Thinking about needs and getting them met (spinoff)

[amyamanda]

Ginger's thread on buy.food.now reminded me that our just-in-time grocery system is not infallible and that a stockpile of food would be useful in the short-term if something like that came to pass.

However, regardless of what your take is on her advice - and I am not even going there, because I see that many divergent perspectives have been hashed out in that thread already - I was reminded of something that I think can be really helpful to everyone:

• Think about your family's needs.
• Think about how those needs currently get met.
• Think about possible alternative ways of getting those needs met, if your usual methods or sources become impossible.

I am sure this process and the responses these items will be different for different people.

Some people are more comfortable preparing in advance for things they think are possible or likely. Some people are more comfortable trusting the status quo and believing in their own ability to be flexible and resourceful when the time comes. Some people feel better trusting the experts and the social infrastructure and systems that we currently have in place. Some people feel better NOT trusting those systems and people, and feel safer coming up with an alternative plan for self-sufficiency.

Figure out what works for you. I'm quite clear on what makes ME most comfortable, but I can see from that thread (and with interactions with others in my own life) that the ideas I embrace make some other people feel stressed out and crazy. But those same things make me feel safer, more secure, and less stressed. Managing your stress level is part of meeting your family's needs.

I think it's prudent to expect that the future is going to be very unlike the present and that sudden changes might be part of how that unfolds. I think it's a good idea to be really aware of what your family's needs are, how they are being met now, and what you might do to get them met if the usual means were to fail. Of course there is no way of predicting what might happen. Some things may be more likely or less likely, and yet stuff still happens that no one ever expected. But some actions make prudent sense and carry very little risk.

Maybe you're the kind of person who would prefer to just roll with whatever comes your way. So if you know that, just feel good knowing that you know yourself and you're happy with your choice not to prepare. But the thought of taking that approach makes me personally way too nervous; I'm a planner and I feel better thinking things out beforehand. Some questions that I think are generally worth pondering:

• How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?
  
• How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?
  
• What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?
  
• How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?
  
• How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?
  
• How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?
  
• If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?

I think the thought process here is very valuable even if none of those particular scenarios, or even if different scenarios, come to pass. I encourage you to think about these questions, come up with some possible solutions, think up other similar questions, and be aware of what you take for granted in your life. It's okay to take things for granted if you want to, but I think it's far better to examine it and choose to take it for granted than to remain unaware of it and wish later that you had considered these things.

You don't need money to explore these ideas. There are solutions to these questions that don't cost money. You might gain a clearer sense of your priorities and make different choices with your money as a result of this process. Or not. I encourage everyone reading this to think about these things, especially in light of the things we are reading in the news these days about layoffs, foreclosures, states running out of money, etc.

I am interested in hearing your thoughts.

[p1gg1e]

Awesome well thought out post! Thank you!

[velochic]

Well said! Food for thought for everyone.

[Violet2]

Nicely said!

V

[Denvergirlie]

Dead on, if people don't want to plan for the future the same way I plan for the future, there is nothing wrong with that. That's their choice.

However, having a plan and a back up plan is always a great idea.

It's not so far off from a lot of different situations. Were we not all taught where to met at if you get separted from your family? If your house had a fire, was not everyone taught to that the meeting location was at the "big tree" on the corner. If you get separted at the amusement park where everyone met at or who to ask for help?

This is a plan, having a plan and a back up plan is pretty much advisable for everyone and carries over to many different situations. Preparedness comes in all shapes and sizes.

[slsurface]

Good work!

[Drummer's Wife]

Thanks so much!

[amyamanda]

Bumping this up so it doesn't get buried - I really think this stuff is very important to consider. :

[jentilla]

Are we supposed to answer these? I have been asking these questions for some time and working on solutions.

How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?
We have a decent stockpile. I could easily go 1-2 months and then stretch things for 2 more months. Provided this were during the winter and not the growing season. We also have some relationsships taht would provide additional food.

