Firstly, I must apologise for not writing on here for a while. There are a few reasons for that which I’ll briefly explain and if you’re still following me here, thank you for sticking around! This blog was the first thing I ever set up to share my writing on, and it’s still hugely important to me, so rest assured, it’s not going anywhere!

In all honestly, my head has been in such a spin lately that it’s been hard to write. At all.

I haven’t written anything on Medium for a while either, despite having so much whirling in my head. I just about manage to write and post my weekly round-ups on Substack – probably because they are quite short and quick to write and follow a sort of template.

I cannot allow myself to write too much fiction at the moment because I am still in the middle of the endless editing…. More on that next week, but I am getting there and Black Hare Valley Book 2: 1966 is edging closer to publication, I promise!

Last year was a tricky one for me creatively. I started to struggle a bit with my day job as a creative writing tutor for children. I’ve had to make a lot of changes there to make it work, and I’m pleased to say that they do seem to be paying off. Again, that’s probably another topic for another day! But the burn-out stretched itself to writing on Medium and my blog. I kept thinking of things to write and then not writing them, which is very unlike me. I definitely lost a bit of confidence and I’m not entirely sure why.

One thing that has been on my mind a lot though is preparedness.

And that mindset and accompanying concerns has led me to writing this post. I am really hoping writing it kickstarts my creativity again when it comes to regular blogging and essay writing!

Firstly, what is preparedness and what does it mean to me?

Preparedness for me simply means planning ahead to make life easier for future me. It really is as simple as that and I think I’ve been doing that for a while now. For example, making two batches of cookies and freezing one batch so future me has some back-up snacks! Baking two loaves, instead of one, and chucking one in the freezer in case we run out of bread and forget to pick some up. Stuff like that.

But in recent months the desire to be more prepared for an uncertain future has really spiralled in me and taken over my life. I wouldn’t call myself a doomsday prepper – far from it – but I do think we are living in unprecedented times which call for us to change our thinking and our habits.

El Nino, climate change related disasters, wildfires and floods, extreme heat, war and conflict, cyber attacks and rogue AI are all here, right now.

Food prices are never going to go down again unless we change the entire system.

I can’t change the world but I can do everything possible for me and my family, and hopefully in time, my community. Preparing for the worst is not fear-mongering, it is simply thinking of future you and making sure everything is okay for them.

Here’s what I’ve been up to:

Vegetable plot/fruit trees/fruit bushes: I planted two apples, a pear, two plums and various fruit bushes when we moved here nearly 17 years ago and I am so glad I did! Though the apple harvest this year has been disappointing, I have managed to grow and preserve fruit from the garden and that feels very reassuring! I am now pretty good at keeping the plot producing year round and currently have just as much growing out there as I did in the summer. I have just added a brand new extension to the plot which will be potatoes and I have plans to extend the plot up the side of the garden to grow even more. I have grown and harvested oats for the first time and I’m planting wheat again soon.

Keeping ducks and chickens: I’m lucky that I have the space to do this and I have recently added to the brood. Two ducklings were born last month and are being raised by their lovely mum, and the chicks we raised in the spring are now adult and laying eggs. Currently I have six ducks and eight chickens. I keep males too so that I can always have more! I have plans for a few more chickens and then I’d like to start selling eggs locally.

Making my own compost: I have one main compost heap and another smaller one that is central in a ‘key-hole’ raised bed. I did still have to buy in compost this year but a lot less than usual, and with all the duck and chicken poo fertilising the land, I am very lucky!

No waste: Or at least, as little as possible! Food scraps go to the hens and ducks or into the compost, or to make things like apple cider vinegar and stock! Egg shells are washed and stored and eventually baked and whizzed into grit that gets added back into their food. It all goes around in a very satisfying circle.

Water collection and storage: We recently bought a second water butt and I would like to get a third in time. I also have another small container that collects rainwater. I also bought two of those water filtration straws to keep as an emergency. I’ve got a small amount of stored bottle water too and I’ve water bath canned some water in jars which can last for decades.

