Dead But Still Walking

At a certain point you will accept anything as normal.  Everything you know was at some point new, after all.  It was with extreme reluctance that the world accepted the undead in this way, however.  It was a process that took several centuries.

Let that sink in: several hundred years of zombies shuffling about.  Most people still find it creepy, but at least now it's so commonplace that they're almost easy to ignore, mostly because there are now ways to cope.

They still shamble wherever they want.  Their heads are smashed in with less frequency.  You tend to forget who they used to be, even if they still retain a resemblance of someone you used to know.  Actually, it's easier now to identify them, because in the early days, it was usual to fixate on what they were rather than who they'd been, even when a transformation happened during an activity that made it hard to ignore.

Planning your day around them is a matter of course.  Once you know how to avoid provoking them, they're almost like any other animal.  They're no longer human, after all; they might as well be a new species, which is exactly what some have classified them, even defended them as, which was considered insensitive by others, at least originally, but has become something they teach in the classroom now.

Maybe in another hundred years they'll simply be an urban myth, like alligators in the sewer.

Since they don't talk it's always been hard to imagine what may be going on inside their heads, which is another reason why they're now considered animals, because that's the eternal question that has always haunted humans, what another life-form thinks when the communication barrier seems impassible.  As you might imagine, there's a cottage industry devoted to interpreting them, now that they aren't simply an object of horror.

And yes, some disturbed individuals keep them as pets.  But what do you expect?

For a nominal fee, you can visit exhibits in most major cities around the world dedicated to the history of their existence.  Trade journals still try to explain why they appeared in the first place.  There are religions that have sprung up around them, extremists who target other nations because of them, end-of-the-worlders who still cling to their anachronistic beliefs.

As for me, I still have never seen one.  Most of my friends have, and sometimes I wonder if I should seek them out, if that would somehow give my life greater meaning, more fulfillment.  It sounds stupid when I admit that.  I mean, they are what they are.  I might as well say I want to see the bottom of the ocean.  I mean, I suppose I could, but would there really be a point?

Maybe I will care more as I grow older.  Right now, I don't, and I know that's not what you want to hear in this essay, but I figure the truth is more important.  Maybe there's more to say on the topic, more that you want to know about what I think, but I'm done writing about it.