Out of Chaos an organizing newsletter
Emergency Preparedness
I’m the first to admit that I am rather blithe about emergency preparedness. Since 9/11, many New Yorkers have tried to keep some kind of emergency kit on hand. I also have many clients who have a grab-and-go file for their most important papers, like birth certificates, passports and social-security cards.
One the one hand, living in NYC makes me feel pretty safe. While I know that calamities can happen, I believe it’s pretty unlikely that my home is going to be destroyed or I am going to die of dehydration with the fire department so near and bodegas full of Poland Spring around me.
On the other hand, it is worth considering: If you were stuck in your home for a few days, or you had to evacuate quickly, would you be prepared?
The problem with an emergency kit is that you have to keep rotating the stock-water bottles evaporate, medicines expire, and batteries corrode. I am confident that I can find my flashlight in the dark, we always have batteries on hand, my Brita dispenser holds quite a bit of water and my first-aid supplies are usually current. An emergency kit is also a space-suck. You need it to be “at-hand” but hopefully you will never actually use it. Of course, to take my approach you have to be pretty organized and know that you have all those emergency supplies in their nonemergency locations, that they are current, and that you can find them. Still, it seems much more organic and efficient to me.
For important documents, I do have an expanding plastic envelope that would be easy to grab, and given 15 minutes I could probably be old school and throw a few bank statements in too. Probably, this being 2015, I would just grab my laptop and access my bank account that way. You could make the argument that if there is no electricity my computer won’t do me much good, but if there is no electricity the bank won’t be open and the paper statement isn’t going to do any good either.
Basically, my advice is the same as ever: Never panic. Panic causes us to run out and buy food we would never ordinarily eat, in quantities we don’t really need. Don’t create another chore for yourself by creating an emergency bag: just make sure you have the basics, and that they are current, but keep them in rotation.
If you ask me, the most important “emergency supply” is usually my sled and my cocoa powder.