What does a good spot mean? This good spot is a place where you do not have to think about preparedness to much. When something unexpected comes up, your prior planning has lead to your appropriate response to the situation. This is a good feeling! I have a joke with myself. The future me either likes or dislikes the past me depending on what the past me has done to prepare the future me! Over the last nine months or so we have had power outages, cuts/bruises/bumps, fires, floods and other issues come up. We have done pretty good through all of these issues.
Remember, an emergency situation to you might be different then what an emergency situation is to me. This is why everyone needs to focus on what their personal situation requires. There are no one size fits all.
Scrapped knees, bonked heads and other child injuries came up. Our medical preparedness allowed us to make it through these 'emergencies'. You would be amazed how much a Spider Man bandaid can change a situation. One second you have a small child whaling at the top of their lungs swearing the end of the world has begun. Some Neosporin treated the physical wound. The decorations on the bandaid treated the mental wound. End of emergency!
More then once an ice pack from the freezer cured the bruised egos of little ones who were on the losing end of a tussle. Sometimes they even kept the swelling down from whatever they had failed at doing or the knot they received from the other one. The ice packs in the freezer even helped to keep the fridge cold during our several power outages. Between the incidents the ice packs were tested to see how long they could keep the ice chest cold after the power came back on. Two and a half days before I thought stuff started to get to warm. (No I was not opening and closing the ice chest. Just kept it closed to see how long water stayed cold.)
Being able to use a single item for multiple uses is a wonderful ability! Just hope someone does not get a bump and you need the ice pack for keeping the chest cold!!!
Our communications abilities were tested during the power outages. The ability to still communicate with the little ones, who's iPads had no internet, was a big one! Hehehehehe! Between text messages, cellular, radios and talking to our neighbors we thought we had a grasp of what was going on around us. Some of our friends found the lag time between news or official information was to much. This lag between what was happening right now to them and what was being put out caused stress to be added to their already stressful, if not life threatening, situations!
Found more resources for staying up to date. Phones have all kinds of applications for staying informed. The ham radio and police scanners helped a lot. Yet at the end of the day we found looking around the house, talking to our neighbors, City Workers and keeping our own situational awareness were the best tools.
Nothing was better then during our first power outage. The children came home to find the house had lights. Each of them had their own flashlight. And best of all....... Pizza had been ordered for dinner!! Took the time to teach the older one how to put batteries in the camp lanterns. Did not seem like a big deal till the next power outage. Someone had to show mom where the batteries went and the best places to put the lamps.......... Future me laughed at that one!
We personally escaped the worst of the fires this year. Friends of ours were not so lucky. I will not put any names in this story. If you figure out it is you...... do not tell anyone! I called it!!!
Two families, we will call one family #1 and the other #2. Let's focus on just the first few minutes of the emergency. Both were faced with the same issues. It was time to go, fire was coming and there was no time left to figure out what to do.
Family #1, no idea what to pack. No real idea where to go. No prior planning at all from what I could figure out.
Family #2, set their planning into motion. Had a rough idea of where to go. Had time to gather more information, pack more items.
Family #1, all over text messages and FB venting their frustration.
Family #2, using the internet to check in with folks and keeping people informed of their situation.
Family #1, basically appeared to melt down.
Family #2, held it together.
This was just the first couple of minutes of the emergency. Why am I pointing this out? Those first couple of minutes could make all the difference. Prior planning prevents poor performance. Am I 'Monday Morning Quarter Backing' either family? Nope just giving my impression of what each family was doing.
They both faced many of the exact same issues. Family #2 was obviously dealing with the situation much better. Why? Seems they had hit a good spot in their personal planning. The situation might have exceeded what they were truly facing but their prior planning obviously helped them through the situation.
Having dealt with a few situations of our own. With the knowledge we gained from what our friends personally went through. The goal now becomes to close up some of the gaps in our abilities. We want to cover more of the basics. Add some more abilities. Plan out a few more scenarios.
Going to be doing all of this with the intention of moving our "Good Spot" a little further down the line.
As Always,
Stay Safe!
Corsair Trainers
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