This blog will be about my friend, Jonathan Parolini. I am writing about him because I told him I would, and because I think he’s a pretty cool guy.

            To start off, Jonathan is a 20-year-old professional soccer player, currently playing in Italy. His father is the translator on the Canadian women’s national soccer team, as the coaches are Italian this year. Jonathan started playing professionally in Italy after Grade 9, which always amazes me. I had a hard time coming down to Ohio on my own at the age of 19, and he went all the way across the ocean, just a year after becoming a teenager.

            I met Jonathan this summer at Master’s Futbol Academy, a soccer academy. We used to be partners for a drill where you have to head the ball back and forth, and we were absolutely terrible at it. Our coach used to give the advice, “Make a tunnel,” meaning imagine a tunnel between your head and the person’s head, and try to keep the ball in that tunnel. We would joke that our tunnel was still under construction.

            Jonathan also has the largest calves proportionately that I ever have seen on someone. He goes to the gym almost every day of the week, yet claims that he has never in his life worked out his calves. He says it’s all genetics. I don’t believe him.

            Finally, he is a big listener of rap music, especially Lil Wayne. Before I came to Ohio, I told him I needed some good rap songs and he gave me around awesome 100 songs.

            We still keep in touch even though he is really far away, and it sucks that I won’t see him for almost a year. But I’m glad we’re friends. Like I said, he’s a pretty cool guy.