Jun
5
Survival Instinct
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Big weather the other night. Stay up late watching the news, worry about the sump pump, take your kids to the basement kind of weather. We survived. It’s hard to tell how much of these storms are actual threat and how much is just over-caffeinated weatherman frenzy. However, two things came to mind:
1. How ill-prepared we are as a family for any kind of disaster.
2. How little I really care about all this “stuff” so long as my family was safe.
Point the first: Much of our unpreparedness is part of our semi-premanent state of transition. My precious files are in a cardboard box, for crying out loud. How could I possibly be expected to find the Neosporin in all this mess? But this is just and excuse. Three months after we move, the power will go out and I’ll have trouble finding a flashlight.
We all know it’s true.
Soldiers have something called a Bug Out Bag–a kit of essential gear in case they have to bail out of the jeep or airship or whatever they happen to be riding around in. I like the idea of this. In a previous moment of survival preoccupation, I did some research into these types of kits, enthusiastically making bookmarks for later reference. Bookmarks I would never view again.
We all know it’s true.
So perhaps now that I’m a father and we have a new house, it’s time to embrace the old Boy Scout motto: Be Prepared. Perhaps it’s time to stow a few gallons of water in the basement, throw some band aids and granola bars in a backpack. Maybe I could read Alas, Babylon for the third time and kick into full-on survival frenzy.
Regardless, it sounds like a good opportunity to make some lists and notes to file in a folder carefully labeled “Emergency Preparedness”.
Point the second: Although I try to fool myself, I’ve always been a pretty materialistic bastard. Thankfully, the only drawback to this has been an inability to appreciate jam bands. I get preoccupied with my stuff. I’ve been this way since I was a kid, painstakingly lining up my GI Joes. Later, at hippie music festivals, I had the most orderly tent in the wasteland. It’s just part of me.
The other night, as my wife and I gathered a few things before hiding out in the basement, I paused to think of any items I absolutely did not want to lose in the impending maelstrom. I could thing of nothing, not a single item that could not be easily replaced, or simply lost forever. There was no sentimental attachment to any of this stuff. I just needed these souls safe around me. So we descended into the basement, certain we would be digging our way out of the rubble under the gray dawn skies.
It was a very Jedi moment. If I had listened, I think I could have heard a jam band guitar solo playing in the background.
The point of all this is that we all live in this world that fools us into thinking we’ll always be safe and never be without things like running water and electricity, safety. This is the first world, I guess. And a big part of the first world is that we a freed up to worry about materialistic goals. But much of the world doesn’t live like this. And we are all ill-suited to the rest of the world, ill-suited for the kind of random bad luck we see on the television news every day.
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