Tag: Valley Road

A bond beyond baseball

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The following story appears in my book Valley Road: Uplifting Stories from Down South. Get it here.

The baseball coach felt as if the pastor was talking directly to him. Sure, there was a congregation full of people, but the message was so pointed, so personal, that it felt like a one-on-one conversation. 

The sermon was about stepping outside of your comfort zone. The coach had always talked to his high school players about doing the right thing, about what he wanted them to do. He did the same when he was the coach at his previous job. He had never really shown them. 

“Baseball is just kind of an avenue for us,” he says.

When the church service was over and he went outside, he told his wife that he wanted to start a Bible study in their home with any player who wanted to come. He then called a friend, who had been a youth pastor at one time. He was all in to help. The next morning, the coach was preparing to tell his players of his new idea when one knocked on his door. He asked his coach if he would be all right with the players starting a Bible study in the locker room. He told the player that he would not believe what happened the day before.

“It was like God’s way of saying, ‘This is what you should do,’” he says.

The Bible study started the following Sunday. It was not mandatory, and players were told that it would not affect their playing time. It was totally separate from baseball. The coach figured on maybe a handful of players showing up. Fifteen of the eighteen on the roster came. Those numbers remained steady. Every Sunday during the baseball season, the players met at their head coach’s home for food, Bible study and fellowship. Sometimes, the studies lasted fifteen minutes. Sometimes, they lasted an hour. Afterward, they would watch the Sunday Night Baseball game on ESPN or play Wii. Players learned a lot about each other. They opened up about family, girlfriends, choices, college. They grew closer.

“It was an unbelievable time of team bonding away from baseball,” he says.

The coach’s favorite memory from those Bible studies is about a player who was selected in the Major League Baseball draft. He decided to instead play football and baseball at an Alabama university. That player came back to his old stomping grounds one Friday night for a football game. The coach stood with him on the sidelines. He asked if he missed the Friday night lights, playing sports at the high school level. The player said that he really didn’t. The coach was floored. How could an athlete not miss high school sports, his glory days? The one thing the player said he missed were those Bible studies.

“It just humbled me,” the coach says.

The coach has continued the Bible studies since becoming the head baseball coach at his third high school. After one of the studies, one of the boys called the coach thirty minutes after everyone left his home. He wanted to come back. They sat on his back porch for two hours, just talking. Without the Bible study, that relationship may have never deepened. 

“I think it’s more than a Bible study,” he says. “It brings kids closer together. To me, that’s the special part. And that’s the important stuff. We are giving them an avenue to talk to us.”

The Bible studies happen during the baseball season, though on some occasions they have begun in December because the kids wanted to start them earlier. The coach says the importance varies from kid to kid, from team to team. Each one has a different personality.

“I just think we’ve seen some kids grow closer together,” he says.

The coach led his current team to its first baseball state championship in school history not long ago. He will not go so far as to say the Bible study was why the team won it all, but it was clearly a factor. That team, he says, just had something different about it. They were close. During the playoff run, at Bible studies on Sundays, baseball was not even a topic of conversation. 

“We love it,” he says.

At a football game about five months after winning that state championship, the baseball team returned for the ring ceremony. There were four seniors on that team, and they had all started college at three different institutions. This was their first time being back together since graduating. The coach watched as they sat at their own table in the stadium’s press box, just sharing their experiences as college freshmen. It took the coach and his wife back to when they originally started the Bible study. 

The coach gestured toward the group and said to his wife, “Look how special that is.”

The piano man

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A chapter from “Valley Road: Uplifting Stories from Down South”by Gary Lloyd, complete with video of the man playing the piano:

As long as I have known him, he has played the piano.

At Christmas, Mr. Darby would play “Jingle Bells” and “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” at my grandmother’s house. He could have played professionally, and there is no doubt about that.

When I moved into my grandmother’s old house not far from Trussville, Alabama, the brown Wurlitzer piano remained. Its top held framed engagement and wedding photos, and its bench often acted as a resting place for bills and other mail. I never played, but there was a time, when my wife and I lived there, that Jessica would sit down on that piano bench and play. Our dog, Abby, sat with her.

When we moved out, the piano again remained. It stayed when a family friend moved in, and after he left. It has stayed since my mother-in-law moved into the house. She likes the piano there, and so do I. It provides a glimpse into the past.

The man who tickled those ivories for so many years is in his nineties now and has lived in a retirement community for a number of years. He has battled severe dementia. When he has called my parents’ house and spoken to me, he has believed I am actually my dad. When I have visited him at the retirement community, he has asked the same questions over and over. He doesn’t remember asking them the first time. Each time, I just answer him, as if it is the first time he’s asked.

This retirement community has a spacious lobby area, almost like a huge living room. There are couches, women at tables playing card games, and a huge, glass case filled with fluttering birds.

There is also a piano.

We visited the Piano Man on September 1, 2014, to see him for his birthday, which was the following week. Mr. Darby wore gray slacks and a teal sweater, and I wondered how in the world people can wear sweaters in September in Alabama.

