The stock market wasn’t the only thing going off the rails over the roller-coaster tariff threats.

I used to have a pantry; now I have a hoarde.

Who wasn’t doing the math and freaking out at the prospect of tomatoes costing as much as a trip to Mexico?

I went into high gear. Shopping sales, stocking shelves, menu planning into the fall. I can’t afford to have my grocery bill triple or quadruple in a game of chicken. And I don’t want to return to the days of shortages and runs on toilet paper.

On the upside, concern over rising prices and subsequent shortages gave me a mission — a way to control something in a world where everything now seems out of control.

I can’t save our national parks. I can’t enforce the rule of law. And, beyond calling my members of Congress to complain about threats to voting rights, women’s rights, human rights and funding for just about every social service, I can’t make officials abide by the very Constitution they swore to uphold.

But I can stock my freezer.

I can buy a storage cabinet and fill it.

And I can double the size of my garden.

That is exactly what I have been doing these past weeks, accumulating stuff, planting stuff and trying to stay one step ahead of the madness.

We are living in a hurricane. It has been four months of wind shear and loose debris. Of course, I am trying to batten down my hatches and gather necessities for my family.

I don’t want to be frantic. I don’t want to be angry.

And I don’t want to chase BOGO sales.

Yet here I am.

Just a few months ago, my personal economy was doing quite well. Sure, eggs were pricey, but not as costly as watching the 401(k) drop by the thousands.

Now, everything seems hard, uncertain and more expensive.

I’ve heard many speculate that the tariff war is a ruse more than a strategy, but how am I to distinguish threats from promises?

If you tell me the price of an item is going to be slapped with a 150% tax, of course I’m going to stock up now rather than be sorry later.

So, I bought canned tomatoes, pasta, olive oil and rice. I stocked dish soap, laundry soap and over-the-counter meds.

And just when I had enough dry storage to make a survivalist proud, the astronomical tariffs were reduced by a hundred or so percentage points.

Am I supposed to feel relieved? Or are we simply in the eye of the storm right now?

I don’t understand what, if anything, is the real goal here, other than some vague notion about taking America back to its factory “glory” days, which seems like a job for the “Mission: Impossible” team given how diversified manufacturing is today.

I am fortunate that I have yard space to plant 30 tomato seedlings. I am fortunate that I have the resources to stock my freezers in advance.

But this hardly feels like “winning.”

In fact, with each passing day, I feel like we are losing — our sense of security, our savings and sometimes our minds.

Through it all, I wonder how the billionaire sleeps at night.

How can someone who has more than he could possibly spend in a lifetime not think about reciprocity? How can someone capable of solving profound problems, including world hunger, turn his back on the suffering?

It is because of the 1 percent’s insatiable desire to hoard that the rest of us are compelled to squirrel away canned goods and wrap that half-eaten biscuit for later. It is because of the billionaire that so many live in poverty.

And yet, increasingly, it is the bloated hoarder that is celebrated in our culture. Confounding.

I was buoyed by the stories retold at Pope Francis’ passing. His devotion to the marginalized made him a superstar in my book.

When I toured the Vatican in 2017, our guide told us that each night, the pope traded his white robes for nondescript clothes so he could go outside the Vatican walls and mingle with the poor without drawing attention.

His mission was to serve real people who needed real help.

His successor, Pope Leo XIV, appears to be cut from the same cloth.

Not only does he advocate for kindness and mercy, he is from our very backyard.

Unlike many of my Facebook friends, I have never met, eaten pizza with or lived on the same block as the new pontiff. And my blood runs Cubbie blue. Still, I am filled with hope.

To think that maybe the people who care about people, who put kindness and compassion above greed and opulence, just might “have a guy.”

The contrast in character between the current top American leaders is incredible.

It reminds me that our choices define our character. And they determine our footprint on history. It also reminds me that in reacting to scare tactics, I don’t want to become the very thing I disdain — greedy.

I would much rather go into the books as someone who over-gave than someone who over-took.

Pardon me while I head to the food pantry with part of my cache, to help the very people the billionaires won’t.

Donna Vickroy is an award-winning reporter, editor and columnist who worked for the Daily Southtown for 38 years. She can be reached at donnavickroy4@gmail.com.