Salt Lake morphed from boomtown to ghost town in 24 hours. Walking down State Street the night after the 2002 Olympic Winter Games ceremoniously concluded, an eerie stillness permeated downtown. Yet watching the Games end can ultimately remind us of all the good things we still have.

For permanent residents, the post-Olympic silence represents a well-known feeling, a melancholy yet familiar old friend. Like the feeling after your birthday party ends and the guests leave, Salt Lakers find themselves in an empty house, longing for excitement and wondering how to pass the spare time.

In the aftermath of the grandest party our state will ever host, Utahns reluctantly address the question of what comes after the gold rush. For those expecting a sustained economic boom, consider the possibility that the recession affecting the rest of the country will finally touch us.

Relative to other states, particularly in the West, Utah’s employment rate and fiscal health have remained strong. Yet trouble looms as the state Legislature debates solutions to the first significant budget deficit in recent memory. News of Dick Simon, Utah’s second largest trucking company, filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy further distorts an already unpleasant picture.

Will budget cuts and an end to the Olympic construction spree bring the recession home? Only time will tell, but the possibility of higher unemployment and regular budget deficits spill dark paint across the canvass of Utah’s economic horizon.

Students returning from the bliss of a month-long Olympic vacation cannot claim immunity from the state’s fiscal trouble. In fact, education may take a significant hit. As the budget shortfall grows, higher education stands to suffer funding cuts, along with numerous other programs and agencies. Budget cutting leads to the inevitable tuition increase, meaning nastier bills for students.

Few Utahns, if any, will escape the effects of our state’s financial quandary. Larger tuition hikes appear less a threat and more a reality to which students may become painfully accustomed.

Of course, money alone doesn’t make people happy, and therefore the lack of it cannot single-handedly break our spirits. Closer to the heart, U students may feel the blues of post-party loneliness. Long before the Winter Games commenced, Olympic fever began growing at the U and around Salt Lake. The extension of Trax, the enormous torch-bearer covering the social and behavioral science phallic tower, even the annoyance of limited parking reminded students of the coming Games.

Few events ever live up to the pre-game hype. Even if we consider the Olympics a resounding success, nothing equals the excitement in the air before the games actually arrived. Returning to class and recalling what occurred mere days and weeks before evokes the loneliest of longings?wishing for a time and place that no longer exists.

Beyond the narrow confines of our academic enclave, the larger community feels a similar void as life returns to normal. Tuning into NBC will not reveal images of our town shrouded in Olympic glory. Despite the misguided hopes of many, the world will not continue flocking to Salt Lake.

Surely, most visitors and television viewers will retain a positive image of Utah. The locals are friendly and the setting is gorgeous, even if the air occasionally thickens like so much filthy pea soup.

But what the world saw of Salt Lake?whether via broadcast or with their own eyes?was a snapshot. The two-week glance represents a momentary freeze frame. No visitor or television viewer can understand Utah’s desolate beauty. The subtle nuances, the quirks and qualities escape passing travelers.

The Olympics offered a one shot opportunity to present the outside world with a brief and ultimately superficial impression of ourselves. Making that impression a positive one may temporarily satisfy, but the feeling is fleeting.

The Winter Games will move on to Italy, then somewhere else, and yet another place after that. A line in an almanac or the answer to a trivia question marks Salt Lake’s final Olympic destination.

We now face the task of coming down from our Olympic high. The best prescription for such a massive hangover? Revel in the fact that we still have this place to call our own. Those who watched from afar or visited up-close saw only a limited display. We get to spend every day in a place that the rest of the world will never understand. Only we can appreciate its rugged beauty and idiosyncratic temperament.

Utahns are strange?probably a little too judgmental and self-conscious. But sincere and honest intentions concerning ourselves and our community remind us that we’re doing the best we can.

Salt Lake will never be New York or Chicago or San Francisco, nor should it be. Remaining a relatively isolated outpost in the Intermountain West allows us to keep for ourselves the community and the landscape we so cherish.

The rat race has its place, and those who wish to play its ruthless game can do that in any number of big cities. Salt Lake offers something else. Our city’s size allows for culture and entertainment, but it also saves room for participants. One can easily access downtown or procure tickets to most events. Try getting into a Knicks basketball game in New York.

Perhaps the impossibility of having your cake and eating it too seems clearer to us. So while boomtowns enjoy their image and notoriety, let’s thank our lucky stars that Salt Lake has enough breathing room and friendliness to retain some of the better elements of a small-town mentality.

Closing the Games brings a certain sorrow, but our contentment lies in what visitors can never take away. This is our home. Whatever the economic, social and political forecast predicts, let’s face it together and continue making this place the best home it can be.

James welcomes feedback at: [email protected] or send letters to the editor to: [email protected].