The Creeps

About a week ago, the bubs and I saet out on an afternoon sojourn to WIllard Park, a really cute little playground/lawn area for kids in the northern end of Berkeley. The playground area is shaded partially by trees (good for the 3 o'clocks sweats) and has a tire swing, a climbing structure, swings, and tons of plastic toys parents just drop off for the toddler community. It is, in short, one of my favorite places to take Kane and watch him go wild. Or, it was, up until this past trip. We had piled out of the car and into the tandem stroller (yes, I could have let Kane run straight off across the field to the park, but that would likely have taken a good half hour, had Kane had his way and stopped for every cavorting dog and paused to say "hi" a thousand times to every sunbathing hippie), and had opened the gated toddler area and had just started to get some good fun going when I made the mistake of sitting down next to a middle-aged man playing with his five-year-old son. My reasong was that it would be safe because a) it was the only place with consistent shade for Carly and myself, and b) it has heretofore been my exerience that parents aren't especially friendly in certain parks, choosing instead to sit and zone out or to bring a friend and just jabber away with them while their progeny ricochet around the sandbox. Sometimes, an adult will strike up some small talk with you, but it only lasts a minute or two before some child needs tending to, and I was fully prepared for that sort of conversation, should it arise. Instead, I got an hour's worth of chatter from this guy, who clearly doesn't get enough adult conversation in his life. And what started as kind of harmless talk about the benefits of Omega-3 fatty oils (we're in Berkeley, remember), ended with him confessing to me (with NO prodding from me, I assure you) about his son's physical abuse at the hands of his mother (who was, nevertheless - as the man was keen to point out - very good about giving her son the Omega 3 oils in her diet while she was pregnant, and so gave him a great start in life). So what do you say to that?! I said: That's horrible. Oh, gee, look at the time; we better get going soon so we can start dinner. The man seemed embarrassed by his admission, or sad that he had to bear it; I didn't take the time to really read him after that. But he did say: Remember, wild salmon has a lot of Omega 3s! Oh, I'll remember, dude.