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08/14/2019 08:30 AMBorn in Pittsburgh, raised in Erie, Pennsylvania—a city of around 100,000—and having spent most of her life in New York City, Jodi Kelly first found life in a small town to be an adjustment.
“I always laugh that in New York, you don’t have conversations. You kind of say, ‘All right. I’ll see you later. I’ll talk you later.’ But you never really engage.
“So it’s been a shift,” she says. “But it’s a good one. I enjoy it.”
As a single mom raising her son in the city, Jodi hoped that moving to a small town would mean having more of a community.
“It takes a village, so I was looking for a village,” she says; she found Old Saybrook.
Her son is now 18 and has “just stepped into the world,” she says, and this summer, Jodi got married.
But her commitment to her community remains as strong as it was when she first came to Connecticut, looking for that small-town feeling.
“I came here to be part of a small community and I really feel like I want to contribute to that community,” she says.
Bringing a Love of Theater
A part-time program coordinator at Old Saybrook Youth & Family Services (YFS), Jodi has a list of projects that sounds rather full time.
She runs the summer stock theater program and two week-long summer community service projects for teens. She coordinates the Early Childhood Council and the after-school program for middle schoolers. And she’s one of the several YFS employees who staff and guide the Youth Action Council, as well as the Junior Youth Action Council. In addition, she directs the Old Saybrook Middle School (OSMS) play.
The summer stock theater program was a natural for Jodi, as she comes from a theater background. Having worked as a film actress, she started her own theater company when her son was born. After a couple of years, her company was bought out by another company, which then hired her to produce shows.
“When I came [to Old Saybrook], I directed a couple of plays at The Kate with the Saybrook Stage Company,” she explains. “OSMS asked me if I would do their spring production, so I did, and I had a great time. And then when summer stock came around, because I worked here, it just felt like an easy segue. Now I’ve done the musical [at OSMS] for three years and summer stock for three years.”
The summer stock program, which takes place over two weeks each summer, has grown tremendously in recent years, she explains, with 80 children participating last year and 70 in this year’s production of Frozen Jr.
“We get together every day from 9 to 3,” she says. “And we’ve got to work through this whole play [in two weeks]. These kids are amazing. They learn I don’t know how many songs are in Frozen—at least 10. Plus all of the dances and the blocking. Then we work on costumes and sets and props. And we play games, just to keep it camp-like. It’s pretty amazing what they can accomplish.
“We have so much fun,” she continues. “I adore working with the kids and watching them learn how to play and be in their characters. And we take a lot of time...to talk about how to walk in someone else’s shoes. I even encourage them to get a different pair of shoes, walk around town as your character while you’re going through the process and really see what it’s like to have this different perspective.
“I encourage them to kind of use the process of a play to just to grow from it,” she says. “From the beginning to the end of a story, the character always changes, so as an actor, how are you changing because of this process?
Theater, Jodi says, is “an art that I truly believe in, that should be nurtured...Even in Frozen, the whole story is about melting a frozen heart,” she says. “It’s about how, when you’re hurt, you can close up. So that’s a lesson that we’re learning as we’re doing it: How do you stay open when you’re hurt?
“Art teaches us, as do books and literature, painting—they kind of teach us how to live,” she continues. “They remind us how to be human. They teach us life lessons.”
Early Childhood
Jodi’s work facilitating the Early Childhood Council, which focuses on families with children from birth through 3rd grade, is also rooted in past experience: She was formerly the executive director of the Branford Early Childhood Collaborative.
The council works “mostly with the adults that touch the child’s life,” she explains. “We work on school readiness and...any issues that we see in the community. Each year it could be a little bit different.”
This year’s focus is universal pre-K and how it affects the town’s private schools.
The council sponsors the One Book, One Town program, and this year’s book is Say Something by Peter H. Reynolds, which encourages children to express themselves with words, art, music, courage, or simply their presence. At Old Saybrook’s Family Day on Saturday, Sept. 21, the children will fill out a conversation bubble with their thoughts about their town.
“And we’ll put them all up on the gazebo,” Jodi says. “It’s pretty fun to see what the littlest residents have to say.”
To boost literacy, particularly in the summer, the council has installed “free libraries” at Trask Park, Town Beach, the mini-golf course, and the Estuary Council of Seniors, and are working on adding another at the train station. These are boxes, essentially, that Jodi regularly fills with books, donated by the library, that are free for anyone who wants them.
“We’ll go through 800, 900 books every summer,” she says. “If you’re finished reading a book, you can bring it back, you can keep [it], whatever you want,” including donating books.
The free library at Trask Park is most popular with children.
“I come to fill it up and they’re waiting,” she says. “‘What books do you have now, Library Lady?’
“It’s great to see them keeping the books, because books are starting to go out of style,” she says. “I like to make sure they’ve got them in their hands.”
Keeping Kids Engaged
OSMS students can choose from an array of after-school programs offered three days a week, thanks to Jodi’s efforts and the volunteers who are willing to share their time and expertise. The offerings range from a Magic the Gathering club to knitting to hip-hop dance classes.
“I kind of take the temperature of what the kids are interested in and then what kind of volunteers I can find that have a specialty,” Jodi explains. The purpose is “to engage [the kids] in a club so they don’t go home and watch TV or get on their computers or their phones. It keeps them there socializing and learning a new skill.”
In the summer, Jodi runs two week-long community service projects for teens, Hunger Awareness and Environmental Stewardship, that have kids helping local organizations and fulfilling their community service hours for school.
“I enjoy partnering the kids up with the organizations in town that are doing this great work,” she says. For some of the organizations, “I say, ‘Can we come? It doesn’t matter what we do. As long as we’re helping you.’
“We go over to David Brown’s house, the Hay House,” she continues. “He lives off the grid. So for the kids to go from their electronics to seeing someone that lives without electricity—I mean, he’s fascinating. We go and help on his farm.”
Uncooperative weather doesn’t hinder them.
This summer, at the Marine Educational Network, “[i]t was pouring rain and we’re out there weeding for [Kathy David, the founder and director] and washing her boats,” Jodi says. “But the kids had a great time. They worked hard. I want them to work hard. I want them to feel like they’ve earned their community service.”
It’s a lot to fit into a part-time schedule.
“My days are full,” Jodi says. “But it’s all stuff that I really believe in. It’s all work that I really think is important. I think if I found it mundane, I would be overwhelmed, but it’s things that I really think are valuable.
“These are the things that I love: books and theater,” she continues, “games and playing with kids. If I can give the thing that I love back to the community, maybe it’ll make it a little bit better for the next person.”