How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?
In my emergency prep I have water tablet purifiers as well as long-term
(5 y) drinking water. I'm also ordering a gravity filter for next month. We would use our rain barrels for bathing.

What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?
5 gallon buckets with a seat and dirt. I'd like to store soem sawdust for that purpose as well, but it would have to be a humanure situation.

How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?
If we were unable to buy much we would likely recycle all packaging taht we had left and compost teh other scraps.

How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?
We have a gas fireplace that we are looking to convert to wood if we do not sell our house and move. Luckily we are in teh South and we use less heat here and would be able to mange that better. We also have a generator to heat things up with a space heater if if was too cold. For colling we installed new windows that have a low e filter and a solar attic fan. We are shaded by trees to teh south and it is not so bad. Um likely just practice cooling measures as much as possible.

How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?

we have two solar ovens and back-up propane and a charcoal grill. If we did have a insert than on the woodstove..

If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?
We have paid 4 months ahead on our mortagage currently and teh goal to have it paid a year in advance by the end of the year. Now we have a low mortagage and good income so this is possible, but not everyone can do this. If we could not hold onton the house after a year, than we would live with my inlaws who live 1 hour away.

[Belleweather]

* How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?

In the short term, we'd rely on our stockpile and/or our community garden. In the longer term, we'd step up gardening and canning and are within walking/bike riding distance of farms, so we'd work on setting up sharing and barter arrangements within our local 'foodshed'. We deliberately chose to live where we do because of food security issues.

* How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?

I can see one of the larger lakes in the area from my front door, so we'd rely on our backpacking water purifiers for immediate drinking water, along with boiling, iodine and bleach in a pinch. Long term, we'd probably set up more rain barrelling and cisterns as well as stocking snow melt and treated lake water for winter use.

* What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?

Bucket + Seat + Compost.

* How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?

We'd probably end up composting much more aggressively and burning more waste as kindling. I also expect we'd end up consuming things with way less packaging if we'd come to that point because of other things that would be unavailable so to some extent it would take care of it's self.

* How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?

We live in the upper midwest, so this is a PROBLEM. We have a fireplace that we could use for some heat, but it's really not an efficient or reasonable way to heat your home when it's -30. We'd likely have to suck it up to a large extent with warm clothes, blankets, window quilts, sleeping in one room, etc. As for cooling (yes, it gets hot and sticky here in the summers), we'd likely do what everyone did pre-air conditioning and suck it up and swim a lot.


* How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?

Propane, in the short term. We have a propane stove and supplies for it. Longer term, we'd be cooking over the fireplace or the firepit in the summer. I've done it before, I can do it, it's just not a heck of a lot of fun long-term.

* If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?

We'd have to move in with my mother, who owns her home free and clear. I've put a not-insignificant amount of thought into how we'd house our whole family (ie. Mom, my sister and her boyfriend, DH and I and the kids) in my mom's 2 bedroom house just in case TSHTF. It's not pretty or comfortable for anyone, but we could do it.

[Usually Curious]

Our central heat went out last week, but we had a fireplace insert installed last month so it hasn't been too bad. FYI, you go through A LOT of wood when using it exclusively so have a plan. Also, do not underestimate the importance of kindling to get a good fire going quickly.

[Juvysen]

Originally Posted by Usually Curious

Our central heat went out last week, but we had a fireplace insert installed last month so it hasn't been too bad. FYI, you go through A LOT of wood when using it exclusively so have a plan. Also, do not underestimate the importance of kindling to get a good fire going quickly.

Dryer lint works beautifully Of course, if you had no electricity, that wouldn't work for too long. Other things that work great as firestarters:

- fritos! yep, they burn like crazy for like 20 minutes.
- pine sap works extremely well, pinecones, too.
- candle wax poured onto sawdust works pretty well, too...

[Usually Curious]

Fabulous! With laundry for eight we have TONS of dryer lint.

[PlayaMama]

* How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?

we live about 2 hours from town so we stock up on supplies about twice a month anyway. long term isn't so good because we have a really short growing season here (high desert of nevada) and it's unlikely that our garden would grow enough for us to survive through the winter.

what i will do about that is get involved with the community garden more and try and increase our growing space. will are planning on a move next winter to a more fertile place.

