How to Stop Bowling Alone: The Free Time Fair
Coming to Tracy Hall, June 22
You don’t have to bowl alone.** Or bowl at all. But everyone agrees that you need social contact, and maybe a sense of purpose, both to maintain your own good mental health and to keep your community vibrant. Rachael Thomeer and friends may be able to help you by answering the question “what’s there to do?”
Thomeer is a member and Special Major Events Chair of the Upper Valley Young Professionals. They have spent the last year putting together The Free Time Fair—“like a job fair, but for fun things”—to help people learn about social and other activities in the Upper Valley. Why is it needed here in the friendly, community-minded UV? She explains:
Difficulty making connections is certainly not unique to the Upper Valley, last year the US Surgeon General issued an advisory [worth a read] about the epidemic of loneliness. The Upper Valley, being a group of separate rural communities, is an especially challenging place to make connections because there is no central hub. Once you learn about the Vital Communities listserv, newsletters like Artful and Daybreak, and join the local Facebook groups, it gets easier to find things to do. I heard about all of those things by word of mouth. A lot of our UVYP members moved to the UV for work or to follow a partner. How are new people without any connections in town supposed to know where to look to learn about all of the fantastic community events?
And there is a certain reciprocity.
There are a lot of people, especially young people, in the UV looking for things to do. And on the flip side, there are amazing organizations who always need new members and volunteers. The goal of this event is to connect people with things for them to do for fun in the community outside of work.
So, if you’re looking to make new friends with shared interests, find out about volunteer positions, or simply want to stroll through the fair to survey what’s available in the UV, here is what you need to know:
All are welcome, and the event is free. No need to be a member of the Upper Valley Young Professionals. You don’t even have to be young.
There are 36 participating organizations, like AVA Gallery and Northern Stage, Alzheimer’s Association and the CCBA, Dayhike and Dine and UV Salsa, the Hartford Salamander Team and The Slow Runners Club (see below). A full list of participants can be found here. Click on the organizations that might interest you and read a short blurb about each.
The Slow Runners Club is a place for slow runners to get together and run! If you are interested in starting, if you can run a little not a lot, if you are a sometimes jogger, if you haven’t run in years, if your running shoes haven't seen pavement, if you hate running but want to love it...no matter what, there’s a place and a pace for you!
The location is Tracy Hall, Norwich, Vermont, June 22, 11:00 am to 2:00 pm.
**What’s with the bowling reference? In a previous Artful post (here), I wrote about the film, Join, or Die, which was recently screened at the White River Indie Film Festival. It was based on the book, Bowling Alone, by our New Hampshire near-neighbor, Robert Putnam.
“Putnam has devoted his life to researching what makes some societies thrive and others sink, and has hit upon the concept of “social capital.” The more that people come together, know one another’s names, build trust with one another, the better not just for the individuals involved, but for the entire society. And that is understating it, as the film’s title Join, or Die asserts. No more “I’m not much of a joiner” attitude. Your life, and the life of your community, is at stake.”—Artful, 2/20/24
(Photo, top, via Pixabay’s Content License)
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And in case you are wondering . . . Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.