It’s true, diamonds are a girl’s best friend.

From age 5 I loved the game. I started out playing tee ball in Concord, NC. I was the only girl on the team. It taught me how to be a good leader, friend, listener and how to be the best I can be at everything I did.

The time spent playing were the best years of my life. I met the best people and the worst. The greatest and the worst coaches. Some teammates I still talk to and others just like my Instagram posts every once in a while. Then, every time we see each other we can’t help but reminisce the years spent together practicing everyday and enduring 8-game tournaments in the middle of August.

I am proud of the many teammates I’ve known that have made it all the way to colligate level. Don’t forget me when you’re famous. For the rest of us, it sucks knowing that our gloves may never see a ball game, our cleats will remain untied, and our bats have become outdated. I’ll never forget the hotel stays for the state tournament every year, when we made it that far. I’ll never forget coming in dead last in the BB bracket when we had no business moving up to 16. I'll never forget the time our catcher broke her hand and we still came together to claim 2nd place overall in the state. I'll never forget the time we all got too old to want to spend the weekend at the ball field.

To the coach the ruined the game for me, you suck dude. There will always be a coach who is in it for politics and couldn’t care less if the girl playing short stop had talent, he only cared how fat her parents wallets were and what street she grew up on. You broke my spirit and made me hate the sport that had brightened my days for 12 years. You made me never want to pick up a bat ever again in my life, and for what? A coach like you had no business picking a team, had no business actually getting paid by a high school to coach young girls.

As for the great coaches, thank you. Thank you for pushing me to be a better player and a better person. You have always been there to cheer us up after a devastating loss whether it was championship game or just an early morning pool game. You taught me never to cry over a strike out and always stay humble after a home run. You told us never to fear the size of the opposing players and always remember the fundamentals. Yes, you could be hard on us, but always enough to make us want to do better next time. So, thank you.

One day, I hope my kids will want to kick ass on second base. I hope he/she will have a new Easton bat on their letter to Santa. Also, I hope I get to embarrass them with my undying enthusiasm I'll have for every at bat.