Boring Rainbow

One of the greatest worries for me in terms of preparing for the Cascadia Subduction Zone Earthquake (other than fires, the fuel depot, air quality, my child and reuniting with my family, communications, etc.) is having enough food and comfort items to get us through.

“Wait, what?” you’re maybe thinking, “The Red Cross says you just need two weeks of food and water!”

That is 100% blatently untrue.

I went to a lecture at OMSI about the earthquake and learned this about services:

If you think about it, the roads will be destroyed. We’ll have no connectivity. If we’re alive, we’ll be stranded and trapped here. And you might want some dental floss after you’ve run out.

Not joking! One night while undergoing the bedtime routine, I thought about how grateful I am for the simple pleasure of clean teeth and how, in the event of a disaster, I would like to continue this simple, human pleasure.

When it comes to food, my biggest tip is to avoid buying stacks of canned soup if you hate it. Buy in abundance the things that your family already eats and loves. For me, this means that I assess our cereal, our boxed soy milks, our supply of chocolate. Yes, we have rice and beans. But what else? Don’t forget the coffee. I’m not kidding… You don’t want a coffee migraine when everything is chaos and the air quality is death itself.

I once bought an MRE and tried it, and it was the most disgusting thing I had ever had. It reminded me of the woman from Italy who I saw on a video once, complaining about Americans sending canned spaghetti after the Second World War. I knew, after trying that MRE, that I would feel even worse if that’s what we ate when the world fell apart. When I first saw her, my reaction was “How ungrateful,” and, after trying that, I thought “How right she was.”

You know, I saw that tiny video clip years ago and it just filed itself into the composure of my body and self. I can’t even tell you when, where, or how I saw it. It just existed at one point, and so do I, now. It’s, for whatever reason, a part of me. She said that her spaghetti was better. I believe it.

Anyways!

Do not buy anything that you won’t like or wouldn’t eat anyway.

When it comes to your essential comfort items, like sunscreen, face serums, dental floss, buy in bulk when you can.

When you’re cashy, if you are, then buy more than one. When Amazon Prime Day came, I bought three of my favorite tinted moisturizer because it was so, so cheap and I love it so much. This has also saved me at times when I’m not cashy and run out and voila: extra in the cabinet. And when the earthquake hits, if I survive it, I will feel like a human.

That feeling, when you find a backup unused, is a rich reward in life itself. It feels GOOD.

One secret to prepping is that you will never feel like you have enough. You will not be able to buy enough food for the apocalypse in one go, usually. And that’s OK. Don’t let yourself get stressed and lose sleep over it.

Any project takes time. At our house, we say “Good food takes time!” (I read that somewhere and now it’s our thing, too) and, in doing big, audacious projects like building a dollhouse and everything in it, it’s easy to feel like a failure and overwhelmed before you start. But if you just… make an object, you’ll be that much closer to done. Slowly, you’ll fill that house. And, by extension, slowly you will be more prepared than you were yesterday.

Let me tell you, a tiny bit more prepared is a thousand times better than not at all.

When the pandemic hit and masks were $1,000 apiece (felt like), I already had some in my survival bin from years of going to Burning Man. It wasn’t a lot, but it was better than none.

Now, I’ve not read the whole thing and I skipped the beginning, but the LDS Survival Manual was really helpful to me. You can check it out here.

When you can, if you can, simply buy more than one of your favorite food and comfort items, a bit at a time. An extra tube of toothpaste for your child. Save the toothbrush from the dentist. Another body wash that you love. You don’t have to go all out here: just a tiny bit more than enough.

I shared with my friend my stress at not having enough. I’m the only real prepper in the family; I’m the one who makes us make emergency bags and practice running out of the house. So I’m the one who has to squirrel away water, food, etc. I’m the crazy one. And I simply felt like a failure at having enough because I can’t do it. Sharing this with a friend, she said that we only really need about three month’s worth.

She wants enough to not overhwelm emergency services. Enough to step back and say, “It’s OK. Help someone else.”

Enough to share during that time. Yes, I really meant that. Share. They say that communities that come together survive together.

She reckons that when you have about three month’s worth, then you’re good.

Then things will open up. You can refresh. You will be OK.

We have enough rice to last a few lifetimes, and some beans to blend in. And enough of the others to get through a time. Maybe, some day, three months.

So the Mormon Pantry. Check it out.

Try.

Have fun with it.

You know what really worries me? Communication. That’ll be my next focus. What’s yours?

Sending hugs and survival. Stay alive!

-P