Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried Eating Them Away For young people, the Vietnam War is a thing of the past and they can only learn about it from second hand sources. In Tim O'brien's The Things They Carried, it becomes very apparent that the Vietnam conflict has proved to be one that many of the participants have not been able move away from, while getting on with their lives. O²brien shows that the conflict takes on a parasitic form that eats away on its victims for the rest of their lives. A parasite is defined as an organism that grows, feeds, and is sheltered on or in a different organism while harming its host. The war in this case takes the p