Family and Fastpitch

Intro

My mother died when I was nine years old.

I know, great way to start the story, but I think that you should know now so that you can understand my story later. She was in the car with my baby brother, and they were heading to the store. Somebody was driving under the consumption of alcohol, an they ran through a red light an hit my mother, along with another car (a couple was sitting in the car, but they survived because they didn't get as much of an impact). So for the last seven years, I've been living with my dad.

He's become my best friend in the past years. We've done everything together, especially baseball and softball. My dad was on a baseball team in college (a pitcher, like me), so I've learned from him the most. Before our town started softball, when I was about five years old, I was on the baseball team. I was the only girl on the team, but I kind of liked that; I was different than them, plus there was a lot less drama. I was their catcher, and I still remember how to do it to an extent.  When I was about eight years old, they added softball to the little league system that our area had. I still stayed close with the main pitcher on the baseball team, Jack. He's become another one of my best friends.

Once I joined the softball team, I was really shy at first. As a couple months went by, I started to get to know everyone better, and we grew really close. I started going to pitching clinics and batting cages every once in a while, and I became the main pitcher. They all felt like a second family to me: the girls became sisters, my dad was already one of our coaches, and my other coach, Coach Jett (who later also became my language arts teacher), felt like a mother.  They helped my get through the car accident, too, which I think is one of the main ways that I became close to them.

I'm in tenth grade now, I'm 16 years old, and I play for our high school team. Coach Jett is a coach of the team (I had her for language arts in my freshman year) and the major team in the little leagues. My dad still coaches the same team that she does, too. Most of the girls that were on my old softball team are on the high school team. Jack is the pitcher on the baseball team (we're still close), I'm the pitcher on the softball team, and five of the girls from my old team (Cassidy, Faith, Kylie, Samantha, and Ilah) are on the high school team.