Doing without

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Hello from the chilly Northeast! We have gotten our full share of winter in the last month, and I don't think it's going away any time soon. Recently, we had an ice storm and the power flickered on and off all night. We were the lucky ones who didn't lose our electricity, it got me thinking about those who had.

Also recently, I lost my cell phone and was without one for a little over a week. Suddenly, something I had done without for the first 20 years or so of my life seemed impossible to do without.

We've all had days where the internet has gone down at work, the dishwasher has broken, or maybe simply enough, the cable has gone out. Annoying, but not life altering, right?

I'm not so sure about that.

I read and write a lot of science fiction/fantasy and I'm always fascinated by stories of worlds where they've gone from having huge scientific advances to nothing. How do people survive? What coping skills do they have to form to thrive? I'll admit, if I was dropped in the middle of the woods, I would probably die. I have a vague idea of how to start a fire and might remember a little bit about finding north, and in a pinch, I might even be able to create a lean-to that could last if the wind didn't blow too hard, but I'd die of starvation and caffeine deprivation in two days, tops.

Now losing my cell phone isn't the same as surviving in the wilderness, but it makes you think, doesn't it? How long could we go without our computers, cell phones, and GPSs? And now that I have a Kindle, waiting for a book to come in the mail is just barbaric.

In my book SLOAN'S HEART, the two main characters, Sloan and Mary, are two space cruiser personnel who get stranded on a hostile planet and must do without any technology whatsoever. It's definitely a learning experience for them, but an exciting one for sure.

What three things could you never do without?

What three things could you give up without too much angst?

And could you survive if we lost it all?