Life Inside an RV, Preparing for the Worst
After Hurricane Sandy, Lisse knew she needed to drastically change her lifestyle, and that meant forsaking everything
Do you know where to find water in an emergency if it gets shut off and you can’t buy it from a store? Do you know what to pack in your bug out bag? Tuna packets. Nuts. Mini flashlight. Compact charger. Medical supplies. Change of clothes. Water. Filter. Knife…
Lisse J. (whose name has been changed to protect her anonymity), by her own admission, doesn’t match the stereotype of a prepper. She isn’t White, male, extremist, conspiracy-minded, militant, completely off-grid, a hoarder, a homesteader, gun-crazed, paranoid, nor a believer in apocalyptic millennialism. She does, however, live in an RV (quite comfortably, mind you), sensibly prepared for disaster. “People are surprised to see a Black woman in the lifestyle,” says the 50-year-old Afro-Latina New Yorker. “I’m a unicorn.” She’s been in the van, nicknamed Langston, going on five years.
Previously, Lisse lived in a house in South Beach, on Staten Island’s eastern shore. But in 2012, when Hurricane Sandy slammed the coast with a 16-foot storm surge that crushed homes, killed 24 residents, and destroyed everything Lisse owned in a violent whirl of salt water that rose to the…
