Long time prepper- silent but venting

I have been a prepper for most of my life. I grew up on a small ranch and my parents always prepared expecting the next depression to happen. As a child, a SHTF situation could have happened and my life would have virtually not changed. My parents are now both deceased and having no brothers and sisters, my family is literally myself, my wife and one daughter. I am an upper management professional working in an office. Other than my assistant of 12 years, no one knows I am a prepper. Some know I collect a few weapons based on various office conversations throughout the years but that is it. My assistant knows a little due to seeing an occasional package delivered as well as I have brought my portable stove to boil water in my office and have had her sample various meals with me when deciding on brands of dehydrated foods (mountain house, Wise etc.) But she also knows I am an avid camper so that is my way to explain away my food taste testing. I tend to prep foods my family has already taste tested and liked. In a SHTF situation, although when hungry we would all eat about anything regardless of taste, I wanted to at least provide my family the comfort of having foods available they will enjoy eating to give us a bit more comfort in what would obviously be a stressful situation.

We have a very small group of like minded friends who know what we do. In all reality we live a very double life as a prepper. In my professional life, I see people every day that have the financial resources to buy anything they need but these same people panic every year when a hurricane comes near and they wait to the last minute to go to the store to buy a little water and various food and as soon as the storm passes so does the thought of preparing. At the end of each hurricane season, I watch the sites like (offerup and letgo) because people then sell their dehydrated food and other supplies for 10% of what they paid for it. Each year after hurricane season is over, I would imagine I pick up enough food to last my family a few months for less than I would normally pay for a week's worth of this type of food. Each time I meet some stranger selling the (obviously sealed and untouched food) I hear the same similar story of how they bought it and did not need it and just wanted to get a little money back. I have even bought food or supplies from the same person doing the same thing each year ( buying in panic then selling for almost nothing). I seriously do not understand this mentality of panic buying just to sell and then do the same thing again the next time a storm comes near. I have actually had co-workers laugh about how I am calm while they are running to the store to buy up the last bit of water on the shelf. I play it off as taking my chances and will just drink out of my faucet or some other sarcastic remark to make them think I am even more naive about preparing then they are. I have even had people insist that I take a case of water from their panic purchases just so I have something. Which I gladly accept and just remain silent as I hear how small jokes about how I should be more prepared for the storm. These same people who if a major storm really hit, would be out of their supplies in a week or two at best.

I have even looked into a few local prepper groups. I have met a few nice people with great knowledge but also meet some fairly clueless people as well. I had a guy actually brag about how he is really overly stockpiled on ammo and then try to impress me by saying he has almost 600 rounds of ammo for his two 9mm handguns and 100 rounds of ammo for his 12GA. I simply just said "Wow that is a lot of ammo" while thinking 600 rounds is a day at the range at best....LOL I met a lady that openly talked about her food storage and although I admit she did have an impressive amount, she also admitted to not owning a single gun. So here is this older single woman basically telling a group of unknown people that she has a lot of food and it can be taken without resistance.

Although I have been a prepper my total life, I consider myself a novice. I am not Rambo or the guy who can go into the mountains for a year with nothing but a knife and fishing string and expect to ever walk out of there.
I find it amazing how being a prepper has such a negative stereotype associated with the word. It is as if we have an addiction that we have to hide that addiction from the rest of the world. If people in my social professional environment knew the extend of my prepping, I would be labeled as a loony and networking professionally would be non-existent. These same people who want to mock people like me would be the first ones demanding that I share what I have saved with them in the event of a real SHTF event. Somehow they would think I owe it to them and if not given they would try and take it. So I find myself hiding in plain sight. My wife and I have to live more secluded. I have reached the point in my prepping that I really have enough to feel comfortable and pass more time looking at ways to blend in and hide what I have from any guests or maintenance or cleaning people who might come into the house. Being know as the guy in the office least prepared for a storm.

I suppose as a prepper I am different. I see the sheep walking around unprepared or at best could live a few weeks off of what they have in their pantries. My wife and I might go to the supermarket or Walmart the day before a storm hits not to buy anything but just to see what was cleaned off the shelf. I find it very curious to see what people buy in a panic before a storm. I think we can learn much from watching the panic buying to perhaps think of something I missed in my preps. But then you see the clueless people. This past hurricane season I went to the supermarket to see a woman with a smirk look on her face with a cart full of frozen pizzas. She must have had 40 pizzas in her cart. She was ready for the big storm and had plans to eat pizza while the rest of the clueless were fighting over the last of the water bottles. Just hope she has a gas oven and a generator and enough fuel to keep the freezer running..LOL.

If had to worry about the power going out for days or months and that meaning my family would not have food or water or medical supplies, lights, a way to cook, keep warm or cold or dry, a way to protect everything, an alternate location also stocked. So perhaps I am odd or different because I could not sleep if I had to worry about those types of things. If SHTF basically everyone that I know would not make it. Perhaps I would be surprised and there more people in my area or neighborhood being silent or acting naive the same as me. I hope that is the case but I doubt it.

During a recent hurricane that was projected to hit directly where I live, my daughter who was born into this and has been taught as much as I can in her limited years, could not understand why I put several AR's in various places throughout the house the night before the storm hit as well as put one in each vehicle not knowing which car we might have to escape in. My wife was out of the country on business and when she left the storm was not supposed to be close to us so it was just me and my daughter alone to ride out the storm. She did not really take it seriously as I had hoped. She seemed more worried about the internet working. After the storm, there was no power for a week. And I considered us very lucky having no damage and only a loss of power. I took my daughter out with me to an area of the city we normally do not go. Already the next day there were close to 100 people lined up at the only restaurant that must have been cooking off gas since there was no sound of a generator anywhere. I parked about 100 yards from the restaurant and let my daughter watch these people pushing and shoving, a few small fights, a group of about 20 hanging outside a closed gas station looking to be debating on looting. And this was day 1 after the storm. I wanted her to see how these people who do not prepare are already acting as animals less than 24 hours of not having power. She watch with eyes wide open. So I hope this helped her to see how bad things could get. And this was a minor storm compared to what it could have been. I told her imagine if a real SHTF situation happened and the power might not be on for weeks, months or never. I was actually very grateful for the storm because it was a good test run. As prepared as I felt I was for the long term, I had overlooked having some comfort fun things to do to pass time the week without power. Wished I had had more board games or some movies download to make a short term situation more enjoyable.

Anyhow...thanks to those who read my ranting. Sometimes you just need to vent a little when living a double life as a prepper.

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Long time prepper- silent but venting