The trouble began with the truck. We usually went to the playground with only snacks: water and some Cheez-Its or an applesauce pouch. But one day, my son wanted to bring a toy. So we arrived with his little yellow excavator truck, which he rolled in zigzags on the sidewalk and then used to dig up mulch and dump it back on the ground in a pile. He was 3, and suddenly the most popular child on the playground. A few kids circled around him as he played, staring at the truck. Their parents stared at me. I knew what everyone was thinking: The other kids wanted a turn; the parents expected me to tell my son to share; and my own child was oblivious, delightedly zooming his truck through the dirt. If he didn't offer to share, and I didn't force him to, the other parents would think he was spoiled. But he loved that truck. Did he have to give it up just because this ring of kids wanted him to' One child kept trying to snatch the truck away. 'No,' his mother said. He tried running at the...
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