An Open Letter to the Undead Among Us

Dear Zombie Nation,

There’s something about living around the corner and down the street from St. Nowhere to make you appreciate the Zombie Apocalypse. Throw a two-doors-down cemetery into the mix and come dusk, the idea of meeting the undead on an evening stroll is not something to discount out of hand.  All in all I decided over the last couple of years that an exercise program involving the fresh air of Zombie twilight was a deal breaker.  No evening strolls around the freshly dug graves for me.

Now that new evidence has come to light, I am convinced that we are receiving mixed messages from the Zombie population. Before the Neighborhood Association Committee starts posting zoning rules, I’d like to get the facts straight so that I don’t slight the undead. When it comes time to pick teams, it seems unwise to offend somebody who can win the tortoise and hare race hands down. So let me just check a few things.

What is the main staple of your diet?  I don’t want to show up at a Zombie potluck with a potato chip-topped brain casserole only to find out I’m with a group who can’t believe they ate the whole thing.  I recently viewed a documentary, “Night of the Living Dead,” only to see zombies munching on arms and legs like they had a combo dinner from Kentucky Fried Children.  If it’s spare parts you want, we can work out a deal with some unwanted telemarketers, cable TV repairmen who are never on time, or the folks in charge of the Affordable Health Care website.

Are you strong enough to break a car window, or do your arms fall off in a stiff breeze?  Because, really, you can’t have it both ways, and I don’t want you leaving limbs around the doorway if you try breaking into my pantry after I’ve just mopped.  And the first time I step on an eyeball, your sorry behind is headed straight back to the graveyard.  Show some respect for other peoples’ homes.  We decorate your living space with plastic poinsettias and this is the thanks we get.

Do you accept animals?  I’m just asking for the neighbor, who sometimes pools listlessly in the driveway until the fog has lifted.  I’m not one to take advantage of God’s creatures, but when it comes to brains, the Labrador at that house runs the show. That man’s fog hasn’t lifted in forty years.  I’m betting any brain cells he has left don’t even add up to fun size.

Once a zombie, always a zombie, right?  Movies that show a lovestruck girl and a rehabilitated zombie boy are surely the stuff dreams are made of.  True love can only do so much.

Just ask Dracula.