Just Get Used To It!

SUBHEAD: For services we take for granted we'll have to go on a rehab program of withdrawal and re-programming.

By Juan Wilson on 12 October 2015 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2015/10/just-get-used-to-it.html)


Image above: Abandoned car in yard surrounded by domestic chickens. From (http://backtothelandmama.blogspot.com/2013/01/homestead-plans.html).

If you haven't noticed "The End Of The World As We Know It" already happened.

Some may place the onset at September 11th 2001, when the World Trade Center buildings were dropped and America became a  nation of paranoid victims willing to trade freedom for safety.

Others might date the fall on September 15th 2008, when Lehman Brothers filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and the American economy collapsed into the endless Greater Depression.

Some predicted that the end time was to occur on December 21st 2012. That date was regarded as the end-date of a 5,126-year-long cycle in the Meso-American Long Count Mayan calendar.

It doesn't really matter exactly when it it occurred. What matters is that it was in the past. And now we have to deal with the aftermath - Welcome to the Post Apocolypse.

Let's get oriented.

If your over forty realize this isn't just a temporary glitch in the "arc of your career". From here on out things are not going to be like they hinted at on Sesame Street or promised on your college graduation day. Promises won't be kept.

Chances are better than fifty-fifty that you will not see the full payout of Social Security, pension or IRA account. You will have to get back into doing something useful locally near where you live... like making barrels or farming.

If you are under forty realize that that smart phone, iPad or MS Surface that holds your life together won't have much more utility than a drink coaster or sushi platter in a short while. The whole techno bubble is one as fragile as one made of soap. And all bubbles burst.

Chances are better than fifty-fifty that you will not have the career you trained for and that you will never be able to pay back the cost of your education. Three part time jobs as a webpage designer barista, and Uber driver won't pay the bills. You will have to get back into doing something useful locally near where you live... like making barrels or farming.

For almost all of us either childhood, or education, or career, or retirement is not going to be what you were counting on. At least not like the secure upward lifestyle portrayed through consuming  such as Amazon and Applebee's.

I think that for many of the services we take for granted we will have to go on a something like a twelve-step rehabilitation program of withdrawal and re-programming.

What services do I mean?
  • Affordable imported fruit, vegetables and meats either fresh or frozen.
  • Clean drinkable water from the tap in unlimited quantity all the time.
  • Steady electrical power throughout your house all the time.
  • Telephone service available everywhere all the time.
  • Internet service available at high-speed in your home all the time.
  • Daily safe air travel linked to anywhere on Earth.
  • Parts and technicians able to fix and repair all your broken stuff.
  • Sophisticated medical diagnostics and procedures to save your ass.
The list goes on. What I am suggesting is that for each of these possible system failures that you will have to find work-arounds.

It may begin with you building and planting a raised bed garden in your yard to take keep you in some vegetables, or a small chicken coop to provide some eggs and an occasional chicken for the pot.

You may fins a way to safely collect store and use rainwater from your roof for that day a major water main breaks and there is no quick fix from the water company. You may want to get a potable water filtering system ahead of time.

You may wean yourself from 24x7x365 electrical and telecommunications utilities. Start with ignoring your FaceBook and Twitter accounts for as long as you can. Work your way up to reading a book in the evening by the light of a LED light powered by a cheap marine battery charged by a small PV panel.

Forget about seeing the world by jet plane. Remember Dorothy's words after being in colorful Oz and returning to her Kansas farm... "There's no place like home!"

Get used to fixing your own stuff or letting it go. Have good hand tools. Keep lumber cutoffs. Keep all hardware; like screws, bolts, bracket, nails; that you come across. You will eventually need it.

Keep mission critical replaceable parts. I keep extra leather cups and flaps for my manual water pump on my well. I keep backup blades for my tools and chainsaws. I keep extra bike tires and tubes. I keep backup little rubber "O"  rings that apply the turning force for my CD players. These things may not be so available from Amazon by drone in the future.

As for medical services. Work safe. Eat right. Exercise. Learn to use comfrey, lavender and other home remedies. If you're ambitious learn to sew a cut and set a fracture. Make friends with a general practitioner who lives nearby and is willing trade service for a dozen eggs or basket of greens.

If you haven't noticed "The End Of The World As We Know It" already happened.

Just get used to it!























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