LD's Resume of Doom

Thanks to the Diner's newest member, Redreamer, for this beautiful fox picture...it's my understanding she captured it with her camera

I've been tasked by a fellow Diner over at the Doomstead Diner forum to come up with a Doom Resume. The idea is to write up a convincing synopsis of why your sorry ass is worth using resources to integrate you into a community post-collpse. Say for whatever reason you are dislocated from your current abode...be it a pointless waste of space that will blow away as soon as chaos happens, or a life boat intentionally designed to weather bad societal shit..like the Just In Time (JIT) trucking that our suburban America requires for things like...food...shutting down. Imagine, and this is my favorite doom scenario due to it's complex richness, that the tractor trailers that keep our current civilization going stop pulling 80,000 pound loads down the interstate system of these failed states of America (FSoA), for even just a couple of weeks due to say 7 dpg diesel. "Experts," whatever the hell that means, say that we have a three day supply of food in the box stores across America...the Walmarts, and Ralphs, and BiLos, and Buy N Larges that house all of the Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation turds of prepackaged, sterilized, devoid of all nutrition, toxin rich, plastic, bad imitations of eddibility, "food." All those shelves will be empty of anything vaguely edible within 24 hours of the official kick off of Zombie panic. Thus has writing a Doom Resume become a worth while endeavor for all of us Post-Petroleum humans to write, and spread into the doomosphere. This is my Resume of Doom.

My worth, in terms of skill sets, started at round 14 years old for me. That's the year I dove head first into the world of Army JROTC. My fourth year I was XO of the battalion, which made me 2nd in command...that means my senior year every cadet except one, the battalion Commander (who has been flying Black Hawks for the last ten years or so) had to salute me. I was best Recon three years in a row and Recon Commander my fourth year. Now, all of this means that I learned, as well as taught, useful skills like orienteering, mountaineering, marksmanship, knot tying, repelling, map reading, and general wilderness survival. But most importantly I learned how to lead men and women, and do it well.

My next set of skills, that were acquired during those same years, had as much a spiritual dimension as practical physical one. I trained in Nihon Goshin Aikido for four years. This is a Japanese style martial art that was created for sword fighting...in the days of the Samuri. Steven Seagal is trained in Hombu Aikido, which is only different because their circles are much wider, whereas Nihon Goshin is tighter and closer to the body. This is a system of self defense that revolves around pressure points, joint locks, and throws, and puts a heavy emphasis on learning human anatomy so that you can know what nerve you are activating...or what tendon, ligament, or bone you might intentionally break pending the offender decides it for himself. I rose to Ni Kyu, or "student instructor," which is a purple belt. I had all 50 techniques in the art when I quit due to moving cross country. When I quit I was working on weapons training...things like how to take a gun or knife away from somebody who is trying to shoot/stab you. Now, at 33, I can still do a running ninja roll over a chain link fence...granted those days are numbered I'm sure. However, I learned this skill set by burning into my muscle memory while my muscles were still developing during early teenage years.

At 18 I began seriously questioning Christianity and religion in general. I became an atheist and basically started over for myself. I arrived at home in Buddhism. Then I moved on to other things like Druidry. Point is I have a spiritual background that is based on empirical experience and not solely on shit other people have written or said. Examples of this experience are a full blow out of body experience, Astral Travel, and years of lucid dreaming. However I remain humble in knowing that there are others more spiritually advanced than I whom I can learn from. To me, humility and equanimity are two of the most important spiritual endeavors where other people, and how you treat them, are concerned. I think this makes me well balanced where morals and ethics are concerned. It also makes me flexible and tolerant of others spiritual views.

Next I suppose would be the USN where every recruit is trained in the art of fighting fire. I was broken down as an individual and reborn into a collective identity in boot camp despite my best efforts to not allow this process to happen. After boot camp I trained at Naval Nuclear Power Training Command to be a nuclear engineer of the mechanic persuasion. After NNPTC came Prototype in Saratoga Springs NY. Then I was stationed in Bremerton Washington and shortly deployed to the Persian Gulf where I was when 9/11 happened. First bombs dropped came off of my boat...the U.S.S. Carl Vinson CVN-70. First chance I got, upon returning to the continental U.S., I went UA (unauthorized absence) as well as "missing ship's movement" as the ship left from San Diego to Bremerton without me. I learned a lot in the Navy...too much to cover in this synopsis...you can start with 115 days at sea without seeing land...all while working 7 days a week. Four hours of sleep was a luxury...use your imagination.

After the Navy I went to a bartending academy in Seattle Washington and began a career as a professional drunk. I also had a short period of time spinning records in the Seattle rave scene. During this period I moved back to Upstate SC and have remained here ever since...that was 2002. I supported myself by waiting tables and tending bar for about 4 years. During the last year I ran a mom and pop hole in the wall bar for ruffians and all manner of Southern drunk rednecks. I was a general manager as well as head short order cook, bartender, and ass kicker (although due to my training, I never had to put any drunk dirt necks in the hospital). I was able to persuade drunk rednecks, hillbillies, dirt necks, and the occasional out of place gang banger, without violence, to do what I said....the confidence that Aikido gave me assisted in that skill). But when I'm applying point pressure to your mastoid sinus you tend to do what I say to stop the excruciating pain...nevermind if I grab your hyoid bone.

