Adult Programs

Open Mic Night
Tuesday, June 16, 6:00 pm

Join us for Poetry Open Mic Night with Durham Poet Laureate Leslie Bulion! The theme this month is AGING. Bring your favorite poem or original poem to share. A sign-up sheet will be available for local poets to share one poem (max. 5 minutes), up to 14 readers. Or, just come to listen!

Registration is encouraged, and walk-ins are welcome! Come celebrate the arts in our community with an evening of poetry!

The Farmington Mastodon: CT at the End of the Last Ice Age
Tuesday, July 28, 6:00 pm

In August of 1913, workmen digging a ditch on the Hill-Stead estate of A.A. Pope in Farmington uncovered the remains of a mastodon. It is the most complete mastodon ever found in Connecticut and it has recently been radiocarbon-dated (14,900–14,200 cal BP) as has another, less complete mastodon from New Britain (13,100-12,984 ca BP).  While the stories of these mastodons are fascinating in their own right, the significance of the finds become even more apparent when considered in the light of recent archaeological finds, which push the date of documented human settlement in Connecticut back to at least 12,500 years ago. This talk, presented by Connecticut State Archaeologist Sarah P. Sportman, PhD, focuses on what these old and new discoveries tell us about Connecticut’s history and environment at the end of the last Ice Age and examines the question of whether people and mastodons might have once shared the Connecticut landscape.

The Story Underneath: Digging Beneath the One You’ve Been Telling
Thursday, July 30, 6:00 pm

Every one of us is walking around narrating a story about who we are — I’m the responsible one, I’m bad at this, I always end up here. But who actually wrote that story? More often than not, it was a much younger version of you, working with the information you had at the time — and you’ve been telling it on a loop ever since.

Drawing on her workbook “Your Personality and You,” writer and IFS (Internal Family Systems) practitioner Dr. Yael Dubin leads an hour of gentle excavation: how to recognize the old story, where it actually came from, and what it takes to begin telling a truer one. You’ll leave with a framework — and a few questions worth digging into — for understanding the parts of you that have been running the narrative, and for leading from something steadier underneath.

Bring a pen. Some of the best digging happens on the page.