Somehow, we convinced him to sit down at the piano and play. I wondered how he would know what to play, how he would remember which keys to press. He sat down, and muscle memory took over. He played “It Had To Be You,” not messing up a single time in a video recording that lasted one minute and four seconds. I couldn’t believe that a man who often forgot my name could do this. It was remarkable.

Elderly women stopped dealing cards. Men, aided by their walkers, came to sit closer. The staff looked on. Everyone clapped. Mr. Darby’s cheeks reddened.

That song has been recorded by famous surnames such as Sinatra, Holiday, Charles, Bennett and Stewart.

Call me biased, but I would add Darby to the top of that list.

Book of inspiring stories releases Sept. 15

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MOODY, Ala. — Gary Lloyd has released his fourth book, Valley Road: Uplifting Stories from Down South.

The book is broken down into three parts: People, Places and Play. 

In the People section, Lloyd tells stories of inspirational people, from a BMX stunt team motivating a school of elementary students to a man with severe Alzheimer’s miraculously remembering how to play a specific song on the piano. 

In the Places section, Lloyd takes readers on a heartening and descriptive ride through the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, to the concrete jungle of New York City, to the Green Monster at Fenway Park, to the azaleas at Augusta National Golf Club, and many places in between. 

In the Play section, high school coaches from around the Southeast tell their favorite stories, words that have never made the Sports section of their local newspapers. In exclusive interviews with Lloyd, they talk about why they became coaches, about basketball saving lives, about baseball players gathering for Bible studies, about a serve-others-first mentality.

“This has been a book I wanted to put together for a long time,” Lloyd said. “So much focus these days is on the 24-hour news networks, the horrible things that people say and do. I believe this is a book that many people need to read these days. They need to know that life in the 21st century is about much more than political debates, riots and negativity. This book is a collection of stories about the good in the world, about undisturbed land in Ellijay, Georgia, about ‘Stop For Prayer’ signs in the Wal-Mart parking lot, about a man retiring after more than fifty years in city service pleading for his wife to be thanked publicly for her support.”

Former University of Alabama quarterback Jay Barker, who led the Crimson Tide to the 1992 national championship, praised Valley Road.

“Gary shows in this book how coaches, youth pastors and community leaders truly impact the people around them and in turn impact communities in such a positive way. Each chapter demonstrates the positive impact of such people and reminds me of how such people have impacted my life, and encourages me and others to do the same. This book is a must read and one that hopefully encourages us all to realize the impact we can have on the people around us.”

Sean Dietrich, the author of seven books about life in the American South, also commented on the book.

“Gary Lloyd writes with fervor that leaves the reader feeling something akin to a plate of blackberry cobbler—with vanilla ice cream, of course. This book, and Gary himself, are gems in this world.”

Valley Road was published through CreateSpace Independent Publishing. The book is available on www.Amazon.com for $10 and on Kindle as an e-book for $7.99.

Lloyd is also the author of Trussville, Alabama: A Brief History, published by The History Press in 2014. He has also written two novels, Deep Green and Heart of the Plate, also available on Amazon.com. 

Lloyd has been a journalist in Mississippi and Alabama. He grew up in Trussville, Ala., and earned his bachelor’s degree in journalism from The University of Alabama in 2009. He lives in Moody, Ala., with his wife, Jessica, and their two dogs, Abby and Sonny. 

For more information, email garylloydbooks@gmail.com. Also visit www.garylloydbooks.squarespace.com and Like his author page at www.facebook.com/GaryLloydAuthor. 

Authors

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When you tear the tape on the heavy cardboard box delivered by UPS, dreams tend to pour out. 

You run your fingers across the matte covers of a hundred books, and you almost can’t believe it’s your name printed on them, your words in black ink inside. It’s surreal. 

You have grand visions for your future. You see a line of people out the door at Books-A-Million and Barnes and Noble, clutching your book for you to sign. You see news articles about your book in publications across the country, praising its prose and description, and maybe it’s even on the bestsellers list. You see royalty checks rolling in that pay for vacations to the beach. 

Those are all extreme examples, but you dream of them, at least a little bit. Why do something if you don’t want it to be the best? But the harsh truth is very few authors reach the mountaintop of writing books, where all you do is write bestsellers that are turned into blockbuster movies. For most of us, it goes a little something like this. 

Your first book signing ever is held at a posh store near Birmingham, Alabama, where your name and photo appear on a large poster outside. You feel like royalty. You sign a couple dozen pre-ordered books in a back room. You expect to do the same in the two-hour event that follows, but mostly you chat with the store owner about his business model, and with your parents about what’s for dinner later. You sell two books to the same man. 

Your next signing is at a bookstore not far away from the first one, and maybe ten customers come in the two hours you are there. About four acknowledge your existence, as if you are the DirecTV rep begging for people’s time in Wal-Mart. You play Hangman on notebook paper with your wife to pass the time, which helps. You sell no books, but you beat your wife in at least one game of Hangman. 

