by Daisy Luther, The Organic Prepper:
It has been only 7 months since the lights went out, but it feels like forever. Some people call it the Apocalypse and consider it the worst disaster that the modern world has known. At our house, we call it the Change, because my mother says that just because it is different, doesn’t mean that it’s the end of the world, and that words matter. Whatever you call it, though, the day the lights went out is the day that everything in our world became dramatically different.
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The days go on and on, blending into one another with the sameness of our tasks. I don’t go to school anymore because there is no school. My mother teaches me at night, when we leave the door to the wood stove open to preserve our precious candles, but still have light bright enough to read by.
I never thought I would long for gym class or for the school cafeteria, but I do. I miss hanging out with the other kids, sitting around the table making fun of the food, and being in the classroom, learning about the things that I used to consider incredibly boring. If I had only known then what true boredom was I would have cherished the time to just be a kid. I would have delighted in every bite of food that I didn’t have to harvest myself.
Instead of school, I work to keep us fed and warm. I work in the garden in warm weather. My mother walks with a cane, so it is my responsibility to be her legs. I walk in the woods near our house and look for anything that might be edible or useful. I collect branches and twigs in the cold weather. Staying warm and fed is the focus of our daylight hours, and those two tasks take up nearly every minute that the sun is up.
We have heard from those passing through that the cities are death traps. People there quickly ran out of food and water and had no way to get more. Violence erupted because people were scared and desperate, and there was no one left to quell it. All the police had gone home to take care of their own families. The people who left right away were the lucky ones. Those left behind are constantly at the mercy of thieves and worse. I’m not exactly sure what “worse” is but when the adults talk, that’s what they say: thieves or worse. I’m glad that we don’t live in the city.
Our home is in a very small town. We have a big fenced yard with an apple tree. My old swing set has become the support structure of a makeshift greenhouse, and the rest of the yard is no longer a yard, but more of a field. I used to think my mom was kind of weird, with her backyard chickens and her garden and her herbs, but now I am glad because we have food. The well water that tastes so different from the liquid that used to come from the taps is our true saving grace, my mother says, because water is more precious than gold.
Other people trade with us for eggs and apples and the seeds that my mother saves from her garden. The man next door with the pale, quiet wife and two rambunctious children gives us firewood in return for 8 eggs per week. We eat a lot of venison because my mother traded her skills and some of her precious jars to preserve some venison for an old man who hunts.
We are safer than most because our home is very small, and it is hidden behind trees. You can’t see it from the road. My mother says that the smallness of our house is a blessing because it takes less wood to stay warm. Since I am the one who goes out to pick up kindling every day I agree completely. I can’t imagine needing even more wood.
The past week has been a break in the daily monotony. It was the week before Christmas.
This Christmas is entirely different from any holiday season I have ever known in my 11 years. There will be no brightly lit tree, half hidden behind a pile of brightly wrapped gifts that were purchased in the months leading up to the big day. We won’t be going to parties or buying useless gifts for the teacher just because I don’t want to be the only one not giving a useless gift. I won’t be getting the newest electronic gadget. We aren’t inundated with Christmas carol muzak at the mall, with people pushing to get around us anytime we stop to look in a window.
The stores are all empty, yawning caverns, littered with discarded wrappers. Anything that could possibly be of use was taken months ago.
Still, Christmas is something to be anticipated.
My mother said that all school children need a holiday, so for the past two weeks, instead of lessons in front of the fire at night, we have been making gifts. Whereas we once would have gone to the store and purchased yarn, waffling between two favorite colors amidst all the choices, this year I have unraveled an outgrown sweater with a hole in it in order to make my mother a scarf. For my next door neighbors’ young children, I have drawn small pictures – one of a kitten, and the other of a puppy. I placed these pictures in little frames made from twigs. Now they will have something cheerful with which to decorate their rooms. For the Smith’s daughter, who is 7, I have made a little book with carefully printed letters and drawn pictures. It is the story of the Three Little Pigs, from memory. For the man who hunts – his name is Roger, but I always just think of him as the man who hunts – I have helped my mother make a warm hat. I embroidered an R on it for his name.
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