The season has begun and I haven’t updated OA for many months. You see, last night I took photos at the Springfield Cardinals home opener for the Springfield Daily Citizen, an online-only news source where I freelance. I accompanied a…
Author: olabner
Welcome! I've followed baseball since I was 8 years old and started this site to illustrate the beauty of the game in prose, poetry, and photography.
I have a Master's in Creative Writing at Missouri State University. For my thesis I wrote a collection of nonfiction micro essays about working in remote Alaska fishing lodges for five summers in my 20s.
After graduation I worked as a northern lights guide in Bettles, Alaska, for 8 months. You can find my favorite aurora photographs at bestnorthernlights.com
I am a freelance writer and photographer. You can find my portfolio at maryellenchiles.com
To be honest I’d never interviewed a major league player before, at least not while he was up in the big leagues. Cousin Jerry played for the Yanks, of course, but he was a prince of a man, and baseball…
Hello again. Thanks for stopping by. I (Mary) took quite a bit of time off OA due to burnout and other mental health issues. I’ve followed baseball gleefully for 30 years, but when I felt like I had to write…
Pictured: me trying to think of baseball topics to write about while the world is falling apart … (No, no, it’s the lovely Irving Lopez.) But seriously … The Cards are trying to make up time lost to covid and…
So strange to watch Kodi Whitley make his major league debut in front of empty seats. Such is baseball in the time of COVID-19. It’s still an escape from the monotony of mostly quarantining, and the anxiety caused by visiting…
NB: I wrote this in the fall of 2015 for a research methods class while working on a Master’s of English (Creative Writing Nonfiction emphasis) at Missouri State. I present it here with no edits except for subheadings (for easier…
Best pals and 2018 MLB draft picks Justin Toerner and Albee Weiss were both in minor league camp when Covid-19 shut down baseball in March 2020. Toerner, a Cardinals right fielder, was in Jupiter, Florida, while Albee, a left fielder…
Shortstop Kramer Robertson was doing well. He began the 2019 season at AA-Springfield and was promoted to Triple-A Memphis in early May, splitting the season between both cities. Then, he earned an invite to major league spring training in early…
Like many Cardinal farmhands, first baseman John Nogowski was in Jupiter, Florida, for spring training. Unlike many of his former teammates, he was playing for the major league club. He appeared in 14 games for the Cards this spring and…
A year ago catcher Drew Millas was playing in his junior year at Missouri State. The team had a rare poor season, finishing 20-36, winning just half as many games as they had in 2018. Still, he was drafted in…