Mom became friends with semipro football player at playground - Insider

Nov 20, 2022

We talked about this and that, as parents often do on the playground while their kids play.

In these scenarios, parents verbally feel each other out — it's almost like a soft interview to see if we could become friends.

Sometimes I don't feel like making friends, but most of the time the Gemini dragon in me can't help it; I just want to be loved.

Between telling our children to "put down that old candy wrapper" and "only use nice hands, please," we were somehow able to cobble together a conversation, and I learned that he was a semipro football player.

This was fascinating to me — I like to know people's stories, but also, when does a regular 46-year-old playground mom get to rub shoulders with a 24-year-old football player?

He told me his story: He didn't take football as seriously as he wished he would've when he was in high school, though he was good at it and it might have taken him somewhere, and now he was trying to reconnect with his dream.