Years ago, I remember being told the
story of a man walking through the woods and he came upon a butterfly chrysalis
that was about to hatch. Thinking to help the butterfly along, he very gently
helped open the cocoon with a pocket knife. The butterfly emerged and promptly
died. It seems the butterfly gains it strength to fly by forcing its way out of
the cocoon on its own. So the man, while trying to be helpful, ended up hurting
the butterfly by not allowing it to struggle.
There are probably dozens of analogies
like this. Gold is purified by fire. The sword is made strong by being pounded
between the hammer and the anvil. Kids learning to swim by being tossed in the
deep end.
I am still sticking with my Great
White Shark metaphor. If you don’t want to get bit, don’t go in the water. But
right now, the metaphorical ocean is all around us and if Alex wants to go out
and swim, he has to learn how to deal with the predators. I think there is a
sanity in keeping him safe but he has to learn to embrace fear and not let it
paralyze you. It is one thing to talk about it. It is one thing to imagine it.
But when a shamble of zoms is bearing down on you, it is a whole other thing.
I remember Fred Cox’s first words to
Alex when he started weapons training. Pointing to his pistol, he said, “The
second you don’t respect this, it kills you.” Zoms are the same way. Killing
your first one is tough. Knowing what we know now, if I were to toss you in a
pit with one, you might be overcome with fear. What if it bites me? If it bleeds on me, do I become infected?
And that fear might cause you not to
act. I think most zoms are deteriorated down so much now, no one sees them as
human beings anymore. They are threats to be eliminated. I think in many ways,
it would be like a rookie NFL player strapping on the pads for the first time.
Imagine the nervousness of that player. Now compare him to a ten-year veteran
of the sport with two Super Bowl rings.
Zoms are like firearms. They must be
respected at all times. But if Alex is going to learn to deal with these
things, we need to advance him beyond the rookie jitters. Unfortunately, the
only way to do that is to put him in harm’s way.
I wasn’t ready for that. He is my
son. My baby boy. I want to protect him at all costs. But in doing so, I am
actually hindering him. He has to learn how to defend himself and how to engage
these zoms so he can be prepared for his inevitable encounters.
It is one of those things. I hate
the idea of putting him in danger but I hate the idea of him becoming a zom
even more…
