Passage from Powder

In my opinion, the most vivid passage in this short story would have to be in the third paragraph; “I could see everything. The green tablecloth, the plates with the holly pattern, the red candles waiting to be lit.” The reason I chose this as the most vivid passage is that it tells us about what this little boy is imagining. Even though he is not home, he can imagine how the house must be set up for Christmas time. This also puts an image into your mind about not only how his would look, but it made me think how my house is set up during different occasions and celebrations. Though we don’t celebrate Christmas, I could still imagine how our own table is set up for special days, or not everything is neatly in its place, how even my room is sometimes neat and tidy. So I believe that this passage not only tells us about the story but also helps us to think about our own personal life.
The main character in this story would have to be the little boy. This story is an autobiography of Tobias Wolff, so that would be who the main character is. The story revolves around this little boy and what his feelings are about what is going on. His father is taking him out for skiing, and as it says in the story “he was indifferent to my fretting.” This shows that this little boy really wanted to get home for Christmas; thinking ahead he knew that since there is so much snow, it would not be good for them to continue their “several last runs.” The whole story is in the point of view of the child and how he feels and reacts to everything that is going on. From being scared about the trooper following the, to assuring himself that his dad is a good driver, we can see that the story is from the child’s point of view.
In “Things they carried” my favorite object would have to be “They carried the land itself-Vietnam, the place, the soil, -- a powdery orange-red dust that covered their boots and fatigues and faces. They carried the sky. The whole atmosphere…” To me, this felt like something different than everything else that was listed in the story. Carrying the land, the sky and the gravity seemed to me like a metaphor for the burden that these soldiers had to carry throughout their journey. It made everything else that they carried light, and having this burden and responsibility seemed to be like the biggest thing that they had to carry.