Over the last few weeks I’ve been doing some research on preparedness.
I’m curious about how I can ensure that our family is cared for through the winter months if the power goes out, or during a job loss.
I wanted to know just how much food we’d need (not money) in case of an extended emergency, like if some sort of huge fire in the bosque burns out all the roads and we’re trapped without being able to go to the store.
Mine are simple scenarios of things that could happen to our family at anytime in our area. You know, if zombies come, what then? (just kidding)
Social collapse is a fear of mine, but its not great enough for me to build a scenario of “its the end of the world, come on kids lets barricade ourselves in and if someone comes on our property shoot now and ask questions later.” I have a hard time wrapping my mind around that concept.
I’ve been to numerous prepper sites, (preppers are those who believe in surviving the worst case scenarios in life) and it really got me thinking about whether we were prepared for “whatever.”
I’ve read many survival and prepper websites, forums and communities, and the only thing that these places have done for me is leave me with a feeling of angst and paranoia. I’m not putting down this community of people because I feel they have much to offer others in terms of preparedness, but I just don’t want to fall into the same mentality they currently occupy.
I’ve seen videos of very intelligent people running to their safe room to get their guns and ammo in preparation for people coming to steal the stockpiled goods they have stored up in secret rooms and caches around their property.
They have felt this will be a regular occurrence when social collapse comes, or when the 2012 End of the World prediction comes from Maya prophecies.
There are those who believe in the Coronal Mass Ejections (I am somewhat concerned with that scenario, I must admit) and others who believe that the Arabs will attack the United States with bio or nuclear weapons of mass destruction (repugnant and totally bigoted in my opinion.) Regardless though of my personal feelings on why these fellow Americans have decided to stockpile and hoard, prepare and plan, they are on to something important…keeping their families safe. I can’t fault them for that.
I’ve read a few reports about how the government is trying to crack down on these kinds of people and to call them terrorists. I’ve watched videos of how the government would like to criminalize anyone who stores food for more than 2 weeks, has firearms and so forth.
It almost sounds like a David Koresh scenario all over again, minus the Messiah complex, or even Ruby Ridge all over again. I’m troubled by the extreme attitudes of both the government and certain people that will go to great lengths to ensure their safety. Is that naive of me? Am I missing something? Is it possible to have balance in our preparedness and still have peace with the government? Is it necessary for me to go from “Farmer Jane to Calamity Jane?”
I have plans on producing a lot of fruits and vegetables in 2012. If I choose to can up my garden, does that put me on the terrorist watch list? Am I that subversive? See, I feel all paranoid! I want to do right by my family. I don’t believe in storing up canned goods that are store bought. Canned food is extremely unsafe to eat. Yes it will keep you alive in a pinch, but it contains BPA in the plastic white lining inside cans, so I’m not interested in poisoning my family with these types of food. We simply do not buy canned food anymore. Any tomato sauce is now purchased in glass containers until I grow enough tomatoes in our garden to can my own. We are also trying to move away from all plastic items. Eventually even replacing our cooking utensils with stainless steel ones or wooden.
We have started to step away from the store bought canned goods and food items in plastic containers, so how does that work for people like us? How do we prepare, store food and enjoy relative safety? I say enjoy because I don’t want my life to revolve around situational awareness (military prepper terminology).
My question to preppers would be “if safety is priority one for you, how can you allow your family to eat things that contain known carcinogens, will destroy your immune system, and in the end leave you ill?” Is there a way for preppers to stay healthy?
It doesn’t seem that this type of thinking leaves any room for thriving. Its just about surviving nuclear holocausts, empty store shelves, marauders, thieves and so on. I don’t want to live like that.
As I mentioned earlier, I am concerned about Coronal Mass Ejections which are solar flares that can knock out our electric grid. It happened in Montreal in the dead of winter and I can tell you that stuff scares me to no end. EVERYTHING, ev-er-y-th-ing runs on electricity. Think in a CME you can just get in your car and travel to the next town or to your family’s house? Sure you could but what if you were low on gas? Can’t get gas since they are electric computerize pumps. Traffic lights are also electric. Can’t get food from the store…electric. Cell phones won’t work. Night time would turn into nightmare since no lights would work. The banks would be closed, you couldn’t go to work unless you worked at a solar company, and you can’t pay your bills. If you have a well, it won’t work if its hooked up to the main grid and you can’t get water at the store because its closed. Everything comes to a standstill and a huge CME is set for between 2012 and 2013. Some say this is just hype, others are so dead serious about it, they are prepared with solar power, wind turbines and so forth.
It could happen right? I mean, isn’t this scenario far more plausible than zombies coming to eat our faces? LOL I’m joking around to try and lighten myself up. This crap has me a bit scared, and zombies are just the thing to make me smile. Sorry. Anyway, do you all have concerns about upcoming catastrophes or do you think life will just keep going the way it is. Do you go all out to prepare for worst case scenarios? Are you prepared for just the simple things? Do you have a secret room, secret stash of goods, food saved for one whole year, firearms and hazmat suits?
What are your thoughts?
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
Having embraced the homestead lifestyle, you are already ahead of the curve. Having seen your great posts on the amazing foods you prepare you must have a larger than typical larder. The wood burning stove is also on the plus side for preparedness. A CME will happen eventually. You are moving in the right direction. One of my favorite sites is run by Jim Rawles. Please read his comments on charity. Thinking preparedness is a natural extension of homesteading.
Hi Fred,
I never really thought of it that way. You’re right. Homesteading does prepare for a lot of things other people may look over or think they can just get with a paycheck. I’ll have to run by Jim Rawles site. Do you have a link for it?