* How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?

our town is on a gravity fed spring so this isn't really likely. if for some reason the pump stopped working we could walk the mile to the water tower and fill up buckets.

* What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?

use the porta potty at the local business office.

* How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?

there's a lot of open space around here

* How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?

wood stove for heat, nothing else for cooling. we'd be sol in the summer.


* How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?
wood stove. i'd probably be burning a lot of food

* If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?

with my mom or grandparent's.


boy, i actually feel kind of good now!

[amyamanda]

Originally Posted by PlayaMama

boy, i actually feel kind of good now!

That is exactly how I felt when I started going through these scenarios. I felt empowered to realize that I am able to come with solutions to even overwhelming-sounding situations. And it feels good to identify gaps and start taking responsible steps to fill them.

[Sierra]

Originally Posted by amyamanda

How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?

In the short term, we'd probably take everything we *do* have, head an hour and a half east of us to my in-laws (or a half hour east to my BILs, though I doubt he'll have much on hand), and see if we can't survive it together. This would require me to either drive back and forth to work or telecommute, and obviously this isn't sustainable, but it would make do for a short term thing. Alternatively, I might contact folks from church and see if we couldn't do the same thing. Actually, that might even be better, if truly *everyone* is suffering from shortages.

We do not have a stockpile. I mentioned in that other thread that when we've purchased extra stuff, we've eaten it when money is tight and then haven't been able to replace it. I'd like to slowly work on a simple stockpile, though, of oatmeal, beans, and applesauce.

If the shortage was longterm, there are some things I could do any time now, and others that I hope to be able to do:

1. One of the first things I would probably do would be to send out an email (or if needed, snail mail) to a bunch of folks at church and maybe also family and friends in this region and basically say, "How can we get through this together? Here's what I can offer..." I've already sent a similar email regarding the current economic crisis, and it was well-received.

2. I also know of a man who has a few cows and could sell us raw milk. We were actually going to buy raw milk from him way back when, but I dropped the ball and never made arrangements. Hopefully I haven't burned that bridge.

3. I know a couple folks who have chickens, and I would contact them to ask about getting eggs. We have been able to get eggs periodically from them in the past.

4. I have a friend who I discussed splitting a CSA share with this summer. We ruled it out because we couldn't afford the bulk costs (she already had bought the share, but my family couldn't afford to pay our half all at once and would have felt badly), but we could revisit that. I also have a co-worker who grows a lot of his own food, and I am guessing if I asked right, he'd share some of his bounty. As it was last summer, he'd periodically bring stuff in for the staff.

5. I do not have a yard and have no gardening skills/knowledge whatsoever, even after trying very hard to learn. *But,* my MIL is helping us start a garden at her house this summer. It is an hour and a half away from our home, but I am hoping once we get established, with the help of a cousin who lives in the same town, she could manage the daily maintenance (she's elderly and not in good health, but it does seem like she wants to do some watering and light weeding). We go there weekly in the summer, so should be able to keep up with the bigger jobs. So some of our produce will start coming from there, and I intend to learn to can for the winter.

We also have a friend here in the ext town over from us (a 20 minute drive) with whom we are starting a garden (in her yard). Neither of our families know much about gardening, but we're willing to do the work, so we'll see how it goes.

How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?

Hmmm...including the water in the hot water tank (which if it wasn't contaminated or inaccessible, I am pretty confident we could drain)?

At this point, we don't have a way to deal if that happens, other than going to stay with someone else if not all supplies were contaminated. However, I do intend to start storing some water. This would help in the short term. I'd love a rain catching and filteration system, but this type of diy project baffles me. Plus, would that do me any good in the dead of winter now that I am out here in New England?

<Resists urge to want to run back to Washington State>

What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?

Go stay with someone else who had a working toilet, or go to church. If *no* working toilets were available, I'm sure we'd come up with a bucket/seat system. Just not sure where we'd take it because like I said, it's not like we have a yard...maybe we'd take it out to MIL's for compost material??

