Megan Rapinoe poses for a portrait during the Team USA Tokyo 2020 Olympics shoot on Nov. 20, 2019 in West Hollywood, Calif.
Megan Rapinoe’s memoir is entitled “One Life,” but anyone familiar with the U.S. soccer star knows she has already lived many lives, any one of which could fill the pages of a book.
Released Tuesday, “One Life” covers not only Rapinoe’s championship soccer career but also, and perhaps especially, her activism. On the field, Rapinoe is one of the most decorated players in the world. The playmaking midfielder is an Olympic gold medalist and a two-time World Cup winner with the U.S. national team. She won her second World Cup title in 2019, also taking home the Golden Boot as the top goal scorer and the Golden Ball as the tournament’s best player.
As she writes in the book, Rapinoe’s playing career is just part of her story. Becoming an elite athlete gave her a platform to be active in the causes she cares about, ranging from social justice to LGBTQ rights to equal pay in her sport. Rapinoe gained national attention in 2016 after kneeling in solidarity with NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, but as she writes in the book, that was just part of a process in which she educated herself on the history of racism in the United States. Much like Rapinoe took those steps to educate herself, that’s one goal she has for her book, to bring attention and knowledge to people about issues that are important to her.
“I always understood that once you have a tiny bit of power, space, or control, you should do everything you can to share it,” she wrote. “Given the breaks I’ve had, speaking out seems like the least I can (expletive) do.”