Your next signing is the one you are looking forward to the most. You just know that the third time is the charm. It is in your hometown, which is also the focus of your book. The event is in a high-traffic area, near an Old Navy and a Target. It’s on a Saturday. This will be great. The publishing company has sent posters previewing your signing to be taped to the windows, so folks will know when to come by. You arrive, and the employees have no clue who you are, or about any book signing event, for that matter. You have been forgotten, and you sell one book. You try to ease your anger about the store’s forgetfulness with more games of Hangman. This time, it doesn’t help much. 

Your next signing event is a true act of desperation, held at a large grocery store in a city full of people who have never heard of you or your book. You wonder why this was even scheduled. You sit near the small section of books the store carries, and awkwardly watch as people push shopping carts full of Gatorade, chicken breasts and vanilla ice cream. One man is intrigued by your work, and he asks you a dozen questions as he flips through your book. He does not buy it. 

This is rock bottom. You wonder if those eight months of research pressed into more than one hundred pages was worth it. You didn’t write the book for the money, but sitting for two hours without selling one is embarrassing and seemingly a waste of time. Then, something great happens. 

You publish your second book, and a church invites you to talk about it and sign copies. You are nervous, because talking in front of a crowd does not exactly seem easy. But you do it anyway, because it is marketing for your book. It goes surprisingly well. You talk for half an hour about your inspirations and the book’s plot, and answer a dozen questions. You connect with this group, and their laughs don’t sound like pity. Almost every little old lady that Wednesday night buys a book. You make five hundred bucks and give some back to the church. You are energized to do more. 

You put out a third book, and it’s back to the drawing board. You promote as much as you can on social media, begging for likes, retweets and positive Amazon reviews. Mostly, those come from your wife and mom. You spend hours looking up independent bookstores in every state, emailing them about your new book. You email a hundred stores and get four responses, all with words you weren’t hoping for. You do the same with various newspapers, hoping for any bit of publicity. You get three stories locally and one in Mississippi. You take your new book and the first two to many locations to snap photos of them for social media promotions. You take photos at a river, baseball field, church parking lot, abandoned business with a rusting door, Turner Field in Atlanta and even your driveway. You hope those images, along with excerpts from the books, draw attention. 

Finally, it’s time for another book signing. You’ve never attended one where there are a dozen authors, but it sounds like a good idea. There will be many people with various tastes, you believe. It is held at a general store just outside the main shopping district in town, where there is not much around. You load your own table and chairs, and a box of books. Because it is held in December, your wife bakes Christmas cookies for the event. Authors are scattered all over the store, between old Texaco signs, a crock pot, carved crosses and other antiques. 

One author has written about her experiences with cancer. Another has written a children’s book. A woman has written about adoption. One man, with more than five books to his name, plays a guitar at his table. Another man, who calls you “Brother,” passes out a poem he wrote that he printed on computer paper. Not many people come to this store during the four hours you are scheduled to stay. Four hours feels like eight. You sell one book, to a man who is about to undergo surgery and needs all the reading material he can get during his rest and rehab period. 

Six months later, you sign up for another large event, this one at a state park along a huge lake. It’s summer, and you assume that it will be well attended, with people swimming and fishing nearby. There is room for fifty authors. Fifteen or so show up. The authors are set up right on the lake, and you’re visited more by hungry mallards than locals seeking the latest in Christian fiction. You feed chili-cheese-flavored Fritos to the ducks and kick yourself for not bringing your rod and reel.

You sell two books: one to your mom for one of her friends, another to the wife of a co-worker. You mostly spend the day talking with fellow authors, about their inspirations and writing processes. You learn about how a man stumbled upon hundreds of documents that told the story of his father in World War II. You learn about adoption. You learn what it takes to write more than three hundred pages. More than anything, you learn about people. You get to know these people better. They become friends and supporters. 

You sell only the two books that day, but you soon realize that might be more than the others sitting near you sold. Some have traveled far for this event, and you feel for them. You help one author take his books back to his car. But they are happy, not deterred by going home with the same amount of books they brought. It is their passion, this writing thing. You learn, after three years grinding in this industry, that money isn’t everything. The industry, like most everything else, is about relationships. Your wife has been to all your events, baking cookies for them, taking in the little bit of money you make, smiling through dozens of games of Hangman. Your mother-in-law has driven to each book signing since she’s lived in Alabama, and even made you a book-themed tablecloth that is asked about and complimented by fellow authors at every event. Your parents and brother have come, and they have bought copies at signings even though they know you’d give them books for free. 

I didn’t get into this industry to make thousands of dollars, though a few hundred would be nice. I did it to tell stories that are worthy of sitting on your bookshelf or coffee table, to put something in print that provides some light in an increasingly dark world. Who knows, maybe some day long after I’m gone someone will read one of my books and say, “I needed that.” I’m going to keep writing as long as I’m able, with that in mind. These authors I sit with in an old general store or in the blazing heat to sell maybe one book inspire me. They fuel my passion. I hope I fuel theirs.

And that’s worth more than any royalty check.