Dan, a dear colleague of mine, is one of a kind. He’s the kind of person who has always has a fascinating story ready to share. And, over the years, we’ve joked about Dan’s propensity to weigh in on a random topic and start with “So… I’ve thought a lot about this.”
One reason for this kind of deep thinking is that Dan believes in the importance of preparing for outlier events that may be low probability in any given year but are not low probability over the course of a lifetime. I – and many others – have learnt from Dan’s thoughtfulness about this topic and we asked him to create a “disaster kit” that we could buy.
He did one better and started writing on www.SoIveThoughtaLotAboutThis.com. He shared a great intro in one of his first posts.
So what? Who cares about being prepared? This is entirely subjective, of course, but I personally believe that a great many people would simply prefer to not think about bad things that honestly probably won’t happen. Spending your days worried about pandemic or zombies, or asteroids, or even catalytic converter theft is not a good way to live. It is isn’t healthy, and it isn’t even productive, in my opinion.
For me, the “pay off” is the little things. I absolutely love being a stronger part of my community. I love being the sort of family that people in my neighborhood call if something goes wrong, or they need to borrow a tool. If the neighbor kid needs her basketball pumped up, I am proud to be the person to answer the door and help. I have great pride in the number of times I have pulled over to help a stranded motorist. Or jump start that old car in the back of the WalMart parking lot. Or had some blister tape in my pack on that little day hike.
Sure, the big wins feel even better. Having invested the money and time to actually get Solar and Powerwalls installed before PGE’s latest calamity. Having spare blankets in the car because we were stuck on Donner Summit in a blizzard trying to go skiing. Having thought ahead to repair the well at our house BEFORE it broke. Having spent the money and time to trim those trees so they don’t fall on our car.
But the pay off is in the little things. And usually, the people that benefit are hopefully your family. I feel like as a dad and husband (my favorite jobs) it is my duty to do my best to keep my family safe, and comfortable. And being prepared (and teaching preparedness) is an excellent way to do that.
I hope as you read some of the topics and my thoughts on this page, you come away with an idea of what being prepared might mean for you. Maybe it means more sleep my dealing with a midnight bloody nose better. Maybe it means being able to help your elderly neighbor out during a power outage. Maybe it means moving to Montana and living in a converted missile silo (invite me!). That is something only you can decide.
He’s already got 6 posts up – it was an immediate add to my Feedly/RSS and I’m looking forward to digging in and getting a bit more prepared.
Dan hasn’t yet got email subscriptions set up. So, if you like what you read and would like to subscribe over email, feel free to reach him on [email protected]. I’m sure he’ll be happy to set it up (and I will nudge him too!).
Update: Email subscriptions are now up
