Here’s my hot take:
Everyone should be a prepper, no matter what side of politics you land on. But late at night, do you worry? I don’t mock people for fearing potential civil unrest this fall. With the media pushing divide so much, there truly is a risk of it.
Add in the unstable weather the world is having—hurricanes, severe flooding, heat, cold, and so much more. What will fall bring? What about the 2-week heat wave that is ramping up right now on the left coast? Inland, 100 degrees is coming this week.
We barely felt 2020 and the upheavals/shortages in Washington State because we didn’t rely on the system 24/7. We followed nonbiased news beforehand and saw what was coming, and we doubled down at the end of 2019 to prepare. When things started happening, we stayed home, away from the crazy happenings that occurred all of 2020 in larger towns and cities. But I do slightly worry about this fall. So much is happening in our world right now.
Does the coming election this fall scare or concern you? How about the climate?
Can you feed yourself, have water, medicine, self-defense, and the ability to heat and cook? What happens when protesters block the roads, you can’t get home, you run out of gas, and your car gets rocked by an angry mob? (this happened in recent years in cities) Or do the stores get stripped once again? Or the power goes out yet again in the first fall storm? The supply chain breaks down again for the 159th time. It has been 4+ years; we still have shortages where we live due to how the supply chain works (and constantly fails). Our gov’t run ferry system keeps failing. Over and over.
It’s OK in society to deride preppers as being weird nuts (and that’s cool; I wear a tin foil hat pretty tightly and have most of my life, so if that’s a person’s go-to insult, it doesn’t even hit me), and that somehow being prepared for what life hands us isn’t a good thing. It’s weird when I meet liberal-leaning folk who take pride in relying on the government for help. We should not be beholden to anyone if we can help it. That is pretty simple – we have only ourselves to rely on.
I spent the pandemic years teaching people how to grow and preserve food. How to store rainwater. How to run irrigation. How to start fires. How to even cook. Sewing. Kirk taught alongside me. We tried our best to free people from the system in place (where people have less than three days of food on hand, no water, no extra gas, and no safety net money for emergencies). A few listened; they are good friends now. We grow on our places, and knowing I had $4 a pound of broccoli to pick this week, that felt good. Fresh food. They were eaten within hours of picking.
Most lost interest once life returned to “normal,” which is normal on all political sides. Their pandemic gardens were forgotten, and grocery stores were the first stop again.
Why Should You Care?
Prepping is for everyone. It’s not just about natural disasters or civil unrest. It’s about job losses, sickness, and buffering setbacks in life. You could become unemployed at any point, and not worrying about feeding yourself (and your family) is a huge thing. Do you have an emergency fund to pay for car repair? Or your mortgage/rent?Not having to hope you can get help from others? Not having to go out publicly to shop when sickness or unrest exists?
Priceless.
To the conservatives:
Silver and gold won’t feed you. Invest in American-made steel, such as hoes and tractors, to help you do hard labor more efficiently. Learn some life skills, no matter your age. There are other metals to invest in, you can figure that out,
To the liberals:
If the government does show up to help, you get what they give you. And you might not like it. But tough luck. Enjoy eating cornbread mix as emergency rations and stale cranberries to go on the side. The food they sent out to children during the pandemic years was so sad. I signed up to see how bad it could be. The US government buys up crops that grew too well to keep prices stable and then gives them out as charity food. So, in 2020, there were so many dried cranberries. It took me years to use them up. Everything sent to us was the bottom-of-the-barrel food.
Instead, make your own choices. It’s hard work but rewarding.
To everyone:
You have three months to get better organized in life. If nothing terrible happens in September, you are prepped for winter storms and sickness that come with people heading inside.
Every argument you might have not to prepare is invalid. The pandemic Years showed that.
So … do you think you’re willing to put in the work? Three months. It is all the time you have.
What does that mean?
Work on your garden. It’s time to plant crops for the fall.
Restock your pantry. Review what you have on hand for emergencies—this past week taught me a painful lesson. I fell hard, dislocated my elbow, and ended up in the ER. While I had a SAM splint in my first aid kit, we had no sling—something we should have had on hand. In a disaster, having supplies matters. Lesson learned.
You cannot do everything. But you can keep planning and learning. Sitting in fear won’t do anything.
~Sarah