“The surreal juxtaposition is what gives many soldiers trouble adjusting back to civilian life”

One day you’re in a sniper hole with your crosshairs on a man, the next you’re at home seeing things like that in movies and trying to decide what to have for lunch. The surreal juxtaposition is what gives many soldiers trouble adjusting back to civilian life. The army, which has become your entire world, is suddenly gone — once again a thing of movies and memories — and it almost feels like the whole thing was a dream.

Gershon Morris, “The Things He Carried”, Forward (21 March 2014), 20.