You’ll Scream for Ice Cream

When you’re a child, kinds words from an adult provide comfort, satisfaction, and affirmation. “Great job!” on a macaroni-and-glue geography project is joyful. “How inventive!” for a book report about slugs makes the time sweating over an encyclopedia feel worthwhile. “You held him to a triple!” takes the sting out of three runners scoring when you pitch a little league game, but the batter stumbles and has to stop at third base.