"Buck" by M.J. Norwood

 – “Hey! Mister! Throw me a ball! Hey! Mister!”

I held it up, like a precious orb. My dad smiled but said nothing.

Constant writer and occasional author M. J. Norwood lives in East Bend, North Carolina. Her work has appeared in previous Personal Story Publishing Project publications Curious Stuff and Twists and Turns. A member of the North Carolina Writers’ Network, and active in Yadkin County’s Between the Covers Book Club, she is currently writing her third novel, and avidly supporting the Atlanta Braves. 

Author’s Talk

M.J. Norwood

I often feel that my brain needs to purchase more storage space, and I’m able to do that by getting rid of a few of my thoughts, by writing. It cleanses my head. That doesn’t mean that those thoughts are gone for good, they’re just archived. I can always revisit them, but I feel like they’re in a safe place once I’ve committed them to a readable format.  

I love the Personal Story Publishing Project because it allows for, what I consider to be, the best form of writing. These are true stories. When someone draws from personal experience, the result is the purest form of writing. I’ve written two novels, and am currently working on a third, and I’ve personally experienced the vast majority of what I’ve written. The trick is to weave those experiences into something believable and relatable. Often, it’s nonfiction that is so much more fascinating than any fiction could ever possibly be.  

I use my obsessions to my advantage. Was it Mark Twain who said that Life is directed by our obsessions? I dwell on the things I love so much that I have to know every detail about them. Like baseball. My dad instilled in me a love for the game. I craved more knowledge, and learned stats and studied the teams, and the players, and the history. All of that, no matter what the topic is, I think, creates a good writing environment. And yeah, I still have that baseball. 

My favorite baseball is stamped with the following: 

“Rawlings
Haiti
Official Ball
National League
Charles S. Feeney
Pres”

(Charles S. “Chub” Feeney was the president of the National League from 1970 - 1986.) 

The pine tar is still on the ball, on the backside, as is the grass stain and infield dirt. Gives me the warm and fuzzies.