The Playground Is My Third Place

My world is smaller than it was before I became a parent. But kid-friendly places have shaped my social life in unexpected ways.

People talk about mom friends as if it was the deep, existential aspect of parenthood that bond us with other people undergoing the same transformation. Or as if our new interest in sleep training, day care, and phonics was so powerful that we only wanted to socialize with other people who share it. But my experience has been that the primary social value of other parents is that we’re in the same place at the same time, in the most literal sense.

The closest analogue to the playground that I can think of is a college dorm on a Friday night. The quality of the company may vary, but kid-friendly spaces reliably take me from being alone to hanging out, no invitation necessary. At the playground, nobody has to clean up, and it’s no big offense if you bail. I think the kids are better there, too. Mine would not even let me loan a neighbor kid one of his sippy cups at home, but he can weirdly handle taking turns with the communal toys in the sand pit. I also don’t have to worry about anybody’s drywall when he runs full-tilt pushing a toy meant for an infant learning to walk.