Be Prepared!

Last updated: Tue, 21 Apr 2009 00:48:00 GMT

So goes the Cub Scout motto. How ironic, then, that we don't seem to think of the children. Won't some body please think of the children?

We are prepared, here in New Zealand. Or, at least, we've no excuse not to be. The government, the media, your mother, they keep telling us to get ourselves sorted. We're waiting for earthquakes and volcanoes and tsunami. As a small, isolated country, we don't have the resources to respond to a massive disaster, and we're a long way from help. I've always had the feeling that Kiwis are a practical kind of people, though.

Anyone who knows me well will already have decided that this is some sort of wet dream for me. They know that I have a first edition copy of John "Lofty" Wiseman's SAS Survival Handbook, they'll know how much I enjoy watching Ray "Chubby" Mears. They'll have seen me tell the time by the position of the sun, or determine direction by use of moss and starlight. They, no doubt, had already guessed that I spent New Year's Eve 1999 stone cold sober.

After the first time one of my best friends met my Father, his comment was, "Yes, I understand now. I can just see him dropping you in the middle of nowhere and telling you he'll see you in three days, if you're still alive."

Well, not quite. But I am, by reasons of nature and nurture, the kind of person who likes very much to be prepared.

So, we have an "earthquake cupboard", which contains a lot of pasta, cheap canned goods, sweets, water, first aid supplies, emergency lighting. I continue to ride my motorcycle to work even when the weather makes it far from fun, because, as well as being cheap, of all the modes of transport available to me it's the one with the best chance of getting me home. We have a rendezvous plan.

We don't want to live in a bunker. Keeping lots of food, water, supplies, is both expensive and impractical. And we have to be honest that we're really just preparing to keep our heads above water for a few days. After that, well, all bets are off. I'm reminded of Sam Elliott in We Were Soldiers:

Lt. Colonel Hal Moore: I think you oughta get yourself an M-16.
Sergeant Major Basil Plumley: Sir, if the time comes I need one, there'll be plenty lying on the ground.

Either it works out or it doesn't. Over-preparation for an event that's never going to occur is just a waste, and just a tad paranoid. The god in my head tells me I should avoid being paranoid.

Sometimes, as if by magic, you and your partner will have the same idea at the same time. It's not really magic, it's just that you probably think along the same lines, and you're often exposed to the same stimuli.

With us, this time, I think it was that we'd been talking about the need to cycle the goods in the cupboard, and at lunch our son had been showing off the earthquake drill he'd learned at school. We'd played along by asking him "Where could you hide in this room?" and "You'd want to stay away from those windows, wouldn't you?" Our eldest two are old enough to take that kind of thing in, and enjoy the game. Later, the wife and I watched Red Dragon, in which Edward Norton, knowing that his family are in danger, teaches his wife to use his handgun. No comment, no spoiler.

We were drifting off that night and one of us said "What if we died in the quake and the kids survived?"

This Sunday, we had a fun day asking the kids what we could buy, and then shopping for, new food for the emergency stock. We split the whole lot out on the living room floor and went through it with the kids. We removed the matches, the candles, the camping stove, the first aid kit. They'll go elsewhere. We picked some old stuff and we got the kids to open it. Note: young children are not strong enough to use a traditional tin-opener. We've resolved to replace everything with pop-top tins as we cycle through, because that's how they got their lunch on Sunday -- we did cook it for them, I should add. We let them crack open a glow-stick each, which they loved. We asked them what they thought baby might want to eat. They spent the day drinking from one of the water kegs we decided to sacrifice, and they enjoyed spilling it everywhere.

Fun was had.

And then we split everything up into two equal stashes and put them in two earthquake cupboards, at either end of the house. What if mummy and daddy were stuck at the other end of the house? You'd need to be able to get your own dinner!

Well, "stuck" is an easier concept for them to grasp than "dead".

And that's it. No drill necessary, because they're kids. They pick this stuff up, and if they ever need it, they'll remember it. If they don't, they'll have a couple of days to work it out and after that...

After that, it really doesn't bear thinking about. You leave yourself open to these kinds of things when you commit the ultimate selfish act of procreating. We prepare them as best we can in order that one day they might one day forgive us for forcing them to survive.

That doesn't make much sense, does it? Too much Frankenstein for me.

I can see it now, though, in 18 years' time: I'm plugging away at something in the workshop, my boy -- now a man -- comes in with one of his buddies and says hello. And as they're walking away I overhear his buddy saying, "Yeah, now it makes sense; I can just see him dropping you in the middle of nowhere and telling you he'll pick you up in three days, if you're still alive."