I put an end to the alcohol/drug abuse, nomadic, anglo saxon, reckless, living for the now, ready to burn up in a blaze of spontaneous combustion glory, lifestyle at the behest of my now wife, then girlfriend GM (gypsy mama of Diner fame)...and began the skills of learning how to be domesticated in the Matrix. This prompted my next skill set, which I began before I gave up that reckless lifestyle, the skills involved in being a medic. For 2 years I worked in convalescent transport "granny snatchin" at the most unholy, lotion and doodoo scented, depressing cesspools of human misery known as nursing homes, before I got into EMS. For six years I worked for a county EMS agency as an EMT-intermediate dealing with all manner of human tragedy, gore, insanity, dead newborns, dismembered and dead loved ones, and body decompositions. I was a professional in dealing with the shit you can't deal with. Why else do people call 911...at least the responsible ones...which granted are in short number these days. I learned a lot about not only the human spirit, mind, and body in this profession...I also learned how to spot knuckleheaded Zombies due to their scent alone. If you are a Zombie I can smell you...thank you EMS.

During the years of EMS I became Peak Oil aware after reading The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler in 2007. I had about 3 years of solitary dealings with this information before my wife started finally taking notice around 2011. I've been PO aware for six years now. At about year three, I finally made it through all of the states of grief and decided it would be a good idea to procreate. I have two children now. Ayden Zen who will be three in less than a month, and Harper Tribann who is two weeks old today. Thus I have learned (or rather am learning) how to be a good and responsible parent. The goal being to facilitate children who will grow into adults with the ability to thrive in The Long Descent, or Long Emergency, or whatever you want to label the clusterfuck we are currently experiencing the opening acts to.

While I was working as a medic my Southern-as-they-come Paramedic partner taught me how to deer hunt. This resulted in me killing two deer in my second full season of hunting. My first season I didn't kill shit because my hillbilly partner decided I had to deer hunt for the first time with his bird gun (a 12 gauge with a fuckin' bead on the end of it...all season...good luck to me). There I was, in a little ass oak tree bout 8 inches around in a ladder stand 12 feet off the ground, swaying in the wind, with two 100 pound does 100 yards out in plain site. I was standing...did I mention I was literally swaying in the wind, and I was applying pressure to the trigger gettin' ready to lob lead at a deer for the first time. This was arguably an irresponsible shot, which aside from the swaying, had me wondering. Just before the gun went off they caught my scent and run oft. The second season I euthanized Bambi twice and consequently field dressed (under the direction of my partner), threw the deer in the bed of my truck and then skinned, quartered, and butchered both deer on my own at home. You should have seen me in the woods behind my house, buck hangin' from his hind legs and me trying to de-glove the whole body. I used a reciprocating saw to remove the head. This is the reality of eating meat...I know it intimately.

I began gardening organically right out of the gates in 2007. It was the first skill I decided to learn after reading about Peak Oil and the global clusterfuck that is the Trifecta of doom (climate change, global economic breakdown, and Peak Oil). I'm in my sixth year of gardening now, however that would be the second year of Permaculture. In 2012, right after resigning from my lucrative position as an EMT in the state of SC (29,000 dollars was what I grossed my last full year which was 2011), I began permaculture training in Asheville NC. I trained in a new program called "Permaculture in Action" which resulted in a certificate of completion. I helped install permaculture design on something like seven different properties during five two day weekends. I learned a lot about permaculture and have been applying the principles to everything I do outside with plants ever since. I've been successfully keeping chickens for the last year and am considering moving from just eggs to a meat operation as well. I have been able to cover my meager costs of keeping the birds by selling the eggs for 3 dollars a dozen.

Now I'm a full time student training to be a Registered Nurse for a well paid position at the Ministry of Health. I have many other skills I've developed over the years like fermentation. I can ferment a good drinkable alcoholic cider that will get you drunk, and I have just about perfected the art of mead making with nothing but good local honey, champagne yeast, and a bucket. I can make all kinds of krauts and make the best fermented hotsauce you've ever ate (just ask JoeP if you don't believe me). I know how to can and grow food on the cheap using mostly scavenged materials. In fact, I'm familiar with most homesteading activities now due to practice in my own life. I even have a humanure operation that's got the biggest volunteer tomato plant you've ever seen growing out of it (last years humanure pile).

So there you have it...my skills, or worth as a potential vagabond post-petroleum human. If you fill in-between the lines, and connect the dots, and see in all dimensions and what-not...then I think I make a pretty valuable asset to your community. Pending the Foxstead doesn't get off the ground before TSHTF, and I get dislocated, and end up at your doomstead...now you can know my skills. My wife Gypsy Mama has a bunch of her own skills that have been won during a life of high tragedy. She recently turned into a Goddess before my eyes while giving birth to our second son Harper Tribann. She did that naturally. As in no epidural, or pain killing compounds of any kind. Just her and our beautiful second son. We are leading the charge out of the Matrix and it's destructive hologram of control. We have skills that will assure we survive anything short of a Near Term Human Extinction Event. Personally, I believe we will survive even that...like a prehistoric endospore that is still viable.

I didn't list all of my skills all official resume like because I'm not official like. There are a multitude of things I didn't list like knife sharpening, hole digging, joke making, fishin', and all manner of professional Jack Leggin'. But where survival is concerned...I and mine will survive. My hope is to bioneer what has been dubbed the Foxstead here in upstate SC with my vagabond crew of Diners. That is if the bottom doesn't drop out of this global bitch, or a super tornado doesn't come through and make the above a dissertation in doomer pointlessness. So what are your skills? We're accepting applications for the first Foxstead. Consider the task of writing your Doomer Resume your application for admittance. We're planning on saving as many as we can...non-Zombies at least. 

An iconic picture taken in Turkey days ago...coming to a Theater of Doom near you any day now (thanks JoeP)