I’ve always hated zombies. I hate the way their eyes seem so vacant; I hate the slow shambling pace they take to mosey across the room; I hate how their mouths hang open so wide that my entire neck could fit inside; and I really hate that they can never hear what I’m saying when I’m trying to sell them tires for their beat up Oldsmobile.

Perhaps I’ve misled you. I am not referring to the recently deceased returning to life to devour the brains of the living; I’m referring to the dim-eyed elderly who have lost too many of their primary senses.

The context to this story is my summer/winter job working as a clerk and salesperson at a tire store in Middletown, where, as a salesman, I have to deal with the customers. In this case, the “customers” happen to be extremely old people – shamblers, if you will – who more often than not forgot their hearing aid and also forgot everything important about their vehicle.

Think about your car; do you know the year, make and model? Do you know the tire size? If you said yes to one of these, then figuring out the size of tire your vehicle needs is relatively easy. When you don’t even know what model of car you are driving, it can be a tad bit frustrating to tell you what size your vehicle takes when there are HUNDREDS of possibilities.

Now, not every old person is a shambler. In fact, quite a few of my favorite customers were the elderly. I just really hate when I spend three minutes explaining the positives of buying a General tire over a Cooper tire only to be met with a blank stare and a toothless “Huh? Were you talkin’ to me?”

Selling things to old people is the most tiring process in the commercial world (with a close second being selling to extremely cheap people), mostly because comprehension is no longer their strongest suit. I don’t mind repeating myself to the hearing impaired because I understand that hearing doesn’t get better over time, but repeating myself five or six times because someone left their hearing aid at home is just cruel.

More than anything though, I hate the way they resemble zombies.

They lumber towards me with open mouths and distant gazes. Their hands weakly raise themselves and I immediately think that my brains are on the buffet menu. My pulse quickens and I silently grab the nearest object I can use to defend myself from my shambling enemy. A moan begins to exit the creature, two solitary syllables gradually form: “Tires.”

After going through prices and ordering the tires, the shambling dead return in a few days and the mechanics proceed to jack the car up and mount the new tires.

At this point one of three things usually happens:

A) The tire size they said they had on their car is completely different than the one that is actually on their piece of crap car, which means we must remount the tires, quote new tires, order those in, and then mount them on the car.

B) The car is so old that the wheels are busted. Busted wheels means we can’t legally put new tires on. So then we have to look for a new wheel, send one of our guys to go and pick it up, and quote the overpriced hunk of metal to a customer whose only remark is, “Huuuuuh?”

C) Everything goes well and the tires get put on the car and the shamblers exit the building with a safe car and a toothless grin while I breathe a sigh of relief that another day goes by without a zombie apocalypse.