In case something bad happens.

S and I have very different ways of dealing with disasters, real or imaginary possible.  In his obsessive endearing way, he researches endlessly trying to foresee every possible scenario. S hopes for the best, prepares for the worst, but manages to stay cool and calm when the worst (usually a medical disaster) happens. Meanwhile, I ignore the possibility of anything going wrong and then freak when the shit goes flying. This is usually about the same time that I begin to appreciate that at least one of us is calm, collected, and full of useful information.

Lately, S has been focusing his research on the most effective methods of surviving a natural disaster. This is our “California is falling apart” kit:

For reasons that I don’t comprehend, it gives S and the angel a strange pleasure to go through and take stock of the contents. They like to unpack it every so often to relish the treasures within and imagine the different uses for each item. My daughter has been playing with the ropes, pretending to climb mountains, rapel, and spelunk. She has also asked us to call her the Fierce Feminine Survivalist.

Another reason I don’t prepare for possible disaster is because as long as my father is near, I know I’ll be safe. MacGyver was based on my dad. My dad worked his way to Africa as an oil rigger and he wears shorts in the snow. Why talk about feelings when you could be chopping trees is the question he asks himself daily. The best compliment I ever gave him was when I told him he’d make a good homeless person. He could survive apocalypse with a pencil nub, a blade, and a banana. So we’re good; no worries.

But I did get into the act just a little bit and made a contribution to our emergency preparedness by buying this:

It’s light (easy to carry in our pack) and it has numerous servings so it’ll keep us nourished for a few days. All we need is purified water, which we’ll have because of our hand cranked water purifier and iodine tablets. I also bought this:

My elementary school nurse taught me that throat lozenges make everything all better. Now I feel prepared; now I’m one step closer to ready for anything. Right?

Are you the prepared sort of person, or are you in the we’re so screwed and now it’s time to freak out boat? What would you make sure to have with you in an emergency, other than my father?

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Today’s Poem: (click link to read entire poem)

The End and The Beginning by Wislawa Szymborska

After every war

someone has to clean up…

Artists and cannibals.

The summer before my last year of college (which I fondly refer to as the summer of my discontent), my mother gave me this book. I fell in love with Georgia O’Keefe, her artwork, and the idea of moving to New Mexico to live on a ranch with crisp white adobe walls. I thoroughly enjoyed the daydream but wasn’t able to figure out what I’d do when a scorpion wagged his yellow fingers at me or a rattlesnake rolled by for a visit. I realized that my inability to reconcile the creatures of the desert with my desire to live there meant that the desert belonged to them more than it belonged to me, so it was better to read about it in a book and admire O’Keefe for her bravery, passion, and hardy constitution from a safe distance.

Less than ten years after reading O’Keefe’s biography, destiny and desire took me from the wet, lush greenery of Maryland to the semi-arid habitat of Southern California. The burning cinder I felt in my heart for the desert kindled like wildfire when I arrived. I’ve lived here for over 5 years and I never tire of looking at my surroundings, especially the wild trophies of survival more commonly known as succulents and cacti. In the desert cacti and succulents are more common than the red ant. I feel at home in the desert. I love the slow pace made necessary by the blanket of daily heat, the way silence hangs in the air like dust, and the way water suddenly seems like life’s most delicious offering.

During our last trip to the desert we found an outdoor monument of relics commemorating the Donner party. I was unfamiliar with this story, so S gave me a brief summary about this group of explorers that headed west and were trapped in a canyon without means of escape for months. The members of the party who didn’t succumb to death by injury or illness sustained themselves by eating the bodies of their dead companions.

Serendipitously, just weeks after learning about this historic tragedy a poem by Kay Ryan that tells of the Donner party fell into my hands. Kay Ryan is the winner of this year’s poetry Pulitzer Prize for her collection titled The Best of It: New and Selected Titles. Like Georgia O’Keefe, I find the woman as compelling as her work. A few interesting nuggets:

-a portion of her childhood was spent living in the Mojave Desert

-she was the 16th poet laureate following Charles Simic, and her first collection of poetry was self-published

-she has held the same job for the past 30 years, teaching remedial English at a community college

-her poetry tends to be short because she doesn’t want to “waste anyone’s time”.

Ryan’s poetry reminds me of the desert and seems to abide by the same laws. Be sparse and waste nothing. Allow the rich succulence of your being to lay quietly within.

Some people believe that there are only a few universal themes in literature which have been told and retold since the beginning of time. One theme is survival. I’m beginning to think that survival is the undercurrent running through every story. The story of an entire life lived with CF, not a second without it, the person coping with a recent diagnosis, the loneliest person in the room, the immigrant, the soldier, the person waiting for a transplant, the widow, the person living paycheck to paycheck, the cannibals, and the artist who retreats alone to a white adobe ranch in the desert . Each one of them, each one of us, practicing the art of survival. Each one of us asking how do I survive this.

When we moved into our current home I allowed the rosebushes in the front to die. It wasn’t difficult: these frail, delicate beauties shrivel and fall away one degree above eighty. Instead, we planted hardy succulents and cacti. Some are rough and spiny, and some are as plush as a baby’s thumb. I remain amazed each time one begins to bloom, a lash of color tearing through the green fabric. They withstand heat, drought, and occasional neglect. They are tough and stunning. Exuberant altars to adamant survival.

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Today’s poem is the piece by Ryan that I mentioned above, along with an interview that tells a bit more about her life and provides an analysis of the piece.

Today’s Poem: (click link to read entire poem)

The Pass by Kay Ryan

Even in climes

without snow

one cannot go

forward sometimes…