Away Games (Public Affairs Encounters in Maine and the World)

In this memoir-in-short-stories, Nathaniel Bowditch writes about the characters, cultures, and conflicts he encountered in his wide-ranging public affairs career, including time with the Peace Corps and U.S.A.I.D.

In Away Games, Nathaniel Bowditch describes his "gigs" as a man from New England who lived overseas for years where he engaged in economic development for different agencies of the US government. He writes that his job was to "go into a place, assess the situation, convene key players, and build a team. Next was to do the analysis and design the strategies. Then build the public-private partnerships and organize the institutional capacity to implement those strategies and support new and expanding businesses." Bowditch embraced the challenge of re-imagining a regional economy, giving new life to a downtown, organizing the institutional infrastructure for community and economic development, and helping to re-build a war-ravaged national economy. He calls the book Away Games since he was always on the other team’s "home field."

The book begins with a story about needing to get away from home during childhood, when the author's father was diagnosed with bipolar disease, and his young adult years as a volunteer with the U.S. Peace Corps. The rest of the stories focus on the author's time as a city planner in Maine; stints in Sri Lanka, Russia, Palestine, Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, and Liberia; and finally post-retirement volunteer work helping to get a school health initiative off-the-ground in Zambia, being a jobs coach for asylum-seeking New Mainers from the African Continent, and serving as a ‘Kamala Captain’ canvassing in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District.