Preserving food: This is a new area for me and I’m really enjoying it! Obviously I have always frozen excess food, but this year I also started drying, canning and pickling! The only thing I haven’t tried yet is fermenting. (Unless you count the cider vinegar) What constantly goes through my head is it’s all very well growing food, but we also have to build up a store cupboard and preserve things for Winter. Just like the old days, I guess.

Keeping a store cupboard: I only started this fairly recently and it has already been a life-saver a few times. We don’t have a huge budget and cannot afford to rush to the shops to stockpile food, water and medicines if the worst happened, so I started small and slow. If I didn’t need a bag of pasta, I would buy one anyway. Old me would look at the cupboards and make a shopping list based on what we didn’t have. Now I do that, but I also add things to the list that we do have. That’s how I’ve slowly built up my supply. I pay particular attention to dried food such as oats, pasta, rice, noodles, tinned fruit, vegetables and meat, and preserving ingredients such as salt, sugar and vinegar. Recently one of our daughter’s left home to start her adult life and had no money for food due to paying out deposits and so on, but I was able to give her plenty of things from the cupboards to get her started and it didn’t leave us short at all. Last week we didn’t have much money, but we didn’t need it because the cupboards are all so full. This week, payments came in, so I went shopping and replaced everything we had used to get it back to the same level. Incidentally, I do the same with the car now. I keep it at half a tank full of petrol at all times.

Being prepared for emergencies: The local wildfires this summer were far too close for comfort and finally prompted me to put together a get-up-and-go-bag. This is a work in progress but so far consists of: a first aid kit, hand sanitiser, wet wipes, bottled water, crackers and chocolate spread, biscuits, cereal bars, dog food and fork, torch, wet weather gear, lighter, waterproof matches, small amount of cash, toothpaste and toothbrushes and important documents in a waterproof wallet (including written down phone numbers.) I have a separate ‘breakdown’ bag for the car, which makes me feel much better as we do tend to a lot of long road trips in our old car… Waterproofs, small first aid kit, wet wipes, hand sanitiser, dog food, torch, cash, cereal bars, waterproof matches, lighter, blanket and warm hats. And for the lounge in case of power outages (which we get a lot of around here anyway) the ‘blackout box’ which is also a work in progress and so far has: candles, tealights and small glass jars to place in, phone numbers, a lighter, waterproof matches and a radio.

There are more things I want to add to both bags and the box but I feel all three will make life easier and less stressful in the event of an emergency of prolonged power cut. I felt better as soon as they were done.

Thinking and planning ahead: It is sometimes hard to think about the future when the world is in so much turmoil but we can’t give up, can we? I think gardening is all about hope for the future which is one of the reasons it is so good for us mentally and physically. Growing a garden proves you have faith in a tomorrow and are actively planning for it. Planting grains such as wheat and oats is a bit experimental for me at the moment but I would love to eventually grow my own chicken food! And of course, my own porridge oats and flour. I am also growing lots and lots of beans, and in particular drying beans, such as kidney, butter and cannelinni. My plan is to have jars and jars of dried beans, as they last up to 30 years! I am also drying and saving beans and seeds to plant again next year. We will get more water storage at some point and as I said, the food we grow will only continue to increase as we gradually let it take over the whole garden!

I totally appreciate that not everyone can prepare to this extent. Not everyone can have ducks, chickens and fruit trees, and not everyone has enough space to grow grains, or vegetables. But everyone has a windowsill and you can very easily grow herbs that you could maybe swap locally for other food. You can grow lots of things on a balcony or in a small garden. People also need to unite together and target their local councils to open up spaces for community growing. This is something I would love to get involved in…

As for stocking up, again, I know not everyone has the budget to do this, but what I would implore lower budget households to do, is just buy one extra thing each week, one bag of pasta, rice or beans that you don’t actually need. That’s how you slowly build up supplies.

What do you think? Am I nuts? Or are you feeling and thinking the same? Have you made any changes to your household to become more resilient? Do you think the governments need to be doing more? Or would that just make people panic?