How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?

We're working to bring our trash/recyling production way down, but at our current level, we'd still have a pretty big problem on our hands. We definitely would have to move in the direction of compost, even if not kept in our own home. And we'd have to continue making changes in lifestyle to reduce non-compostable waste. If there was a market for recyclable items, that would definitely help us. I guess in the end we'd burn what we had to, though we'd try to avoid it (pollution).

How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?

We've been working on this already. We do not have a wood stove (nor a source of wood) or other alternative, but we have been learning to live with the heat on very low (which have included some different lifestyle choices and using some tricks of the "olden days" LOL), and we've already begun a conversation with friends and family about sharing more time at one another's houses so that only one house has to be heated at a time. We do have at least one family with a wood stove.

We have a fireplace, but I understand that this can actually let out more heat than it produces (??). I'd love someday to invest in a system to help minimize the heat loss by distributing as much heat as possible into the house from the fireplace (is that what an insert does), but I still understand fireplaces can be a problem. Then again, we'd still have the problem of a lack of wood.

Depending on the exact situation, we also have two different sources of heat: we have oil-powered steam heat (radiators), and we have a very efficient little space heater that can really help especially if we just move into one room. Assuming we can get either oil, or electric, we will have at least a little heat.

I wish I could say I have something better, but I don't.

How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?

Bunking with someone who did LOL! If none was available, I suspect we'd do very little cooking. We'd have to eat a lot more raw foods. Of course, cooking in the fireplace would be a possibility some of the time, but again, there is the problem of not having access to wood.

If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?

When I was facing the possibility of a job loss a month or so ago, I had a long talk with my parents in-law about moving in with them for at least some length of time if it came down to us eventually losing our house. They agreed to this. Now I try to remind them of it every once-in-a-while because even though I know I have a job for eleven more months, it's anyone's guess after that. Of course, if *everyone* loses their homes at once (all dw's sibs), there might be some competition for that resource and I have a feeling that we might get bumped.

My mom also said that we could always make our own Grapes of Wrath trip back west, but my parents have even *less* space at their house. They have a very small house.

[amyamanda]

• How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?
  
  We have a stockpile that I think would last 6-12 months if used wisely. That would buy us some time to make it to "growing season" and figure out a longer-term plan.
  
  Long-term, we have our garden and the necessary tools/seeds/know-how to grow things; also canning supplies (pressure canner, jars, lids) and a dehydrator and an extra freezer. We have perennial food plants like berry bushes, perennial herbs, fruit trees, etc. We have books on foraging and already do some minor foraging. We keep talking about getting a hunting rifle but haven't done it yet. We have fishing gear. I wish we had chickens. We have connections in the local farming community for meat, maple syrup, eggs, and vegetables.
  
  
• How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?
  
  Wellllllll...this is one area where I think we need improvement. We have about 25 gallons of stored water. I want to make one of those $20 gizmos that lets you pump water out of your well by hand in an emergency (our well pump runs on electricity and there is no hand pump). I would like to get a Big Berkey water filter but haven't been able to afford it yet. We have a swimming pool that would provide a reserve, and our neighbors have a pond, and there is a stream nearby, so if we had such a filter I think we'd be fine.
  
  
• What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?
  
  We have a sawdust toilet made out of a 5-gallon bucket and a special lid (google Luggable Loo - it's something like that). We keep a supply of sawdust for emergencies. We have a separate composting bin, out behind the shed, for humanure. We only use it in emergencies but it is SO convenient. I recommend the Humanure Handbook for anyone who is considering this. Our family of six (all at home all day) fills the bucket about once a day, to give you some idea.
  
  
• How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?
  
  I'm not really sure - we try not to generate much trash, we already compost all food scraps, recycle whatever we are able to... We might burn anything that seemed safe to burn, and do our darndest not to generate any additional trash from that point on, but we would realistically end up burying some of it.
  
  
• How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?
  
