O'Brien On the Rainy River

Out of all the stories that we had to read in The Things They Carried, On The Rainy River was my favorite. It was a little bit confusing towards the end when O'Brien started to see the past, present, and future people in his life, but what I really liked about it was that it was the point where he became a man. It seems a bit weird that the moment he became a man was also when he was balling his eyes out crying. Elroy, the old 88 year old man that took O'Brien in saved his life. I believe that when Elroy told O'Brien that he actually owed him for working around the lodge, it showed O'Brien that no matter how bad things seemed to get, there is always hope in the world. For O'Brien, the whole six days he was there seemed surreal, because he ha no interaction with the rest of the world for those six days except with the old man. The one thing that I did find a bit fishy was that at the beginning of the story, O'Brien said that he has never told anyone the story and that no one knew about it. Maybe the 60's were way different back then, but if I disappeared for six days after being drafted, I am pretty sure my parents would have some idea of what I did. But hey, maybe O'Brien is just as good at lying as he is at writing. The whole story is bigger than O’Brien’s struggle, at some point in everyone’s life, they have to grow up and they have to go through something similar to what he went through on the river. I am curious to know if he ever saw that old man again, because he should be forever grateful towards him for having such a positive impact on his life.