Day 19 of the Apocalypse, Ground Zero, Gerton, NC pop. 231

Here are some things that have helped significantly as we’ve been navigating this brave, new world.

Right before our power went out, I filled 17 quart-sized Ziploc bags with water and froze them. I divided those bags of ice between our two freezers, and between them and running our generator for 5 hours a day, we were able to keep all our frozen food frozen. Nothing spoiled, which is miraculous after 17 days of no power.

We have dinner every night with Erik and Kate, our next-door neighbors. I set the table with cloth napkins and a candle, to welcome us together. It is the main event of our day, where we catch up on activities and news.

We take turns washing dishes, and now that we have power, we usually watch a movie together after dinner. This helps us to create a sense of normalcy.

We cook all of our dinners on our outdoor propane grill, originally designed to conserve generator power inside the house. We also discovered we could readily get 20-pound containers of propane at the Walmart of donated supplies inside of our fire station, to refuel our grill.

Dinner is always some kind of meat (or veggie burger for Kate) and vegetables - like cabbage or zucchini - which stored well in our sort-of-cold refrigerator. We add potatoes, corn, or microwaved packets of rice or lentils for starch.

In the first week, I started making all kinds of lists in a notepad I kept on my desk:

• Calculations of how much propane we have left
• What to pack if we need to evacuate
• What we’ve borrowed from neighbors' houses
• A task list for activities to do when the generator was on for 2 hours in the morning, and 3 hours in the evening (charge phones, filter water for drinking, flush the toilets, take showers, wash laundry)
• A list of what we are doing each day because our brains can’t remember anything
• Supplies that we need to gather - a small gas generator. Gas. Extension cords. Electrolytes. Hand sanitizer. Food. Protein drinks.
• “Future Disaster Planning”: what we want to have in place should something like this happen again (like walkie-talkies to communicate with each other, and a radio so we can get news from the outside world)

It soothes me to be able to add things to the lists and check things off of the list. It gives me some semblance of control.

• Our hiking packs, with water bladder inserts, to keep us hydrated during the day, and to allow us to carry things back up the mountain. Add to that our hiking boots to navigate our now rugged terrain.
• A chainsaw, to cut up fallen trees. Chainsaw oil and replacement chain. Saw gas.Two rechargeable small lamps we bought on a whim a few months ago. They give off warm, inviting light at night once we turn the generator off, and are easy to carry as we move around the house.
• The UTV we bought last week because hiking down and up the mountain every day (3 miles each way) isn’t sustainable on top of everything else we are doing. Also, because we need to be able to get supplies to our house, and can’t always rely on someone else with a UTV being available to cart us, and all of our stuff, back up the mountain.
• Our wood stove, in our living room, which is powerful enough to heat the front half of our house. We began using it a few days ago when the weather turned cold.