At times when humans are not satisfied with what they have, they escape to a fantasy world. When a human can not continue living the reality, he escapes to a world of fantasy. The author of “The Thing They Carried” describes a group of military soldiers that have a careless and unorganized leader. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross was the leader of that platoon who was responsible for the lives of his men. The problems occurred in this platoon due to Cross’s illusion of being in love. He was unorganized and did not take his job seriously; also he did not follow the military rules as a lieutenant for his men.
Lieutenant Cross was receiving letters from a girl named Martha; he had hoped that they would be love letters. He spent hours during the night reading the letters, which were sent to him by Martha. Cross was in love with Martha, and he had been pretending that Martha loved him as well, but he also knew that the love, which Martha had for him, was not as intimate as his love for her. He tastes the flaps on the envelopes, hoping Martha used her tongue to close the envelopes. Lieutenant would think of romantic camping and being with Martha everyday (O’Brien, 78). His love for Martha was an illusion that he had made into realit
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Lieutenant Cross finally realized that because of his love for Martha Lavender was dead. The last and the worst order given by Cross was to burn down the village where so many innocent lives would be taken away. By allowing the men to do what they wanted, Lavender was jeopardizing others lives as well as his own life. He had no way of escaping the war and as the leader he had made a serious commitment to the military, and his country. “Lavender, who was scared, carried tranquilizers until he was shot in the head outside the village of Than Khe in mid-April” (O’Brien, 78). They thought that they had to get back at them by burning down the village, only knowing that there are innocent people living there. The reader would assume that instead of Lieutenant Cross’s debating his own conscious and daydreaming, he should have concentrated on the war in order to win. Cross knew that Lavender was high and on drugs when he got shot. He loves Martha very much, and he hopes her feelings are the same for him. The reason that Lavenders got shot was his own lack of care and responsibility of Lieutenant Cross, if only he had stopped Lavender from smoking drugs he could have been alert and alive.
Cross still did not realize that he had to be more like a leader and be responsible for others. For example: one of the soldiers “Ted Lavender carried six or seven ounces of premium dope, which for him was a necessity” (O’Brien, 79).
Approximate Word count =
1213
Approximate Pages =
5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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