and his father out of his head (O’Brien, 134-135). Bowker kept saying, “I almost won the silver star” aloud, imagining he was saying this to his father (O’Brien, 135). He could not keep a job and he still drove his fathers car around town (O’Brien, 149). Bowker hung himself at the YMCA one day, two hours after he was playing basketball (O’Brien, 154). He used a jump rope and his friends found him hanging from a water pipe (O’Brien, 154). He left no suicide note or any type of message (O’Brien, 154). Eight months before that he sent a letter to Tim O'Brien telling him how his life was going (O’Brien, 154). He said in the letter “The thing is, there's no place to go. But just in this lousy town. In general. My life, I mean. It's almost like I got killed over in Nam… Hard to describe” (O’Brien, 150). That was the last time Tim heard from Bowker (O’Brien,

O’Brien was shot twice in vietnam's war (O’Brien, 180). On his first shot Rat Kiley was there to take care of him, he was shot on his side (O’Brien, 180). The whole time Tim kept thinking “I've been shot, I've been shot” (O’Brien, 180). Rat stayed by Tim until the chopper came to take him away and Rat also helped him into it (O’Brien, 181). Tim recovered and came back to the war twenty-six days later, but when he came back Rat was no longer there (O’Brien, 181). There was a new medic named Bobby Jorgenson (O’Brien, 181). Almost an hour after Tim returned he got shot again, this time in the butt and he almost died of shock (O’Brien, 181). Bobby just laid on the ground and stared at Tim for almost 10 minutes, he would not go towards him and help (O’Brien, 181). Once Tim got to the hospital, he had time to plan his revenge towards Bobby for almost letting him die (O’Brien, 181). Tim got out a month later and Bobby tried to apologize to him but Tim had said “It's not that easy” in response (O’Brien,