For area libraries and patrons, pandemic has meant a whole new story
By Luciana Perez-Uribe and Michelle Siegel
Capital News Service
WASHINGTON When the COVID-19 pandemic emerged but before everything truly shut down Elyse Kovalsky’s first stop was the Mt. Pleasant Library on 16th Street in Northwest Washington.
“When everyone else was freaking out and going to buy toilet paper, I freaked out and went to the library,” said Kovalsky, 39, an employee at a nonprofit in the city.
“I got as many books as I could physically carry, and I remember walking home and they, at some point on 19th Street, all fell out of my hands,” she said. But at that moment, going to the library “felt like the most important thing.”