It was meant to be a get-away, a nice drive down the coast, a way to leave worries and the requirement to wear a piece of cloth over one’s mouth and nose behind. I thought the beach-goers of Santa Barbara would be chill on the mask wearing nonsense, which has, due to I can only presume a paranoid general public, evolved into wearing a mask at all times regardless of whether or not one is maintaining the required six feet clearance from others, which is a suspicious amount of space if you ask me.
The official “guidance”—which is not a law on the books anywhere—is that it is “advised” to protect others around you by wearing a face mask when one is outdoors and cannot maintain a distance of six feet from others. That’s it. The mask is there to catch your sneezes, spray when you cough or speak, or sing opera in public. I cannot recall ever being sneezed on by a stranger. However, in some warped interpretation that has no merit or, to be anally retentive “safe,” people believe that masks protect the wearer keeping virus particles out. This is an incorrect interpretation of what wearing a mask is for, but how else can you explain individuals driving in a car, alone, wearing a mask, when there is no one in the car to sneeze on.
My complaint for essentially muzzling myself up for extended periods of time is that among other things, it forces me to re-breathe my CO2 that my body is designed to exhale, it’s like re-breathing the smoke you just exhaled from a cigarette. Further, it hides my expression, it hides others’ expressions, but the sheer stupidity of requiring healthy people to walk around wearing a mask is my greatest frustration. When I see cloth masks bearing sports teams names, designer labels, and rhinestones, I want to go home and disconnect from humanity. I simply don’t belong here.
But I was wrong. Santa Barbara was full throttle into the hysteria and illusion of being “safe.” I was not only forced to wear a mask, in some stores I was required to wear plastic gloves, too, upon entry, and in one case I was chased down an aisle when I had said, with a smile to the glove-giving store person, “No thank you” (a smile she could not see since as it was hidden by my handkerchief “mask” —the only mask I will wear).
The pressure to wear the gloves hit a nerve and since I was alone I challenged her. I do not need gloves I told her though she argued that they were required. I told her she was harassing me. She whipped out her cell phone to call the manager. “Call,” I said, nonchalantly.
Of course I could have left, but I needed what I was buying and there wasn’t another store around and who’s to say I would not have experienced the same irrational reasoning at another store. I grabbed the gloves like a raging bitch. I finished shopping, bought my items, and ripped off the gloves as I left making sure they missed the garbage can for “used gloves.” I imagine they used gloves and maybe a ten-foot pole to pick up my used gloves.
I am unpopular and I could not care less. I would rather be talked about when I leave the room than conform to that which I do not believe or trust.
Which brings me to the pool. We were in instructed by the hotel to wear a mask while sitting around the pool in lounge chairs regardless if you were next to someone or not. Again, instruction that is completely devoid of common sense. We arrived and the cheerfully short perky woman handing out towels with a pixie cut was rolling up and stacking blue and white striped towels into nice pyramids like an Olympic athlete, sanitizing her hands constantly. The fool.
We dropped our things on a couple of lounge chairs and immediately jumped into the pool when emerging from the water I coughed. Since one can’t be sick with anything but this coronavirus, the mask-wearing pool-side loungers immediately turned their attention to me, maskless in the pool, with a cough. They whispered to each other. When a couple strode in after getting towels from Perky, I was afraid they’d take the chairs next to ours. I told J I’d get rid of them and I let out another cough. As I suspected, they passed our towels and went down a few more chairs, settled in, and when I coughed again, they whispered and decided to leave (though they left their cooler behind so I figured they’d return).
Then someone else grabbed a chair a couple down from mine. This classic in shape dude in swimming trunks dropped off his towel and baseball cap and then walked away to sit at another chair on the other side of the pool. As he was walking to the chair J had a brief sneezing attack, which sent us into hysterics laughing alone in the pool. I presumed Other Chair Guy was waiting for us to leave but clearly a dip in the pool at this point in his world was probably way out of the question.
This is isolation insanity.
To ensure the trip was a total disaster, I lost my wallet, cancelled all of my credit cards, and then discovered a good Samaritan had contacted me via Instagram (still don’t know how to get messages in this highly censored social media platform). We ran over to meet her, got the wallet and I was greatly relieved.
The cherry on top that would soon slide down the whip cream and onto the pavement was that we were not able to get my Santa Barbara famous McConnell’s Turkish Coffee ice cream since they, the bastards, did not accept cash. They were afraid my “cash” could have “the virus” on it, and, well, so much for the crazy ass beach scene at Santa Barbara.
Can’t wait to not go back.
—Sketch
letters from sketch 