Well, We’re all prepar­ing here for what­ev­er it is we are prepar­ing for.  Hur­ri­cane, eco­nom­ic col­lapse, earth­quake, civ­il unrest, what­ev­er it is.  As a sin­gle per­son, prep­ping has been a pret­ty sim­ple con­cept to under­take.  Know what my needs are and act on them.  Sim­ple.  I want a months worth of food, I buy it.  I want a new camp knife, I buy it, I make a plan, and it seems pret­ty sim­ple, I act on it.  It’s been remark­ably sim­ple for me to prep and learn on my own.  Enter a new phase…

Recent­ly, I have been dat­ing a great woman.  Smart, fun, has her per­vier­pi­al ‘stuff’ togeth­er, and makes me hap­py in every way.  I love her nine year old Weimaran­er.  He’s awe­some.  Hell, he’s sleep­ing next to me on the couch as I write this.

It hit me this week though, that while I am some­what pre­pared for many of the com­mon sit­u­a­tions I know I would expe­ri­ence, I had a con­ver­sa­tion with my girl­friend this week about her Hur­ri­cane Sandy expe­ri­ence.  She lives in a town near the Hud­son riv­er in NJ, and owns a 1^st floor apart­ment.  She described her expe­ri­ence, how she lost her car, the boat that came down the street to help res­cue strand­ed peo­ple, etc.  What I got out of that, and after spend­ing some time at her apart­ment, is that she is com­plete­ly unpre­pared for any type of dis­as­trous sit­u­a­tion what­so­ev­er.  I find myself now think­ing about what I can do for both my girl­friend and her dog to bet­ter pre­pare them for a sit­u­a­tion that may dis­rupt their lives again.  I find it to be a bit more com­pli­cat­ed than I had antic­i­pat­ed as I see some per­son­al pri­or­i­ties shift­ing, mak­ing them more a pri­or­i­ty, and oth­er sit­u­a­tions not as much a pri­or­i­ty…  To slight­ly com­pli­cate things, my girl­friend has an inter­est­ing diet, that lacks a lot of meats and poultry’s.  I know you’ll eat just about any­thing when you are try­ing to sur­vive, but you, (I) of course want to be sure every­one is as com­fort­able that they can be.

So what are some of the things going through my mind?  Self defense, a Get Home Bag for her, preps (food, water, etc.) for both the dog and my girl, and of course finan­cial con­sid­er­a­tions.  Car­ing for anoth­er is an inter­est­ing thing.  It’s been sev­er­al years since I have been in a seri­ous rela­tion­ship, and my pre­pared­ness think­ing is tak­ing a shift.  It’s hon­est­ly a lit­tle over­whelm­ing and unex­pect­ed to begin think­ing about.  Those of you that are mar­ried with chil­dren and pets, I give kudos to.  You’re way ahead of my game in your mind­set of ‘fam­i­ly’ pre­pared­ness.

Next thoughts, full dis­clo­sure to my girl­friend about my pre­pared­ness plans.  Sigh, this is some­thing that I have been pon­der­ing.  I began the dis­cus­sion with one that I thought would make or break the bur­geon­ing rela­tion­ship, when we were talk­ing about hob­bies.   “No, I don’t golf, I used to many years ago, but no longer do.  My golf is tar­get shoot­ing.  There’s noth­ing like send­ing some lead down range and putting some holes in a paper tar­get.”  There was a flur­ry of gun ques­tions, how long, how safe, etc.  Then there was the question/statement, “I want to learn how to shoot $#!t.”  At that moment, I had a smile.  I asked if she’s ever held a gun, fired one, or had been shown how to be safe with one.  “Nope.”  This is my seg­way into pre­pared­ness.  This is my seqway into the get home bag etc.  I think I can also spin the “boat res­cue” into a pre­pared­ness moment as well…   Full dis­clo­sure in time, I think…

Either way, this is a new path I am on in my pre­pared­ness jour­ney.  Those of you that have sig­nif­i­cant oth­ers and fam­i­lies you are prepar­ing with/for, please sound off as to your thoughts and your con­cerns while prep­ping, please…