I wasn't expecting an open casket.

My children and I walked into the room to see the mother lying lifeless, surrounded by those who loved her.

My son, then 6, tightened his grip on my hand when he glanced at the coffin. He needn't have worried. I wasn't headed anywhere near the young mother. It wouldn't have been appropriate to be any closer to the circle of grief around her.

We would have been strangers to Carolyn Dutta. My daughter, then 9 years old, played with her daughter on the playground at school. She was the only one of the three of us with the faintest connection to anyone in the room. And she was behaving as if this surreal moment was completely normal.

When I got the email from the school principal during Christmas break a few years ago, about the car accident that killed Carolyn and injured her daughter, I wondered how I would break the news to my daughter. I waited a week, until a day before the visitation.

"Maybe you could make your friend a card?" I said. She loved making cards for nearly any occasion.

She asked if she could write "We're so sorry about what happened" on the cover. I suggested she stick with "So sorry" on the front and write the note inside.

She carried the card tightly in her left hand, slightly crumpled in her grip.

When we walked into the funeral home, I realized there were few children among the hundreds of visitors. Esme, her friend who had been hurt in the accident, wasn't there when we arrived. I told my daughter we would find a relative to deliver the card to her friend.

News reports described Carolyn as a devoted, energetic mom, who loved to cook and play with her three young children.

"Picture Mother Teresa on roller skates, moving very fast," is how her sister described her, according to reports after the funeral.

Carolyn had been 44 when a drunk driver killed her during a family trip in Canada. Her husband, Suman, would be raising Esme, 8, Liam, 5, and Vivienne, 2.

At the visitation, we quickly found a relative of the family, handed her the card for Esme and left within a few minutes of arriving. We talked in the car about how many people they had to take care of them and love them, and that we would keep praying for their family.

I have thought about those three children frequently.

I took my children to that visitation because I wanted them to know that people can survive the worst kind of tragedies. And that it's important to show respect and compassion for another person's tremendous loss.

But I also needed to be reassured. This mother's death shook me. I wanted to see all the love and support that would surround her babies.

When I became a parent, my life became so much more dear to me than it had ever been. Only I know the way I can love them. I know the way in which they need me.

The Windsor (Ont.) Star reported that the week before her death, Carolyn had called her sister-in-law almost in tears.

"I panicked because Carolyn never cried," Linda McFall said at the funeral, the paper reported. "I asked her what was wrong and she said 'No, nothing's wrong. I'm just standing at the window and I'm watching Suman play with the three kids in the backyard and I'm just so happy right now.'"

I know that feeling. That poignant joy that comes with seeing your children carefree and playing and loved.

This mother, whom I had never known in her life, revealed to me something essential and timeless after her death.

Love doesn't die.

Leading up to the country's annual cultural spectacle, an NFL cornerback gave a post-game interview that instantly became a national Rorschach test.

Seattle Seahawks defensive back Richard Sherman was either vaunted as an inspirational success story for his rise from Compton to Stanford graduate to NFL All-Pro, or derided as a classless thug for calling out an opponent as a "sorry" and "mediocre" wide receiver.

In fact, his behavior can encompass both.

When more than 100 million of us plop in front of our wide-screen TVs to witness this subplot in the Super Bowl drama, it may be worth explaining to the youngest viewers among us that those portrayed as heroes and villains on the screen are usually more complicated characters.

Sherman's case in point: He harnessed his insatiable ambition and work ethic to propel himself, the son of a trash collector, from a rough neighborhood in L.A. to salutatorian of his high school class. He motivated others to reach, not just for a football or basketball, but for their academic potential. He started a charity focused on giving inner-city kids the most likely keys to success: school supplies and textbooks.

Isn't that the kind of professional athlete we love to cheer?

He's also got a mouth that won't quit. He's a sportsman with a skewed sense of sportsmanship, in the eyes of many parents.

Like many other parents, we watched the NFC Championship game with our young children. Our 8-year-old son, in particular, cheered Sherman's spectacular play that clinched Seattle's trip to the Super Bowl.

Watching the post-game interview, he immediately looked to gauge our reactions after Sherman delivered a rant fit for a costumed professional wrestler ready to throw a metal chair.

"Did he just say some bad words?" our son asked.

"No, he didn't say any bad words. But he said some bad things about another player. And you would never say anything like that after winning a game," my husband said.

Odds are great that the vast majority of our children will never play in the NFL, NBA, NHL or MLB. They are not going to be among the world's elite athletes playing on the largest stages. But there will be millions of children playing in countless youth sporting events every weekend of the year.

Obviously, we want them to learn how to be gracious in victory and defeat.

The Super Bowl -- this annual most-watched, sexed-up and violent affair -- might be a strange place to look for life lessons. But it's an event that influences so many young notions of who and what is awesome. It's rife with teachable moments.

As someone who has loved the game since watching with my dad as a child and then cheering for my younger brother when he played in high school, I realized as a parent that watching professional football with children comes with some responsibility beyond that of a zealous fan.

