I can’t help it. It happens every time. Every single time.
Even though I live and breathe baseball vicariously through my husband, who works for the ballclub, when I go to Camden Yards, it’s as if I never left.
As the old theme song states, “Something magic happens.”Be forewarned: take me to Camden Yards, and I get sentimental.
With the pandemic seeping into every aspect of our lives, I haven’t been to the ballpark in a year and a half. On Friday night, our family enjoyed a lovely outing and got to spend time “at the yard,” as Orioles fans like to say.
Luckily for us, the team had a big win Friday night over the Nats and ended up taking the series 3-0. But the truth is, whether the team wins or loses, the magic of Camden Yards remains.
When I tell people I grew up there, I mean it. I grew up there. At 19, I landed my job as a part-time public relations assistant in college shortly after I switched my major to mass communication and knew I needed an internship. In that professional atmosphere, among so many other colleagues and friends, I grew up fast. I learned from the late, great PR Director Bob Brown what a work ethic is. I learned what it means to budget your time. I learned the basics and nuances of sturdy public relations and community relations practices. I tried new things, new tasks, made friends with people older and younger than myself. I had to deal with the media, the public and the players. As a young person learning the field (pun intended), there was something incredibly magical about working there.
I’m also happy that my husband gets to continue to work there since returning to the club in February of 2020.
So, here’s what else has happened.
When I got back from the game, I picked up my novel called Baseball Girl that I published back in 2015. I haven’t read it in six years. I started to reread it. Its limited success has always bothered me. There’s been constructive discussion among my family members that perhaps the title of the book may not be indicative of what the book is actually about. But it totally fits the story if you read the novel.
It is NOT about a girl who plays baseball.
It IS about a woman who works in the sport. She has lost her father and they shared a love of baseball. When she secures the job working for a professional baseball team as I did at the age of 19 and grows with the ballclub, she becomes entangled in a love triangle with a player and a sports writer.
Perhaps the title Baseball Girl has scared people away; perhaps it needs to be redesigned.
So, I’m thinking of a cover revamp.
It’s a story loosely based on my life working in baseball. It’s sentimental and chock full of real stories that I fictionalized to tell this tale. There are life lessons molded into the chapters, lessons that can be learned from baseball.
If you enjoy a good love triangle, fun characters, and you like baseball okay (you don’t have to love it to read the book), you might enjoy this romp as a summer read.
I get sentimental thinking about my time in baseball, and this novel is the best way I can share that time with you.
Here’s what I’m thinking for the redesign.
Thoughts?