Yes, I agree now taht preparedness is a natural extension of homesteading. Maybe that is the balance and middle ground.
As requested
James Rawles site: http://www.survivalblog.com
I won’t say who, because they’re a little secretive about it but… some folks close to us are preppers, and it all just seems a little… silly… to me. It is impossible to have a conversation more than ten minutes long with these dear people without it ending on their latest preparations, or concerns about their preparations, or concerns for us because we are not prepared in the same way.
Here’s the thing. I believe we are held in God’s hands. And even if I’m wrong about that, I know that there is more to life than preventing death. There is more to life than protecting ourselves.
Life is INHERENTLY unsafe. Life is dangerous. Full of risk. Five thousand things could happen today, this moment, to end everything I hold dear in this life. Tomorrow I could get in the car with my family and get rammed by a truck-driver and we could all die in a fiery flash.
And I am not going to be any happier for worrying about it.
I think your attitude is much healthier. Learn to live more self-sufficiently because it makes you happy, because you love the way it makes you feel, because you enjoy it. Prepare for obvious risks, take reasonable precautions against reasonable threats. But enjoy your life. Enjoy your family.
And if you think that a major armageddon-style melt-down is a likely scenario, then by all means prep if it makes you happy. But I plan to spend my time building connections in my community, developing enjoyable self-sustaining patterns of life, and developing resourcefulness in my children. And if the worst happens, then I’ll take it as it comes.
All men (ahem, and women) must die. But not all men (or women) truly live. It’s that second half that I find much more interesting than the first.
Yes, yes, yes Heather! You always come through as the voice of reason. I feel the way you do, I just didn’t know how to say it as elegantly! I don’t want be worried and looking over my shoulder for someone who might be coming to hurt me or my family. It just makes sense to have a few emergency kits just in case we need them.
I don’t know if I could live my life like your friends do, always thinking about the last thing we did to prepare. I too feel that knowing our community is important. God brought us to this place for a reason, and even though I’m not naive enough to say “if God put us here nothing is going to happen to us because we are living in his will” I am willing to say “God brought us to this place and I value what he’s done for us, so lets make sure we make the most of it.” And that includes being prepared for the most part. But I won’t be saving up a years worth of food for some sort of catastrophe. If I do happen to have a years worth of food, its because my garden was extremely productive. heehee. I’m tickled by that. Isn’t that what homesteaders hope for? A very productive garden to help get them through the winter?
I love the end of your comment,
“All men (ahem, and women) must die. But not all men (or women) truly live. It’s that second half that I find much more interesting than the first.”
Biblically speaking one could look at this issue in a couple different ways. -
Do nothing and have faith that the lord shall provide:
“Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek, for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”
- Matthew 6:25-34
or be extremely paranoid and prepared for many years of troublesome times:
“Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt: And there shall arise after them seven years of famine; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt; and the famine shall consume the land; And the plenty shall not be known in the land by reason of that famine following; for it shall be very grievous. And for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice; it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass. Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this, and let him appoint officers over the land, and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years. And let them gather all the food of those good years that come, and lay up corn under the hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food in the cities. And that food shall be for store to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt; that the land perish not through the famine.” – Genesis 41:29-36
My wife and I choose a middle ground, we do not worry about mutant zombies or other catastrophic events but do try to be prepared with enough food (that we use) and firewood should unforseen events come our way that might cause us hardship if our cupboards were empty and our wood pile all used up.
I too want to have balance and remain in the middle ground. I believe the Lord does provide for us and at the same time there are times when we do need to prepare.
I see my prepping as a hedge against higher prices ans stability in my budget. When you have a business, there are times when no money comes in, but you still need to pay the bills. By buying in larger quantities on sale, I can protect us from higher prices when there is little cash to spend until things pick up again. Being in business requires a prepping attitude.
I’m glad you brought that up Sonia because I’ve wondered what I would do when we have our cottage industries up and running.
We moved out to the country in 2002 to grow our own food organically. Since then, I’ve realized there are a lot of other benefits to our lifestyle. I really don’t worry about how much food I have stored up because I have seeds, a 12-month-garden, and all sorts of livestock. We could be self-sufficient if we had to, and that would be practically forever, not just until our store-bought canned goods ran out.
Hi Deborah,
I’m very interested in the 12 month garden as well as Intentional Gardening (at least that’s what I call it). I want to plan out our gardens to be thriving throughout the year and to plant food accordingly.
I read Four Season Harvest several years ago and thought that even though the author was from Maine, it probably still wouldn’t work in Illinois. I mean, really, it gets well below zero here! Then a few years ago we went to an organic gardening conference, and there was a professor there from Michigan State University, and he was showing slides of their “salad palace” where they grow greens for their dining halls through the winter. That did it! The next year I told my husband to buy some PVC pipes at the local store, and I ordered greenhouse plastic and row covers, and we had lettuce all winter! This year, we also have arugula, mustard greens, and Swiss chard. Oooh, and I have a miniature orange tree, which is currently blooming in my dining room and has the most heavenly aroma!
We have some mutant lettuce that made it through 10 below zero temperatures for a few days without being covered. I thought for sure it would have died, but nope! Its still alive unassisted without water or anything else. I find it amusing that when I try so hard to make our garden beautiful and successful, its the neglect and forgetfulness that sometimes makes all the difference.
We will definitely have sections of our 2012 gardens that are spring, fall and winter ready. I would love to get a few citrus trees for in our dining room, but I think we’d have to put solar tubes in first since it doesn’t get a lot of direct sunlight during the day.