Sunday, November 22, 2009

There is one other story that is apparently very true unlike the other stories mentioned but like it was mentioned before, the point of the stories within this text isn’t whether or not they are true but rather they serve as an eye into the happenings of people in wartime. It explains the story of a man who’s friend was killed in the war and he wrote his friend’s girlfriend to explain why her boyfriend wont be coming home. He pours his heart into the letter, crying on numerous occasions. Months pass after the letter had been sent and still there has been no response. The soldier took it as hard as if he were the dead. He couldn’t believe that this girl wouldn’t write back to this kind of letter. She finds out her boyfriend is dead and sends no reply whatsoever. The soldier could not believe the audacity she had. Dead friend aside, he poured his heart and soul into that letter, but to get no sort of emotional feedback infuriated him. The effect that this story is supposed to have on the reader/listener is that after spending months on end in wartime, after a soldier asks for something simple such as a reply letter from someone who meant a whole lot to his fallen friend, he is denied it. After living in the horror that is war, people start to appreciate the little things that normal people take for granted every day like affection, the emotional attachment that forms when men form a brotherhood during wartime, or simply letters from a place where there isn’t gunfire or good friends getting torn apart by explosives.

People who weren’t there or didn’t experience any of these events that these soldiers told can not judge the validity of said stories. Regardless of whether or not these stories are true or not does not matter. What matters is the message that gets across. Without exaggerations in the story or emphasizing things in the story that may have not happened, the stories would not have as much of an impact as it would have if a boring story where nothing happened and no one died. The stories strike the listeners where it counts, in the heart. What matters the most is the message and the effect it has on one’s life after hearing it. “In other cases you cant even tell a true war story. Sometimes it’s just beyond telling.”

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