Oh, wow, oh, woe! Early on I was decidedly in love--so much as you can be in love with a realistic book about a horrible war. His numbing recitation of the things segued over into what their Lieutenant was carrying--his love for a girl he hardly knew and a desperate attempt to hold onto the life he craved. After that we learned what a war story really is. I had to skip the story of the baby water buffalo but I heard enough to know that if I'd held out, I would have understood something worthwhile--something you can only understand when very young boys are placed into scenes of impossible unreality. The story of Tim's struggle with his fate after being drafted was eerily familiar even though my own life had never met such a challenge.
But I began to lose it when he got to "the mud field" and then "the revenge on the green medic." The mud field was rehashed from different angles--which would be okay--but then rehashed all over again from the same point of view. I was--to put in plainly--tired of it. Simple repetitions of words and phrases bring rhythm and ritual to a story. They bring it alive in a way the simple linear recitation of facts cannot, because they let the listener participate, in a way...no longer listening but remembering. It implants the memories and then revives them--for me, I was there--and I hated it and loved it as much as he did.
But when he started to tell "the mud field" episode all over again, I was ready for it to be over. Which isn't the same as saying I was glad it was over. I was tired of it--and sated--and sorry I started. But then again, wars are awfully boring.
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