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Walking Dead


A few days ago, my sister-in-law bombarded me with “riveting” conversation about a TV show I have never seen: The Walking Dead. With all the enthusiasm of a young child describing her favorite power ranger, she described the characters (some live people, some dead people and a few in between), the premise of the show (not-quite-dead people walking around trying to “turn” the humans, which is apparently a really bad thing) and the basic plot (essentially don’t let anyone bite you, which is pretty much a rule I live by anyway). My sister-in-law went on to passionately describe the lengths the characters go to in hopes of avoiding contamination by the zombies as they battle both the undead and other living humans for survival.

Then she mentioned something that really stood out and made me think (I must be honest, up to that point I was having a hard time being engaged with most of the discussion despite her overwhelming excitement): each human carries the zombie strain and must be careful to not let it become expressed.

But before I go back to that comment, here is Google’s definition of a zombie: “(in popular fiction) a person or reanimated corpse that has been turned into a creature capable of movement but not of rational thought, which feeds on human flesh.” Wow, I think I know a lot of people who fit that same definition! I am sure you do too. If you take the more “humanized” definition, I will wager you could add even more people to the list: “a person who is or appears lifeless, apathetic, or completely unresponsive to their surroundings.” And while these people may not literally feed on human flesh, those who stumble through life without direction or passion, indiscriminately existing through lifeless days, certainly do have a tendency to devour a piece of your soul and spirit. They can consume your excitement and hopes and dreams for the future.

Now back to the comment about each “healthy” human harboring the zombie strain. I thought about this and how it relates to real life. What if that is true of us? What if each one of us carries a low-grade infection of apathy and indifference just waiting to spread through our being? I think to some degree this is accurate, and each of us must take measures to ensure that virus doesn’t become expressed. We must avoid being “bitten” and evade possible infection. And as much as we can help it, we must steer clear of the zombies.

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