Lady Borton was born into a very loving family. She had caring parents and a very supporting family. This had a great effect on how she viewed the world. She is not self-centered or self-absorbed. I think this is very evident by the way she writes her stories. She writes about how the war affected the Vietnamese, and not just the Americans. So often we are only subjected to the American view of the story and forget about all the innocent victims of Vietnam. As I mentioned earlier, many innocent kids are being born with severe birth effect. Lady Borton writes, "One infant had four arms, another a bowl in place of her cranium, a third a face on his abdomen, a forth his naval protruding from his forehead."(Borton 1103) These are just some of the effects of the harmful pesticides the Americans

Lady Borton has a very unique way of writing. She gives names and describes each of her characters. She wants the readers to realize that the people in her stories are real and not just some made up persons. Her writings allow the reader to interact with the story and become a part of it. Most authors that write about a negative event rarely use names and descriptions because they do not want you to get to know the whole story. The Vietnam War was such a negative effect on the United States, but Lady Borton lets the readers get to know the entire story.

I have a first hand account of how Post Traumatic Stress Disorder affects people. My Great Uncle Mike served in the Vietnam War. Last Christmas, I went to his house to visit. I am not sure how we got started on the subject, but he showed me his Purple Heart and other medals. I asked him if he would tell me some stories about the war. He started to, but then he started to cry and got all choked up. I have never seen my uncle cry before. He told me that he was sorry because he could not go on because it brought to many bad memories back. This opened my eyes to the effects that the Vietnam War has caused.

In "Wars Past and Wars Present," Borton writes about a disease that still effects many veterans still today. This disease is called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She writes about her life is compared to a movie projector. She constantly has flashbacks where she is back working as a Red Cross nurse back in Vietnam. She talks about how when a drop of water touched her hand, "Suddenly I was back pushi

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1066
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)