Tag: traditions

Festivities in the Apocalypse: How to Keep the Holidays When the World Has Ended

Posted on by admin

It is tempting to think holidays would be the first thing to go at the end of the world. History says otherwise. People in wartime, in siege, in refugee camps and in Antarctic research stations have gone to great lengths to mark their holidays, because a celebration is how a group tells itself it is still a group and that time is still moving forward. So here is how to keep the holidays in the apocalypse, starting with the reasons and ending with the cocoa.

Why it matters

Survival is mostly routine and mostly grim. A holiday breaks the routine on purpose. It gives people something to look forward to, a reason to share food instead of hoarding it, and a story about who they are. If you lead a group of survivors, the holiday is not a distraction from the work. It is part of the work.

Decorations from what is left

  • Greenery is free. Evergreen boughs, holly, pinecones and dried berries make wreaths and garlands without a single store. Wire, twine or strips of fabric hold them together.
  • Salvage the shiny things. Tin can lids cut into stars, foil from food packaging, old CDs and bottle caps all catch firelight beautifully. Smooth any sharp edges with a file or a rock.
  • Paper still works. Paper snowflakes, chains and lanterns cost nothing but scissors and patience, and they give children something to do.

A feast from the pantry

The holiday meal is the centerpiece, so plan it weeks ahead and set aside the best things you have: the canned ham, the jar of cranberry sauce, the bag of chocolate chips you have been guarding. Then add whatever you can forage or trade for. Our pantry recipes scale up well, and coconut rice pudding makes a decent holiday dessert with no oven at all.

A note on foraging: pine needle tea is a real winter tradition and a source of vitamin C, but not every evergreen is safe. Yew is highly poisonous, and some pines, including ponderosa, are dangerous during pregnancy. Only brew from a tree you can identify with certainty, and white pine is the classic choice.

Gifts that matter now

The best apocalypse gifts are useful, handmade or both: a pair of mittens sewn from an old sweater, a carved spoon, a mended coat, a jar of preserves, a hand-drawn map of the safe routes. A skill makes a good gift too. Promise to teach someone to knit, fish or patch a tire, and then do it.

Traditions to start

  • Mark the solstice. The longest night of the year falls around December 21 in the Northern Hemisphere. Keeping a fire going through it and greeting the sunrise together is one of the oldest winter traditions there is, and the days start getting longer from there.
  • Sing. Caroling around a fire needs no electricity and no talent. It also carries, so mind the volume if you are keeping a low profile.
  • Tell the old stories. Holiday traditions from before the collapse, family stories and favorite movies retold from memory all help keep the past alive for people who will grow up without it.
  • Make a winter contest. A snow sculpture or ice carving challenge turns the cold into entertainment for an afternoon.
  • Count the year. At the new year, go around the fire and name one thing each person survived and one thing each person hopes for. Then post a watch, because celebrations are exactly when someone should be looking out.

One safety note on lights

A string of candles or lanterns in the window looks like hope, and it is also a sign to anyone watching that a house is occupied and has supplies. Decide as a group how visible you want to be before you light up the night.

What tradition would you keep no matter what? Tell us in the comments.

Crafting Resilience: How to Record Your Family’s Stories, Recipes and Traditions Before They’re Lost

Posted on by admin

When a house floods or burns, the thing people grieve longest is rarely the furniture. It is the photo albums, the recipe card in a grandmother’s handwriting, the stories nobody wrote down because everyone assumed they would always be around to tell them. You don’t need an apocalypse to lose those things, only one bad night. So this post is about saving them now: what to record, how to ask for it, and how to store it so it outlasts you.

1. Interview your people

The stories in your family’s heads are the most fragile archive you have. Sit down with parents, grandparents, aunts and old family friends, record the conversation on your phone, and ask open questions. A few that tend to unlock good stories:

  • What is the earliest thing you remember?
  • What did your family eat on holidays when you were small, and who cooked it?
  • How did you meet the person you married, and what did you think of them at first?
  • What was your first job, and what did it pay?
  • What was the hardest year of your life, and how did you get through it?
  • Who in our family should I know about that nobody talks about anymore?
  • What do you know how to do that hardly anyone knows anymore?
  • What do you want your great-grandchildren to know about you?

Let silences run. The best story usually comes right after the pause where you would normally ask the next question. Write down names, places and dates as they come up, because they are the details that fade first.

2. Write the family cookbook

Recipes are culture you can eat. Collect them from everyone, with the real quantities, not “a handful” or “until it looks right” (cook alongside the person if you have to). Note who made each dish, when it was served and any story attached to it. Then add a few adaptations for hard times, such as how to make the holiday bread with powdered milk or without eggs.

3. Print the photos

Phones and cloud accounts feel permanent, but they depend on companies, passwords and electricity. Print the photos that matter, write names and dates on the back in pencil or archival pen, and store them in acid-free albums or boxes. Unlabeled photos become mysteries within a generation.

4. Teach the skills, not just the memories

Some traditions are things you do with your hands: knitting, canning, fishing, woodworking, a particular way of braiding hair or tending a garden. Recording them on video helps, but the best way to keep a skill is to learn it while the person who knows it is still here to correct you.

5. Keep the calendar

Write down your family’s holidays and observances and how you actually keep them: what food, which songs, who sits where, what is said. Traditions survive disruption best when someone knows exactly how they go and can lead them even when everything else is different.

6. Store it like you mean it

  • Follow the 3-2-1 rule. Keep three copies of anything important, on two different kinds of storage, with one copy somewhere else entirely, such as a relative’s house in another town.
  • Use paper for the core. Print the most important stories and recipes on acid-free paper. Paper read with your eyes needs no software that might not exist in thirty years.
  • Keep digital files simple. Save recordings and scans in common formats like MP3, JPEG and PDF, and copy them to new drives every few years, because drives and discs degrade.
  • Protect against water and fire. A waterproof, fire-resistant document box holds a surprising amount, and a sealed plastic bin on a high shelf beats a cardboard box in a basement.

Start with one interview this month. You will be glad you did, whether or not the world ends.

What story from your family would you most hate to lose? Tell it in the comments, and you will have saved one more copy.

10 Ways To Keep Up Morale In an Apocalyptic World

Posted on by Morgan MorganZRT

The apocalypse isn’t going to be exactly ‘chipper’.

However, there’s no reason it has to always be gloomy, either.

As much as we like to think that the apocalypse will be nonstop, action packed fighting, that just won’t be the case. Maybe for the first few weeks, but there will certainly be downtime.

During this downtime, it’s important to keep up your morale so you can keep on keepin’ on, instead of checking out early. Continue reading “10 Ways To Keep Up Morale In an Apocalyptic World”