"The Things They Carried," by Tim O"Brien is a story about a group of soldiers marching through Vietnam during the war. It describes the men and the things that each of them carries. These soldiers carry both tangible and intangible items, which depends on each soldier individually. They carry the basic "necessities" for survival and the bare minimum to make life as livable as possible. They also carry fear, memories, and the weight of emotions. The main focus of the story centers on these intangible burdens that are as real as any of the physical, necessary items, yet harder to cast away.
This is first shown when Lieutenant Jimmy Cross expresses his love for Martha. This is probably the biggest burden of all in the story. This is proven in the first paragraph where the narrator shows us what he does after a day's march: " [He would] unwrap the letters, hold them with the tips of his fingers, and spend the last hours of night pretending. He would imagine romantic camping trips into the White Mountains in New Hampshire. He would sometimes taste the envelope flaps, knowing her tongue had been there. he wanted Martha to love him as he loved her. " These daydreams of Martha keep him constantly distracted until the death of one of his men. That will be explained later.
Almost everything is given a weight quantity, even the letters. They weighed 10 ounces. Guns, ammo, boots, food rations, and helmets all have a specific weight, given in the story. "The weapon weighed 7.5 pounds unloaded, 8.2 pounds with its full 20 round magazine. The riflemen carried anywhere from 12 to 20 magazines.adding on another 8.4 pounds at minimum, 14 pounds at maximum." Helmets were weighed at 5 pounds and boots at 2.1. This is done to show the weight bearing down on them as they march, or "hump", their way through the jungle. Items such as these are given rather simple descriptions. But as we read on, we find more descriptive tones are given to forces of nature and emotion such as: "They carried diseases, among them malaria and dysentery.