Eight - Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong

This little story is about the transformation of a sweet young lady named Mary Anne into a fierce Green Beret Warrior Princess, who I can only assume changed her name to Xena at some point. I was skeptical of the actual truth of this story, but, just two chapters ago, O'Brien told me that "In many cases, a true war story cannot be believed" (p. 68), so maybe there is a slight degree of truth to it. It just seems like it should be more difficult to just fly somebody into an active warzone. So rather than getting hung up on the truth, or truthiness, to use a Colbertism, of this tale, I'll just look at what it accomplishes.

O'Brien uses the metaphor "She was part of the land" (p. 110) sort of as a way to mark the end of this transformation. By calling Mary Anne the land itself, O'Brien shows that she has officially deviated as far as possible from what she once was, sweet, innocent, and adorable. So what does it mean for Mary Anne to be Vietnam itself? Well for one, she's wild now, no longer reserved, completely free, unpredictable, and unforgiving. She's lost her humanity, and it would appear some degree of her sanity. The same thing happened to so many men that came back from that war. Oftentimes, veterans of Vietnam say that they "left a part of themselves" in 'Nam. I think Mary Anne's story shows this to an extreme. Just as she left every part of her being in Vietnam, many of the men that came back, didn't quite come back all the way mentally. I guess O'Brien's just showing what war does to people, maybe to the extreme, but still...it just happens.

This is Xena. If she was real, she would be a green beret too.