  We manage fine without AC in the summer; we like our ceiling fans but can live without them. Would probably make use of shades/curtains to help manage the heat.
  
  In winter, we heat with oil...we have one woodstove that can be used if the furnace is not being used (same flue) and another one that is not hooked up but could be strategically placed so that the entire house was heated with two small woodstoves. It wouldn't be instant but we could make do.
  
  
• How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?
  
  Woodstove (winter only)? Camping stove/grill? Our propane supply would only last so long. Open fire? We'd need a fire pit or we could use our hearth. We have access to wood we can forage and try to keep a half-cord or more for emergencies. I would probably build a solar oven if it seemed we needed a permanent solution.
  
  
• If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?
  
  There are two large homes in our extended family that are not currently occupied; one is a vacation retreat that is almost always available. It's 3 hours from where we live, but it's an old house (suitable for off-grid living, if need be. We could easily live there if we were willing to move.
  
  We also have a large pavilion tent, some smaller tents, and plenty of longish-term camping gear that we could use in spring/summer/fall weather. This would likely not work in winter, but you can get a woodstove for our particular tent and we would consider it.
  
  We also have family who would take us in, and have talked with them about the possibility. We have also thought about how we'd manage if we needed to take family in to live with us; we could make it work.

See if you can come up with other scenarios to explore. Here is another one:

• Where is your money kept/stored/invested? How fast can you liquidate it (i.e., get it all as cash in hand) if needed?

[PassionateWriter]

* How would you feed your family if all the grocery stores (i.e. the just-in-time food supply) suddenly shut down? In the short term? In the long term?

if all the grocery stores shut down, i dont think anyone will be sharing food so i dont know. we have around 6 months of food potentially (not perishables). we currently purchase our raw milk from a farmer...i wonder what the price would be if stores close down?

we are currently talking about stockpiling some more staples and what that should be.

* How would you provide drinkable water for your family if your current water supply became contaminated or inaccessible?

hmmmm....we have a well so if that becomes contaminated, i guess we will be screwed. we always have around 30 gallons of water in the house for our water filter, but honestly that wont last long at all.

someone here said they had 5 years supply of water. how? i dont even know how to quantify how much water that is.

i think our well is too deep for a hand pump.

we have a pool that woudl provide some water i guess. there are lots of ponds around.

* What would you do if your toilet(s) became unflushable/unusable for more than half a day?

build an outhouse. done it enough backpacking.

* How would you manage your trash/garbage if your town's municipal services ended (or your dump closed)?

we dont generate alot of garbage..we compost and recycle alot but recycling also goes w/ our municipal services so we would probably have to get rid of that too...

* How would you heat or cool your home if your current system stopped working for an extended period of time? Could you manage without those systems, or would you need a backup solution?

our current system is oil and wood. if we lost access to oil, we would simply use wood. we have enough property to get wood but only about 5 acres where we are. if we had to cut all this down we could drive 2 hours north and cut down from there but that would be a lot of work.

* How would you cook if you had no gas/electricity?

wood and propane. have a wood stove and have a grill. but if gas and electricity go, propane wouldnt be far off.

we have a generator but again.....needs fuel

* If you lost your home to foreclosure or eviction, where would your family be able to live?
move up north

Where is your money kept/stored/invested? How fast can you liquidate it (i.e., get it all as cash in hand) if needed?

safe. accessible.

we survived a 9 day power outage this winter. got us thinking alot.

[Just My Opinion]

We were without power for 9 days as well during hurricanes of '04. Reading George Orwell's 1984 by candlelight during that time didn't do me any favors

These are great questions to think about OP, indeed.

[Usually Curious]

Just a thought...if you are on city or municipal water IMO 'they' will do everything within their power to keep it on. TPTB do NOT want riots over the lack of basic services. One can live fairly easily without electricity, but not without water. We were without power for two weeks after the last hurricane and we just pulled out our camping stuff. We had water and gas(for hot water) and that made it much easier to deal with anything that came out way.

They may not be able to do it, but they will do everything within their power to keep the water on.