February 2026 Athlete of the Month
By Del Moon, NSGA Storyteller
Brenda “B.J.” Jones, 65
Clarksville, Tennessee
Softball
Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
Maintaining an active lifestyle is essential, but it’s just one aspect of robust aging. Finding social connections and keeping your brain engaged are also key to longevity.
Senior softball pitching ace Brenda Jones has known this intuitively for her entire life and is excited to now have time to explore her creative side as an author.
“I’ve been playing softball ever since I was like six years old, and I finally published my first book at the age of 58,” the Tennessee native shares. “It’s never too late to try something new that’s going to improve you.”
A Lifelong Love of Sports
Brenda, known by most as B.J., is proud to be a late-blooming author, but it’s clear her entire life has revolved around sports. She grew up in a blended family with 13 siblings in Union City, a small west Tennessee town with one high school. All she cared about was reading books and if there were enough kids around to play basketball and softball.
By the time she became a teenager, B.J. was playing on a mostly adult community softball team that went on the road in the summers. “We’d get in our cars and go to different places – Jackson, Tennessee, Cairo, Illinois, Dyersburg, Tennessee – just wherever we could find teams to play,” she recalls.
Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
There was always time to play ball, even throughout her 26-year career as a banking compliance officer and busy mother. She also found her wedding diamond on a diamond, so to speak.
“I went to watch some neighborhood guys play baseball, and that’s where I first saw this really cute guy, and he ended up becoming my husband, Anthony. We’re both pitchers, and he had a college career at Middle Tennessee State. We’ve been married for 42 years, so that was a nice perk!”
A competitive nature led B.J. to embrace the role of a pitcher. “You’re the captain of the team out there, right? Everything starts and ends with what you do on the mound,” she says. “The mental battle never stops. If I walk somebody, I have to push ‘reset’ from batter to batter and inning to inning. Pitchers can’t take what happened in the prior inning back to the mound. We have to remain engaged the entire time and focus on one batter at a time.” She then adds, “I pray a lot on the mound.”
“My accuracy is not always what it should be,” she continues with a growing smile. But when I’m on, there’s nothing more exciting than striking someone out looking. I love that!”
Finding “Extra Innings” with Senior Games
In her late 40s, B.J. was playing on a women’s league team and was invited to play in the Nashville qualifier for the 2011 National Senior Games presented by Humana in Houston. She turned 50 in time to join the team and fell in love with her team experience.
B.J. continued playing regional tournaments with various teams until she was invited to join the East Coast Gems in 2018. The team, now in the 60+ division and called Gems Next Level, has kept its core players and found success, winning division gold medals at the National Senior Games in 2023 & 2025. They also have won gold the past two years against strong competition at the Huntsman World Senior Games.
“I love my teammates. These ladies started out as my friends, and now they’re my family,” she says. “When we play in Nashville, I live 45 minutes from the ballfield and will host teammates and a barbecue. One time, I had eight of my teammates come stay at my house, and I loved every minute of it.”
The Gems Next Level at the 2025 National Senior Games presented by Humana. Image courtesy Brenda Jones.
She says softball also taught her lessons about perseverance. “I ruptured my Achilles on my right foot during a softball game, and it was the hardest thing for me to be away from it,” she says. “But I appreciated the sport more, and it made me work harder to rehab so I could get back out here. So, even if a challenge comes, don’t be afraid of the challenge, because you can grow through it.”
The Author Emerges
B.J. has been writing poetry as a hobby since grade school, but during her banking career writing was mostly relegated to communications and analytical regulatory reports. Eventually, she was able to follow the dream of becoming an author and penned her first novel, “Not Yet a Woman,” which earned a Distinguished Favorite award for women’s literature in 2019.
Eight years later, she is still writing and has her own “W.C. Child” webpage. The third novel of her planned trilogy will be completed in 2026. She has also produced a spiritual guide and two books of poetry, but relishes being a storyteller. “I love the challenge. I like writing because I get to be somebody else through the characters.”
Speaking of being someone else, we asked why she uses W.C. Child as her pseudonym. “My father, Willmor Caldwell, never got a chance to see me publish a book. To honor him, my pen name stands for “Willmor Caldwell’s Child.”
Acting on a dream to become a writer in midlife has empowered Brenda to share advice with friends. “If you ever stop wanting to grow and take on new ideas, then you’re mentally defeated. It’s never too late,” she says, adding, “We also all need people around us. We were not meant to walk through this life alone. And even if we don’t always agree, I get to learn something about you, and you get to learn something about me.”
Watch an interview with Brenda at the 2025 National Senior Games presented by Humana below!
