Start the Day

Her child had been shot dead as she ran for her life. Luckily for her, the bullet didn’t go through the baby’s body. When she stopped where we stood, she sat on the ground and removed her child. It was a girl, and her eyes were still open, with an interrupted innocent smile on her

“I’ll never hit you in the face where it will leave a mark...” The words rushed in, taunting. The cold emptiness in the tone, like he was there in the room, whispering in her ear. And all at once, the fear was back. The raw fear that gripped her body like a vice and left her gulping in air. In a panic, she whirled her head around the room. She was alone. Relief flooded her, but the sickening butterflies remained. She gripped the counter until her knuckles turned white; outlining the jagged scar more prominently, and she fought to steady her breathing, blink back the tears, focus on something else.

As Sandy Kemmpner writes to his parents about his experience in the vietnam war, we can clearly notice that he cannot stand one more second of it. On September 2, 1996 he writes a letter to his parents describing the horrible conditions he has been put through. Using imagery, sarcasm and parallelism he is able to convey the anti-war sentiment.

was “viciously attacked” on the street, how “his eye socket was shattered and hemorrhaging”, and how “his ear canal was lacerated internally from a tremendous blow to the side of his head”. These few examples prove how her word choice was so specific in the sense that it really makes the reader visualize the horrendous pain that her son underwent and gives them a sense of fear.

William, Rachel’s three year old son is crying standing over her as she is slowly regaining consciousness. Her boyfriend, Daniel, was gone; their bedroom door was left cracked open and Rachel was on the couch in their room. Pained around her neck from where he choked her, she tries to wrap her head around how she got to this point. Why does Daniel hate her? What did she do this time? Can she, should she, just leave with William? Rachel realizes she has to get out of the house before Daniel gets back. When she arrives at her mother’s house, her mom is alarmed. Rachel has bruises around her neck and marks around her hairline. Rachel’s mother tells her “You come here every week and you go back to that monster every week. I see these bruises but you must not feel they are a problem since you keep going back to him.” Rachel’s mom walks out of the room frustrated.

For countless of people today, the Vietnam war is just something from the past, but for Tim O’Brien, the Vietnam War will endlessly be with him. This one year in Vietnam changes the lives of this platoon from emotional pain, physical pain, as well as muscle pain will commence to cloud their vision. The weight of the things that they carried takes great effect on them that they have to continue to endure on this one year trip in Vietnam and remember these memories for the rest of their lives..

“When we first got here-all of us- we were real young and innocent… but we learned pretty damn quick” (O’Brien 93) . In the novel “The things we carried” by Tim O’Brien he shows that many young Americans lost their innocence as soon as their boots hit the ground in Vietnam. The Vietnam War took many things away from the men who walked throughout the jungles arms, legs, and innocents. One character named Mary Anne was changed dramatically with the war on how she saw things and acted in her daily life. Mary Anne changed immensely from how she came into the war and how she left.

This chapter covers the transition of Mary Anne Bell, of how she changed from being a normal, sweet teenage girl to being one of the Green Berets, filled with enthusiasm for the war and intrigued with the culture of Vietnam. This message is about how the innocence of women is consumed by the war and how once they begin to learn more about it, they are hopelessly entranced by it, far from returning to their usual selves. Rat talks about how, “Anne made you think about those girls back home, how they'll never understand any of this, not in a billion years. Try and tell them about it, they’ll just stare at you with those big round candy eyes. They won't understand zip.”(O’Brien 108), and this shows that women won’t understand what Vietnam really is like, they have to experience it themselves. Women also won’t understand the grueling mental pain that soldiers experience in the war.

“Earlier today, we learned that an attempt was made on your cousin’s life,” her father said to her. “Your mother has so much grief for your cousin, because of the actions that he has made since the past two years – deeds worthy of being told to all

Due to the effects of war, Ha and her family were faced with countless challenges, turning their former lives and everything they had known “inside out.” The most significant of such effects can be seen through Ha’s father, who had left home to serve in the Vietnam war and never returned. Ha stated, “Father left home on a navy mission...He was captured...That’s all we know.” (Page 12) Ha lost her father to the war, and despite the brevity in which she had known him; it influenced her greatly. Growing up without her father left her lonely

        The words stabbed at John’s heart and flooded him with a mixture of regret and guilt.  His muddled mind served up flashes of his disagreement with Mary, of his refusal of his mom’s request and of the related emotional suffering he and his siblings had

“Mama!”. She nestled into her mother’s arms. “Why would they do this to me? How could they?”

‘“Everything changes now,” he says. “It’s time I got to know my own son, who had his mind poisoned against me”’(page 100)

Tears swelled behind a mothers eyes. Her cries echoed through the bedroom. A smoking barrel held firmly in trembling hands. The ventilated breeze pregnant with the smell of ignited gunpowder; nitroglycerin, graphite, and a hint of sawdust. A smell that had once reminded me of the Fourth of July. The off white paint was now accented with shades of crimson and scarlet. The slug had pierced the wall leaving cracked plaster and splintered wood in its wake. The singed exit wound, a peephole into tragedy.

Cathy’s mother was against Cathy partaking any protests in regards to this war in fear of her safety. She had neglected to think about the war in the same way that she saw the Vietnam War in which she protested against as a girl Cathy’s age. Within the first page McFarlane had set Shelia’s stance on the war which was “Shelia hated this war. It was all they ever showed on television and she couldn’t bear to watch it. She wanted the Americans to bomb the Iraqis into submission and have everything back to normal by breakfast time.” This statement made me think about the different ways that a war can be looked upon and reconsider my lack of interest because Shelia was of the same view of me where you just get sick of hearing about it but you’re not fazed by the deaths. However by the end of the story Shelia’s view had changed into one that just wanted to support her daughter and stand for what is right. After Cathy the question “what do you think Dad’ll think when he sees us laughing like this on TV tonight?” Shelia said “he’ll wish he was here with us” Cathy couldn’t help but notice the note of sadness in her mother’s voice and how her perspective had