“Be
ready, son,” my father would always tell me, growing up. “The
zombie apocalypse could happen at any time.”
All
fathers have their obsessions. Sports. Model trains. Grilling. His
was zombies. At bed time, he would tell me stories of people planning
and surviving, or not planning and dying, stories of people keeping a
level head and surviving and people panicking and dying. Every night,
he would give me the adventures of Goofus and Gallant: Undead
Nightmare edition. While other boys' dads taught them to catch a
ball, mine taught me to make a headshot from fifty yards with a pull
string, compound, composite, and cross bow. He taught me wilderness
survival and took me camping the way many fathers in rural areas did,
but the advice was different. Sleep in a tree so Zed can't get you.
Walk in the stream so Zed can smell you. Don't use guns unless you
have to. Guns are loud, and will attract Zed.
At
seven, just in case, he gave me an air pistol and would randomly
stick targets in unexpected places to keep me on my toes, and at ten,
he gave me a real pistol, taught me to shoot just in case (a bow
simply will not do you any good within striking distance). I learned
to strip and clean my gun blind, learned to make my own ammo. My
friends called him weird. So did I when I hit my teens.
But
to this day, every time I step outside the cabin and put an arrow
through one of their heads before I even consciously realize one was
shambling toward me, I say a little prayer of thanks for everything
he taught me.
- Originally mailed to P. Walker in Diamondhead, Mississippi
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