Axios Salt Lake City readers share their pandemic memories

Here's what you told us: "I lived in an apartment downtown at the start of COVID. I'll never forget how quiet the streets were with the lack of traffic. I had a view all the way down 200 East and the only notable lights were stop lights," Andrew G. wrote.

• "I knew it was for real when a couple hours after I'd checked into a hotel in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, cops showed up announcing they were shutting down the beach. I went up to the rooftop of the hotel and watched as cops began tackling hardcore surfers who were refusing to end their beach day." Justine M. said.
• "I was the administrative assistant in charge of the wonderful volunteers at the Huntsman Cancer hospital. It was my job to reach out to all 150 volunteers advising them that they were no longer able to serve. One of the saddest days ever!" Patrice wrote.

Kim's thought bubble: I was in the newsroom at Deseret News, my first journalism job, creating a push alert about Rudy Gobert testing positive for COVID-19. I canceled my upcoming 25th birthday party at Bar X immediately after.

Ross' thought bubble: I moved to SLC from Atlanta about two weeks before COVID changed everything. When the Rudy Gobert news broke, I was zipping around an apartment complex trying to buy a couch from someone off KSL Classifieds.

• A few days later I hustled to Ikea to get a couch and after two weeks working at KUER we went to work from home, which I've been doing ever since.

Erin's thought bubble: When the pandemic started, I was on the health beat — a job I felt fated for because I lived in China during the 2003 SARS outbreak.

• That experience was one of the reasons I became a reporter. So I immersed myself in COVID, hell-bent on answering every question I could.
• I didn't process the effect on my own life until my daughter, then 7, slid these notes under my door while I was in an interview. It broke my heart, and I knew I had to be more present.