Can You Make a Hard Hat Decision?

It is early morning at the home of my two youngest grand children. My daughter and her husband had to be in Dallas for an early morning appointment. Typical of this time of year in East Texas, the weather flipped from Summer to chilly Fall during the night. Teeth and hair brushed, school and daycare nearby, we are good, we have plenty of time. The spouse comes in the house from outside, "You better get your jackets on, it's cold out there." The seven year old stands before me in cotton shorts and a T-shirt. The five year old, the family fashionista, has on one of everything from several categories and nothing close to a match.

 To the "cotton shorts", I say "Don't you think you better put on some long pants?"

"Nope, it will get warm later," is the answer.

Oh crap, I felt an unmistakable twinge of disaster. While the mini model has yet another layer, a jacket, added to her attire and the backpack strapped on, I hear the soft wailing from the bedroom. I rush to her aid, "Sweetie, what-is-wrong? are you hurt?"

"My hat! my very favorite hat...I can't find it...it is hat day.  I have been looking forward to wearing that hat all day, all week long!" a river of tears flow down her cheeks.

"Well, most certainly, it is here somewhere," I offer.

"No, no-o-o," with a stabbing glare at her colorful little sister, "SHE lost it, she was doing her stupid fashion show and she lost it!"  Little bit promptly runs to the pegs, takes down her own cap and plops it on her head, just to let her sister know that SHE has a hat.

Well, the dutiful grand parents deliver the near naked child to school, tears dried up with a promise of a hat to be shortly bought and brought to the school. And yes, a jacket, because according to her sad story, she does not own one single jacket in her size. The jolly little sister arrives at her place for the day, and with her sister already gone, jerks the cap off her head, "I don't wanna wear it," she says with a big grin.

This little story brings me to my point.  The good parenting thing, the strong and hard thing to do was to teach the lesson, If you are not responsible for your possessions, then this is what happens. You will have to pay the price and be hatless all day among  your hatted friends. It would be a Hard Hat decision. Fortunately, I am the grandma and have the luxury of not doing the hard thing, not making the difficult choice, at such a moment in time.

As the American Blackout special pointed out, the choices will be very hard.  In one of the many scenarios that could befall America, it won't just be a matter of, can you eat cold beans for eternity? Or will you have any beans?  It will be whether you will share your beans or can you prevent them being taken from you. 

In the depiction, the neighbor comes to the gate, begs for food that he knows the prepper must have, and invokes the heart wrenching, I have children. That is when the Hard Hat decision has to be made. The real truth of the situation, a person with a family lives in the wilds of Colorado and has made no preparations for a disaster. It could be an apartment in the city or a house in your neighborhood, unprepared is unprepared.  That person will be at his neighbor's gate or door instead of out hunting, scrounging or figuring out how he is going to feed his family. The can of beans that a well prepared man might take from the mouth of his own family and share will only be the beginning. Each can will diminish the survival time of his own children. And such an unprepared person as the beggar, will be back, more desperate each time. 

Being prepared is far more than storing up food and water. While the physical preparing for a catastrophe is imperative, the hard part will be the mental preparation.  There will be Hard Hat decisions to make, the kind that most of us Americans have never been faced with. No matter how much you prepare, the majority will not. We, Americans have lost the belief in and the ability to be self sufficient. All things will not be black and white, clear choices.  If the military comes to your door, if they state that you must leave, you must hand over your weapons, your stores. If they state they will take you to shelter and safety and food. If you feel you are good, you have worked hard so that you and your family have a chance to survive, will you go quietly? Will you trust or will you defend your ground?

See? there will not be always easy choices. I can't even begin to claim that I have these answers. I do know that the more I prepare, even on my average and limited level, the more confident I feel. The clearer it becomes to me that survival may depend on Hard Hat decisions. When and if catastrophe occurs, will you be strong, will you or I, be able to salvage some of our humanity? Each of us will have to make those decisions. I do believe that those that are not prepared, will have very few choices to make.   JO

***I am always interested in hearing your opinion and input. Click on the word, COMMENT below, if you would like to leave a note. J.



  

What Are You Thinking?

 Did you watch American Blackout on the Nat Geo channel?  If you missed it, there will be repeats for a while.  It is worth watching and forming your own opinion as to it's plausibility.  I personally think that it is a fairly good portrayal of how things would progress in a widespread catastrophic situation in the United States of America.  

I am an author...that still seems astounding for me to declare. Four books that have been surprisingly received and one in the works, actually makes it seem acceptable to put that label on myself.  I am also a "prepper", a normal everyday prepper.  Not a dig a hole and drop a big bunker in it, fill up a whole room in my house with dehydrated food or amass enough weapons and ammunition to support a small country's army, prepper.  Nope, I am just your everyday garden variety prepper.

As my profile says, I have always been a person who believed in being organized, planning ahead, absolutely not a fly by the seat of your pants type person.  As the predicament of America, her failing finances, her swerving  direction, her sharp and steady decline in values and morals has steadily accelerated; my concern has increasingly grown.  My obsessive compulsive sense of order has previously kept me from stacking up food or amassing necessities....just did not seem imperative, after all, I had more important things to fill up my space and my mind.  Over the last year or so, my feeling have drastically changed.  I have come to believe that we all should be making at least the minimum of preparations that would give ourselves and our families a chance to survive any one of the various disasters that could very well occur.

These apocalyptic events could be man made and they could be from nature. The fact is there are many things that could happen in our world that would be totally out of our control and that are not predictable. 

My books are about just average people, families that are using their smarts, ingenuity and unity to survive a catastrophic event.  That will also be the theme of this blog.  I believe that just normal folks can do things and have a mindset that will greatly increase the chances of survival in a world that had been completely changed.  I will write about things that I have learned, things that I observe, things that I think any one can do to prepare. 
 
I will also give some updates on the progress of my next book, The Days After (Big River). As with all personal blogs, these will be my opinions.  I hope that I will have an exchange of ideas that will be interesting, entertaining and useful. Looking forward to "talking" with you.  JO

***I am always interested in hearing your opinion and input. Click on the word, COMMENT below, if you would like to leave a note. J.