Summary

Caytha Jentis recounts her life-long journey with softball, from her first co-ed team to playing in various leagues across different stages of her life, finding joy, camaraderie, and a sense of meaning through the sport.

Abstract

Caytha Jentis's experience with softball began in the Advertising League as a fill-in for a team needing female players, leveraging her athletic background in tennis and a natural affinity for sports. Over the years, she played in multiple leagues, including a Mom's Softball League in suburban New Jersey, where she found a strong sense of community and support, especially during challenging times like 9/11 and the pandemic. Despite her children growing up and moving away, Caytha continues to play, embracing the diversity of players and the thrill of the game. Now in her fifties, she plays for the Writer's Guild East team, relishing the camaraderie that softball provides, which serves as a counterbalance to the solitary nature of writing. Her passion for the sport has led her to play on four teams simultaneously, viewing it as a significant part of her life's purpose.

Opinions

Softball offers a unique blend of camaraderie and diversity, welcoming players of various ages, classes, races, and sizes.
The sport serves as a supportive outlet for bonding, particularly among mothers in the Mom's Softball League.
The league has evolved to become more competitive as more women with sports backgrounds join, yet it maintains a supportive atmosphere.
Softball provides a sense of community and healing, helping players to navigate through personal and collective hardships.
The joy of softball lies in the excitement of the game, the satisfaction of making a good play, and the opportunity to form unexpected friendships.
For Caytha, softball is not just a hobby but a meaningful aspect of her life, offering her a sense of purpose and fulfillment.

Finding the Meaning of Life Thru Softball

The first adult softball team I played on was in the Advertising League. I didn’t work in advertising, but my friend worked for an agency that needed more female players. A perk of being a female athlete is that there is always a co-ed team in need of women.

I hadn’t played softball in high school, but I was a division one tennis player and an all- around scrappy sporty girl. High level tennis is an individual blood sport, so I welcomed a social big team sport, and my skills transferred. I have good hand eye coordination, am a fast runner and can properly throw a ball.

That said, the bar was usually low for teams in need of the league’s requisite number of female players. Back then, a female ringer was like winning the lottery. Most teams merely looked for a reliable enthusiastic warm feminine body to fill out the roster.

We played in Central Park and on Randall’s Island. As a twenty-something living in New York City, there was nothing more fun than wearing a company branded team jersey, playing on a Central Park field followed by celebrating a win or loss at a local sports bar with teammates.

The following year I played in the publishing league. We played on the Lower East Side fields near the East River. I worked for a small literary agency but played on the team at a larger agency who needed another female player. After the season, I got offered a job. I joked I didn’t get hired but drafted.

What I love about softball is the camaraderie. I love that the levels of play can run the gamut. I love the diversity of the players — age, class race and size. I love the thrill of connecting with the ball followed by the full speed sprint to first base, or the realization that the fly ball is safely in my mitt, or that I have fielded a hard grounder and made an infield play to a base. I love making new unexpected friends through a shared passion.

Years passed before I played on another team. I left NYC, moved to Los Angeles, had two kids, and then moved back east with my family to live in suburban New Jersey.

It didn’t take long for me to learn that our town had a Mom’s Softball League. Each team was affiliated with one of the town’s six elementary school districts. When my first child entered Kindergarten, I signed up. The rules were simple: only mothers could play, and fathers were not allowed to coach. While we played, our kids rooted for us or ran around and played with each other.

When I first joined the league, it was more recreational than competitive since some players were new to softball and others new to sports in general, but all were welcome. For a couple of seasons, our team was called “The Poke-Moms” while another’s jersey proudly proclaimed, “Just Another Thing Your Mother Can Do!”

I have played and continue to play on this team for twenty plus years even though my kids graduated years ago, and I no longer live in the town: you can take the kid out of the school, but not the mom off the field.

Many of my teammates have played as long as I, one even longer, and a couple are now even grandmas!

Since more women have participated in sports growing up, the level of play and competitiveness increased over the years. That said our league remains a supportive way to bond with other mothers.

Willard Mom’s Softball Team, Photo by Katie Saladucha

We grieved and healed together after 9/11 when our community lost loved ones. We got through the pandemic together when the league found a way to have a safe ‘modified’ season last summer. We had fun auditioning for a Bravo reality show and have off season activities like trivia and game nights. It is a special sisterhood that I look forward to each summer.

Back in the city now a fifty-something, I joined the Writer’s Guild East team when I became a union member. When I stepped on the Central Park field at the first game of the season, I felt the same giddy thrill as I did back when I was a twenty-something.

That feeling hasn’t worn off. I proudly smile every time I head to our assigned field. Writing can be a lonely blood sport profession, so I welcome this social big team.

WGAe 2021 (partial) Softball Team, Caytha Jentis Photo

I share the field with news and tv/film writers — young and old — fledgling and experienced — who share with me a passion for softball and telling stories.

At a game two seasons ago, a teammate asked me if I wanted to play on another team that needed a female player. Without missing a beat, I said “sure’ — no questions asked.

When I learned the team played in Brooklyn, an hour and two subways from my apartment, I realized I should’ve asked a question, but this was my first time playing on a field in Brooklyn, so a new softball experience. I nervously arrived with no idea the level of play. Was I going to be ‘out of my league?’’

I noticed I was the only female player. When I asked where the other women were, I was told this league only required one woman on the field!

I gulped and hoped that I wouldn’t embarrass or more importantly hurt myself. Mind you, I’m not afraid of getting injured, you can’t play sports if you are — but these were fast young strong… men. They supportively reassured me that I’d be fine, and I was. So I schlep to Brooklyn to fulfill a Tomboy bucket list fantasy.

Having that under my belt, I took my game to the West Coast and guest played once on my then manager’s mens team in Los Angeles that was short players while I was out there for meetings. I RBI’d him home when I was at bat. Talk about a thrill.

This season, I added another co-ed team that needed women for a Sunday Central Park league. Technically I am on four teams. It may sound like an addiction, and perhaps it is… or perhaps, for me, it’s my meaning of life. As long as teams need women, I’ll be their girl of summer.