Some very heavy women!

The title The Things They Carried could not more appropriately epitomize the theme of both the tangible and intangible weights and burdens that are placed upon soldiers. I think that one of the most cruelly ironic burdens that permeates throughout the novel and the lives of the soldiers is the burden of hope. It is hope that manages to keep the men struggling through the pains and challenges of their fully transformed daily lives, but it is also the crush and loss of this hope that is ultimate downfall of many men. And quite frequently, this hope is manifested in the women of the story.

Ted Lavender's death, or more specifically the guilt it evokes in Jim Cross, shows us our first glimpse of the glorification of women and the consequential defeat that follows. Cross' obsession and continual daydreams of Martha lead to the careless loss of Lavender. Lavender, whose name alone indicates the "mellow" stupor through which he coasted, stands out amongst the characters as least capable of self-sufficiency, making the death seem only more blame worthy to the reader. Cross accepts full blame, and acknowledges to himself the fact that his fantasies of a woman back home are responsible for such an error. This woman, however, this hope and strand of attachment to reality, is not even the one steady perfection that Cross wishes and needs her to be. Martha is placed upon a pedastal, glorified and worshipped by him, but she is not his girl and possesses no desire to be. It is a desperate and delusional attempt to remain connected to society and humanity, but in the end, it brings not satisfaction but demise.

Kiowa's death also shows the destruction that breeds from a preoccupation with girls, or at least how it is perceived to be so by the soldiers. The young, nameless boy feels responsibility for the death, but still cannot stop from relentlessly digging through the shit field in search of the photo that supposedly provoked the raid. He is searching for a girl who is no longer his, but represents all that he formerly had. It is a withered, feeble hope based not in reality but in wishful fantasy, as the boy digs in hope that "...something might finally be salvaged from all the waste," (173). It is the waste of his life and his future, and a last ditch effort to scrape together some meaning and beauty from pieces of his past that no longer belong to him. Compassion and love are not a soldier's duty, but the terrified boy and his comrades cling to them in fear of losing themselves entirely.

The metamorphosis of Mary Anne articulates this point most clearly. Even Fossie's girl, a binding link to humanity who is at least willing to return his love, turns out to be a false illusion once truly tested. War destroys the one clean and pure element of Fossie's life, and erases any treasured facade that allowed for happy simplicity. The very core of his future, the piece of stability in his life, is a weak mirage that disintegrates in the face of fear and death. He struggles "...to appreciate the full change" and comprehend her "utterly flat and indifferent" eyes and human tongue jewelry (110). His hopes have been dashed and his illusions shattered, leaving him to face the harsh realities of war without the filter of stability and simplicity awaiting him at home.

O'Brien is telling us that emotions, civility, and essentially any qualities that make a person more than a thoughtless soldier are a recipe for destruction when in war. Hope is a bittersweet necessity that keeps the men striving from day to day but spawns distractions that lead to death, or even worse, to crushing dissapointments that produce numbness and a forfeit to the horrors that they are gradually becoming a part of. Women embody all that was previously good for the men, and in their willingness to grasp at thin strands of normalcy, the men are more susceptible to very evil they so desperately wish to avoid.