Survival Kits and Second Chances: A Night at the AMVETS Hall

I met a man at an AMVETS Hall who changed how I think about mortality. He wasn’t a veteran. He was a guest, like me. And he was dying.

He didn’t lead with that. He led with survival kits. He had a whole system. Emergency supplies organized by scenario. Natural disaster. Power outage. Evacuation. He showed me his binder. He walked me through his process. He was meticulous, thoughtful, and clearly had spent hundreds of hours preparing for the worst.

Later in the evening, I learned he had a terminal diagnosis. And suddenly the survival kits made different sense. Here was a man preparing for everything except the one thing he couldn’t prepare for.

I don’t say that with judgment. I say it with recognition. Because I do the same thing. We all do. We plan and prepare and build systems for every possible future, and we avoid the one certainty we all share. We’re going to die.

The survival kits weren’t about emergencies. They were about agency. About having some control when the thing you can’t control is staring you down. That’s fear doing its job. Trying to find footholds in a freefall.

But there was also love in that hall. The way people gathered around him. The way he lit up when talking about his systems. The pride in his preparation. The fact that he showed up at all, to a place full of strangers, and shared what he knew.

He found wisdom in the most unlikely place. And I found it by sitting next to him and paying attention.

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Learn more about the adventure at www.heart-strong.org