Summary Of The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

Life is a bountiful experience, brimming with wonderful opportunities and difficult hardships; filled with experiences that form a person, regardless of whom they are. The way one will approach moments of success to trying times will ultimately be different from one another. When life brings one at a crossroads, it will not remain stagnant while they choose. In the book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, his short story On the Rainy River focuses on the author himself, who is drafted for the war against Vietnam. He is troubled with the choice of fleeing northwards to Canada in order to avoid serving in the war, or to choose otherwise, and go against his morals. In the process of deciding whether or not to fight in Vietnam, O’Brien is

This serves as an effective reason for O’Brien to be critical in himself because prior to deciding to serve in Vietnam. “[He] imagined [himself] doing things [he] could not do – charging an enemy position, taking aim at another human being.” (O’Brien, 44) He was against the idea of violence against another human being. Deciding to serve in this war contradicts this statement. Prior to receiving the draft notice, O’Brien holds himself in higher regard in terms of “who knows better”. He would “carry on fierce arguments with those people.... sending [him] off to fight a way they didn’t understand and didn’t want to understand.” (O’Brien, 45) He is aware that the reasons for this war is more complicated then jut stopping the Communists and considering that he would argue this fact proves that he is indeed “above others” in terms of self-awareness. But even so, he relents to the wishes of his peers and serves war, thus dismissing his original beliefs against the war. This is worthy of shame, as one of the main reasons he relents to his peers is because he was embarrassed. “It had nothing to do with morality. Embarrassment, that’s all it was.” (O’Brien, 59) He could not stand the fact that his community would shove him away, and use derogatory slurs against him because he knew better. In the final moments of his time at the Tip Top Lodge, as O’Brien sat in that fishing boat 20 yards away from Canada, he felt the whole universe’s eyes on him. O’Brien exaggerates the amount of people who care about his decision, but this depiction of his hallucination reminds others about the heaviness of the decision he was making. But even so, his acclaimed morals are thrown away for the sake of his