“I was lucky enough to be chosen
as the official Texas Rangers Bat girl,”
Locks said. “My husband nominated
me. Each of the 30 Major League
Baseball teams has an Official Bat Girl.
On that day they brought me out and I
got a pink bat engraved with my name.
I got to throw out the first pitch.
All of the players wear pink. I was
incredibly honored to be able to do
that.”
Locke told Dr. Gunter about her
upcoming Bat Girl experience.
“Monday, I was at work and I
got a call from Dr. Gunter’s Office,”
Locke said. “It was Victoria from
Dr. Gunter’s Office and she said that
Dr. Gunter had gone to my game and
she had taken a video of me throwing
out the first pitch and she had sent
it to me.”
“From then, it was getting back to
the norm. I would go in super early so
I could take off to go to radiation. I had
been at that job for 11 years”. She took
off two days on the day of her surgery
and the day after. Other than that Locke
was the same super-reliable worker she
had always been.
After arriving home one afternoon
Locke began reflecting on her career
and her life.
“I was not happy with work,” she
recalls. The company she had been
with for 12 years had recently sold and
although there was no one reason why
she was not happy in her job, the fact
remained that she wasn’t happy with
that aspect of her life.
Her husband, John Locke asked her,
“What’s wrong?’
Her reply was, “Nothing.”
“My husband is retired from The
Navy and he’s now with Lockheed
Martin,” Locke said. “He said, ‘Why
don’t you take off for a while? You
know, we can do that.”
Locke longed to go into volunteer
work. She wanted to do something to
help other people who were battling
cancer. She was looking around for
a charitable organization, one she
could help, a place where she could
do some volunteer work.
Locke did some volunteer
work but she didn’t find it to be an
emotionally rewarding experience.
Locke’s husband found out
through the Internet, that Dr. Gunter
participated in the Careity Foundation
Celebrity Cutting event. The Lockes
bought tickets to the event.
“I wondered if they needed help?”
“We bought tickets and I met
Beverly Branch,” Locke said. “There
was just something about her. I said to
her, ‘I have volunteered with another
charity.’”
She immediately began volunteering
for Careity Foundation.
“The feeling I got from (the
co-founders of Careity) Lyn (Walsh)
Steve Buechele and Kim Locke
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