I was recently sent a copy of Wendy Brown’s book “Surviving the Apocalypse in the Suburbs, the Thrivalist’s Guide to a Life Without Oil.” by New Society Publishers. Both Wendy and her husband also maintain two separate blogs
that are a joy to read. Wendy at: http://happilyhome.blogspot.com
and Deus Ex Machina (Eric) at: http://mooseboots.blogspot.com.
I have to admit, I have watched the “Mad Max” series of
movies one to many times and Stephen King’s book “The Stand” is one of my all
time favorite reads. It is
certainly these vile renderings, of our world when the SHTF and spirals into
the hands of the “Zombie Hoards”, unto which most of us base our “survivalist”
preparations. No doubt, Hollywood knows shock and awe sells and we as consumers
readily digest this mumbo jumbo like it’s our last day on earth. This media
storm of death and destruction had me under the impression that perhaps your best TEOTWAWKI preparations had something to do with lots of firepower and plenty of ammo.
Wendy’s book dismisses most of this doom and gloom, instead
painting a picture of a much more civilized future after TEOTWAWKI. While she
does dedicated one chapter to “Security”, the rest of the book centers on what
I define as practical no nonsense living. In the resource poor future, people
will need to understand and cope with the realities of a life without many of
the creature comforts we currently take for granted. Wendy predicts that
gasoline, oil, electricity, supermarkets and even public education will
disappear and we will as a society need to learn to live (thrive) without them.
To prepare for this “challenge”, the chapters take the
reader through the steps necessary to prepare themselves, their family, homes
and available land to be as productive and energy efficient as possible. In
many of these situations, I see Wendy providing the reader with a blueprint of
how we should all be living NOW and not necessarily after some apocalyptic
world-ending event. Reducing, reusing, recycling, growing more of our own food
or buying produce local and in season, raising our own livestock, producing our
own localized fuel sources for heat (wood) and other practical and smart ways to
live both before and after any impending “collapse”.
Also critical, is the idea we must forge a skill set of self-reliance,
while also understanding there exists strength in numbers. In the future, it
will be beneficial to have an individual practical skill set, as well as a
network, community or neighborhood of support. I particularly liked Wendy’s afterward, that walks the
reader through a typical day in a community after TEOTWAWKI.
To close, I wanted to include this excerpt from the book as
it sums up most of what the book seems to center on, “If we are to have any
hope of giving our children a future, we need to start now with changing the
attitudes from one of making money to one of making a living. We need to change
our mindset from the belief that independence is related solely to one’s income
to the understanding that true independence comes from being able to provide
for most of one’s needs.” (p. 212)