We take for granted -- or relish -- the inherent brutality of the game. Just prior to Sherman's scene-stealing denouement, we witnessed another player's gruesome knee injury, replayed over and over during the game. There's also the issue of the lifelong damage done by repeated concussions, which the league attempted to settle with $765 million to brain-damaged former players. A judge refused to approve this settlement because it may not be enough to cover the damages.

President Barack Obama recently said that if he had a son, he wouldn't want him to play professional football, comparing it to the known risks one takes when smoking. Sports medicine and emergency room doctors have said they wouldn't let their sons play the game at any level.

There's an opening to talk about the importance of prioritizing one's long-term health and safety over the competitiveness in a game.

Besides the physicality of what happens on the field, the Super Bowl provides plenty for parents to discuss with their children during or after.

The $4 million ad spots are bound to glorify drinking, include some patently sexist images and detail the pharmaceutical solution to erectile dysfunction. The halftime show is unlikely to be as racy as a Beyonce number or lead to any wardrobe malfunctions, but it's still best to watch with the remote in hand.

Sherman's rant, much like the sport itself, was emotional, loud and over-the-top.

But within 24 hours, he apologized for "attacking an individual and taking the attention away from the fantastic game by my teammates."

There's a quote worth sharing.

Meg Gerritson, 31, remembers the moment she felt like a mom stalker.

Gerritson, of Hull, Mass., was filling her car's gas tank at a station down the street from her house. She noticed a young mom walking into the store, pulling her son in a wagon behind her. The woman looked laid-back and fun. Her son held a surfboard. Gerritson, who lives in a beach town, loves to surf and had a young son about the same age.

"Who is that?" she thought to herself. "I've never seen her before." She was at the stage in early parenthood that can feel so isolating.

"I thought to myself in the car, 'Do I follow her?'" Her immediate next thought: "That's so creepy! I'm not a stalker!"

That's also when it clicked.

There had to be an easier way to make friends with other like-minded mothers.

As it turns out, two other moms -- Christa Terry and Julia High -- had the same idea. Why couldn't they do for moms what eHarmony and Match had done for singles?

They found each other while doing research on this business idea. Beyond sharing an entrepreneurial spirit, they had each had their own challenges finding the right playgroup.

Gerritson's son Jack, now 2, has severe nut and egg allergies. She quickly figured out how this would affect social relationships when she signed up for a local moms' group outing. She had asked the organizer if Jack's food allergy would be a problem, and was assured the playdate would be safe for him.

There were at least a dozen 1-year-olds at the event, and one boy was eating peanut butter crackers. Gerritson, whose son is sensitive to even being touched by someone who has eaten peanuts, approached the boy's mother and said, "I hate to say this, but would you mind putting those away?"

The woman looked at her and said, "Oh, it's okay. Your son doesn't have to eat them."

At that point, Gerritson felt uncomfortable enough that she simply left the event early.

"I was trying to make friends, not enemies," she said.

One of her business partners, Terry, 34, of Beverly, Mass., had two premature children and found it difficult to find other moms who could relate to her concerns about taking them out when they were babies.

And across the country, High, 35, of Kirkland, Wash., had just relocated from the East Coast and didn't know anyone. She remembers being in a park shortly after moving and watching her 2-year-old play with a little boy about the same age.

"I was chatting up the boy's mom. We were getting on so well, so I asked for contact information. It turned out -- of course -- that they were from Canada, and had just stopped at this park to take a break from their road trip."

Gerritson, Terry and High have launched Mom Meet Mom, a national website for mothers seeking friends that takes into account location and personality. The site promises to eliminate the awkward and accentuate the connection.

Women can register their personal information for free, along with answering a short survey about the type of parent they are and the type of friends they are seeking. Even details like allergies, or other health considerations, can be factored in. The site uses geomapping and social mapping to generate the best matches.

It launched in Boston last Mother's Day and rolled out nationally by the end of July. The founders have at least 10,000 registered users in the U.S. and plan to expand internationally in a few weeks, with their eyes on Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia.

Now, research (and common sense) suggests that attracting and keeping meaningful friendships is not a problem unique to mothers. The State of Friendship in America Report, published by LifeBoat, which describes itself as a movement of people rediscovering friendship, claims most Americans are in a friendship slump and that the country faces a friendship crisis. The 2013 report says only a quarter of adults in its survey reported being truly satisfied with their friendships. They singled out Gen Xers as the most in need of true friends.

Incidentally, that generation is now at an age when many people are in the throes of caring for young children.

And so, the playground is the new singles bar.

"It's a shot in the dark," Gerritson said. You may be a vegan who ends up investing a lot of time in a conversation with a woman who can't imagine a meal without meat.

Their site is designed for mothers, even expectant ones, with children of any age.

She touted a success story: One of her friends met a match through the site who only lives a mile down the road from her and has a daughter the same age. The two turned out to be so compatible that they've gone into business together.

Some friendships just click.