Thanks for checking back in to see how the neighborhood is fairing with no electrical grid. The neighbors are running low on food and apparently didn’t have the fore-sight of knowing that a house isn’t much of a shelter without a heat source… These situations seem to have a way of going from bad to worse but we can always hope for the best! Let’s see where this one goes…

 

____________________________________________________________________________________

 

 

  You have to think fast to answer the question about sharing some firewood. On one hand this IS your neighbor, he’s always been thoughtful enough to wave as your cars would pass on the block… You do have a BIG pile of firewood still and could give him a few days worth without putting yourself in an immediate bind. Will this character keep his mouth shut about how much you have or will he expect to keep coming for more? How can you give him some and not let the others see? Wouldn’t it be better to just tell him you can’t spare any?

 

   “Sorry Man, I just don’t have much myself. If I gave you some, I’d be in even worse shape. I really wish I could help but you have to understand, it’s cold in my house too and we’ve been rationing our supply to make it go further.” The words just sort of came out before you had even made up your mind how to handle this… It was almost surreal that you would turn down a request from a neighbor that you had the ability to accommodate.

 

   His response also took you by surprise… “You must have mis-understood me, I wasn’t ASKING you!” he said more forcefully. The words were like a punch in the stomach. Was he really telling you what you were going to do? A million thoughts all tried to race through your mind at the same time, it was impossible for you to focus on formulating a rational response to this… What? Was it a threat? Was he only joking around? Should you cuff him once alongside the head, so he doesn’t start thinking he can push you around? If only you had anticipated this predicament.

 

   Without looking up at him, you replied – “I’ll assume you’re joking so I don’t take offence to that statement, this situation is bad enough without having to start fighting amongst ourselves over firewood.” Was this going to be enough to discourage him or would he continue to press you? You’d read the stories online about these societal breakdown scenarios and how people would do stupid things when they became desperate. This wasn’t a story and it had only been a little more than week since this all started. How could you guys ever look each other in the face again, once civilization was restored, knowing that you had fought over firewood?

 

   “Let’s just say I was kidding but unless you want to share the firewood with everyone on the street, I suggest we come to an agreement”, he said with a little less force in his voice. “I think that if you were to decide to share the wood supply with my family, we could see our way to keeping our mouths shut about all that fuel you have stored for your generator.” He said it in such a way that you thought he might have been rehearsing the interaction…

 

   “I’m not sure what you think you know but I’m down to my last 10 gallons of gas…”, you said this out loud knowing it wasn’t true – would he buy it? Everyone knew you had the generator, you had run it quite a bit over those first couple of days but how could he know what you had as far as a fuel reserve… This idea of leaving the house to engage the neighbors wasn’t working out so good.

 

  ”You’re not fooling anyone, we all know what kind of guy you are”, his tone of voice cold – “Your kid told my kid that you expected something like this to happen and so you always kept a lot of supplies around, just in case. You thought you were being so secretive but several of us saw all those boxes getting dropped off by the UPS truck. It was kind of a joke at the mail boxes… Someone would always ask if the other guy had been to Costco lately, it didn’t go unnoticed that you made a few more trips than what a family of 4 could have been using up on a regular basis. Why do you think that the neighbors are all knocking on your door to borrow food? Nobody else has anything to spare but you kept giving the hand outs? It was always good for a few laughs about what a crazy survivalist you were but nobody’s laughing now because you might have the things we all need…”

 

   It all started to rush through your mind, could you have been the brunt of the neighbors jokes and never realised it? Had you been to lax on your OPSEC? The answer to that was apparently, you had… Didn’t everyone carry boxes in the house from weekly Costco runs? “Crazy Survivalist?” Wouldn’t that make me the good guy, you thought to yourself. Quick! Think of something to say to this guy! “So, you saw those boxes being dropped off? Did you wonder what was in them? If I was smart enough stock up on fuel for my generator, don’t you think I’d be smart enough to make sure someone couldn’t just walk up and take it from me?” With that statement you stepped away from the other man and started up your driveway. You wanted to turn and throttle the guy just for the fact that he would be so disrespectful to you but thought better of it. It was wise that you hadn’t, when you turned to close the front door you saw that some of the other neighbors had been watching as the two of you walked away!

 

  As soon as the door was closed behind you, you released a very deep breath that you hadn’t even realised you had been holding. Your wife who had been watching from the upstairs window since you had left the house, came running down to see what the details were. The outrage you were feeling exploded all over her. This was completely unbelievable, veiled threats from a man that had lived across the street from you for at least 5 years. With the urging of your wife you were able to catch your breath and regain a bit of your composure.

 

  Who does he think he is? Doesn’t he realise that I could take him out ANYTIME I chose to? If he wants a war – “Bring it on”. Hold on, hold on, just one minute mister – you lose the moral high ground when you lower yourself to the same level, your wife reminded you! With a few more minutes of her prodding you were able to relay the details of the impromptu meeting and the exchange with the individual neighbor over the firewood.

 

   With this off your chest and a new perspective from your wife, it became clear that you had really fouled up when it came to OPSEC. Had you only taken a few precautions when having packages delivered or even while unloading the household supplies, you probably wouldn’t be in this pickle. Unfortunately, this genie wouldn’t put itself back in the bottle. The trouble-making neighbor was sure to leverage his information to make allies of the other “Have Nots” and then everything would go down hill quickly from there.

 

  At this point there was only one thing that could be done, unless you’re willing to give up your supplies without a fight. This wouldn’t wait until morning, it had to be done right now or the window of opportunity would pass and possibly with it, your firewood!

 

 

Prepper