safe

Last week I bought a safe. Been meaning to buy one for years. Ever since I got to LA in fact. This is earthquake country. Mudslide country. Wildfire country. I come from a safe country, where there is not too much nature actually capable of endangering the vital papers of life. And we have houses of stone built for eternity. A whole different sense of security in that one. But here, I always wanted to pack the important things in a box so they'd be safe in case something comes along. I'd have them handy, organized. Finally, an ad brought an ominous black box into my field of vision. 40 dollars for a home safe, securing the valuables for 30 minutes in a fire, and waterproof.
So I hauled it up the long walkway to our house. It's really heavy. Inside the heavy box with a top door is a shoe-box size space that fits legal size hanging file folders - if only it hadn't warped in the middle. Made in China. 40 Dollars don't get you something worthy of German engineering. So the folders actually only fit at the very front and very back. The middle space is for diagonal filing. My German papers work there, they are too long for the folders (German legal size paper is called Din a 4. Its skinnier and longer.) I can make it work, put my life's papers in there. But now I don't know if I want to. I kept the packaging box and still am ready to return it. Do I really need a safe? Is it not just sitting there, taking up space? Don't I have most of my important stuff online?
There's the passport, the birth certificate, the Master's certificate. Tax returns. Insurance papers. Stuff you could get back, but it would save time if you didn't have to. I don't understand why I am so undecided about this. Old, deep-seated anxieties. Am I just too free a spirit for a safe? What seemed to be a reasonable, sensible thing to do turns out to be an enigma now that I did it.
I am confused. I should probably put some other things in there they want you to have prepared, just in case. A battery-less torch light. A little cash. An emergency radio. Then I should buy some gallons of water. And canned food, stash it safely. So we are prepared. The "big one" is always coming.
I dread all this because I always hated to be prepared for life's surprises. That was for losers, Spiesser, for squares. As far as I was concerned: To hell with retirement savings, life insurances, owning real estate. No way to live. It's all about the moment. I should have known. The safe. A manifestation of middle-class anxiety staring at me. A manifestation of my growing older, away from those rebellious youth ideas of freedom from what my parents valued.
Calm down. It's just a box to make things easier. To be efficient. Just in case.