Politics & Prose Reading
The other day, I did a book event at Politics & Prose, a fabulous book store in DC. You can listen to it on NPR, and if you speed through the not-so-thrilling part where I am yapping (to about minute 16), you start to hear the questions. People’s comments were smart, thoughtful and sometimes a little weird—in a good way.
I couldn’t believe how fun it was, to tell you the truth. There was even a seismologist there, along with one of the foremost experts on building safety in the world, all of which was a little intimidating. But they were gentle.
One of the nice things about this topic is that everyone has a unique and valuable story. You’d be surprised how many people have had life-or-death experiences—and the details are often very different from what you would expect. Some of them have shared their stories in comments on this site, and each one is remarkable in its own way.
Lucy Edwards said on July 23, 2008 at 2:17 pm
I just read the excerpt on the NPR webpage. YES! Ordinary people. We call them spontaneous rescuers, and they are at every disaster. They are our neighbors, the first to arrive at our house after the disaster, and they can get hurt if they are not trained. I wanted to write, because you mention homeland security dollars and where they go—and as a Citizen Corps Program (Community Emergency Response Team) we do our best to put a few of those dollars to work organizing and training ordinary people. (No HAZMAT suits.) I am looking forward to reading the book. And our neighborhoods in Ashland, Oregon are preparing to survive and help our neighbors. Please let us know if you come to the West Coast.