Santa Barbara in the Year of Coronavirus

It’s come to this: toilet paper, guns, and cannabis, the building blocks of the apocalypse. Who knew? I must have missed the memo. But even if I got it, I still wouldn’t get it.

I showed up at Smart & Final Sunday morning, 15 minutes before it opened at 8 a.m. I figured I was nice and early. Not remotely. There was already a huge line. One overachieving early bird arrived at 6 a.m. sharp, and those waiting — armed with Smart & Final’s Kremlin-grade shopping carts — wound from the store’s front entrance all the way to Santa Barbara Street, where they curled up toward Haley. It was longer even than the usual line of urban backpackers, bike campers, and other residentially challenged people who typically claim this area as their portable living room. As usual, I was impressed by the congeniality with which most Santa Barbarans — myself excluded — vent their panic. There was no pushing and shoving when the doors opened; it was all “After you, Alphonse.”

Once inside, however, all bets were off. Imagine a demolition derby of carts packed to the sky with toilet paper. And that was with the store’s strict two-per-customer limit. Smart & Final sells product on an industrial scale; toilet paper there comes in packs of 48. A guy I knew grinned sheepishly about the 96 rolls of fluffy whiteness he was navigating to the checkout line. In the military, that would be enough to last one person eight years. “I don’t even know why I do this,” he exclaimed. Later, he answered his own riddle: “I’m going to give some to neighbors.”