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Little did I know or ever realize how much I would need “Boy Scout Survival Training” while I was spending all those wasted hours in Campfire Girls. We spent, long and tedious hours making bookmarks endorsed with our names made out of alphabet soup letters and those useless wire rings! I have spent a lot of time pondering what wire rings ever had to do with fostering a sisterhood of play, work, and healthy values to shape us into active, modern women. My wire ring collection includes just about every size and color a person would want. The closest I came to learning “real” survival techniques were weaving together strips of newspaper to make a forest mat which we neatly enclosed in a garbage bag tapering the excess edges to fit the size of the mat by taping or stapling the edges. But, with the newspaper industry virtually disappearing into online formats, it is highly unlikely we will carry our personal stacks with us deep into the forest ever again.

From these early experiences, survival never had a personal meaning. As an adult, my husband always compensates for me wherever we go to make sure we never forget anything because he was a boy scout. I have often teased him about bringing the kitchen sink but just last weekend we were out on an unexpectedly long hike at Cougar Mountain because we became lost on one of the 67 acres of trails. As the brief dusk abruptly went to dark, it quickly overshadowed all the fun we were having. Several moments of fear and panic overtook me as I realized I had absolutely nothing except the house key and one tissue – not water, not an ounce of food and certainly not a light. As bats started diving over me, I threw on my hood and quickly ran frantically up the trail looking for any familiar trail names which may tie back into the ones we knew. I was imagining all that could go wrong and all of the animals lurking in the shadows waiting to attack us. This fear all comes from a part from our most recent experiences in the jungle. I can see survival is becoming a reoccurring theme for us. After a while I settled into knowing there were no any deadly snakes or wild animals ready to pounce on us, rather just the woods we grew up in and know well. Our very own Northwest woods became the marked turning point in my personal survival responsibilities. Here is where I want to pass down my lessons to you. Learn to be prepared even if it doesn’t seem natural. You could be out on a hike like us, expecting only to be out for a half hour which could turn into much more than you bargained for. Heed the Boy Scouts’ motto: Be prepared for anything!

While most people probably follow some of the suggested basics, this could be new territory for others who may have shared similar experiences as me. It’s not even that I haven’t been aware of them, it comes from a belief like, “We are only going for a short hike -- I really don’t need to bring anything” until you find yourself in unexpected circumstances. REI suggest the following 10 essentials for day hiking for safety, survival and basic comfort:

1. Navigation like a compass and map
2. Sun screen protection: lotion, glasses, hat
3. Insulated clothing and shoes
4. Illumination: flashlight or headlamp
5. First aid supplies
6. Fire: matches in a waterproof case or a fire starter
7. Repair kit and tools: knife, tape
8. Nutrition: energy bars, trail mix
9. Hydration
10. Emergency shelter or blanket

Going beyond just day hiking into thinking about emergencies or natural disasters, I have found some great advice from the Survival Center:

Planning is important, but rehearsal is when you will test your plan and identify flaws. Rehearsal is simply pretending you are in a survival situation and acting accordingly. Here are some survival examples to try:

1. Live for a weekend without electricity. You can do this the real way by shutting of the breaker (to prevent cheating) or the easy way by just "pretending." If you do the latter, you should fine each other for violating the rules. The exercise will teach you that boiling water over a camp stove or a fire in the back yard just to make you're morning coffee can really wreck your normal morning routine. But hopefully the experience will also help you identify missing supplies, bad ideas and develop a new, stronger plan.

2. Try to evacuate your family to another location (anywhere from a friend or relatives to a motel 100 miles away). Give yourselves 20 minutes to pack. Once you've reached your destination make a list of everything you forgot and then add it to your bag. Once you've settled in at your destination, take a minute to think how you would feel if everything you left behind was destroyed by a fire or if everything below the second floor was damaged or destroyed by a flood. Revise your storage and survival plans accordingly.

3. Go for a drive one Saturday in the fall. Pull over in a remote area (if it's safe) and spend the night there with only the supplies on hand in your car.

4. Try eating only your survival foods for a weekend or even a week. This is a good one if you're ready to rotate out some of your food. It also has the added benefit of letting you identify any dishes you can't stand or to realize you need to add some spices and a cook book to your stash.

Lastly, to develop a survivalist mentality, you must think through scenarios. Play scenarios through your head and rehearse your options and actions. For example:

• If you are stuck in traffic, imagine what you would do if a large earthquake struck. Where would you go? What would you do?
• If you're traveling out of town or in any unfamiliar area, think about what you would do if you were stranded due to a breakdown or if the area was suddenly hit by a flash flood. What would you do to increase your chance of survival?

Perhaps through my survival exploration, I will eventually find a purpose for all of those useless wire rings, but at least they hold a strong reminder of what to keep in my head next time we are out on another hike or deep in a jungle in another country. Don’t get rid of those perceived useless relics you may have, they may hold a key to helping you change your behavior and become a survivalist.