My love for ice cream emerged at an early age - and has never

“My love for ice cream emerged at an early age — and has never left!” — Ginger Rogers

Thus speaks Ginger Rogers, dancer of silver light and grace incarnate, whose feet glided across cinema’s golden floors beside legends of her age. Yet here, in this gentle confession, she reveals not glamour but humanity — the tender joy of love for something simple, sweet, and enduring. What she names is not merely affection for ice cream, but a symbol of constancy, of innocent delight that survives the tempests of life. Beneath the laughter in her words lies an eternal truth: the heart that can still savor its childhood joys remains forever young.

Ginger Rogers, a woman of poise and power, faced the relentless march of time, fame, and the expectations of an era that demanded perfection. Yet amid all her triumphs — the applause, the spotlight, the spinning dances — she never forgot the small pleasures that once made her smile. Her love for ice cream, born in the carefree summers of youth, became a quiet thread that bound her to her beginnings. It is as if she is saying, “I have grown, I have changed, but I have never lost the sweetness within me.” To keep one’s first love — whether for a person, a passion, or a simple taste — is to keep one’s soul intact.

To the ancients, such love would not be dismissed as trivial. The Greek philosopher Epicurus taught that true happiness springs not from excess or grandeur, but from the mindful enjoyment of life’s simplest pleasures — a warm sunbeam, a good meal, a laugh shared with friends. In Ginger’s ice cream, we find this same wisdom. The flavor of joy, tasted in childhood, can become an anchor through life’s storms. When we hold on to what once delighted the innocent heart, we preserve the flame that no hardship can extinguish.

There is a story told of Walt Disney, who in his later years, despite commanding an empire of imagination, would sneak away to eat sundaes at an ice cream parlor near his studio. Surrounded by children, he would smile quietly, lost in the same wonder that first inspired him to dream of castles and talking mice. Like Ginger Rogers, he understood that to keep the child alive within is not to be foolish — it is to remain connected to the source of all creativity and joy.

The world urges us to abandon such simplicity. It tells us that adulthood demands austerity, that dignity must cast away delight. But those who follow that command grow hollow, their laughter thin and brittle. The wise know that innocent pleasures are sacred — that a scoop of ice cream, a favorite song, a stroll in the rain, can restore what ambition and sorrow have worn away. The heart that honors its youthful joys becomes a wellspring of renewal.

So when Ginger Rogers declares her lifelong love for ice cream, she does more than speak of dessert — she offers a philosophy of endurance through sweetness. The ice cream stands for all the small things that remind us who we are beneath the layers of time. It is the childhood self waving from across the years, saying, “You are still me.” And to recognize that is to remember that life’s truest pleasures are never outgrown — they are carried forward, cherished, and shared.

Practical counsel for the seeker:

• Revisit the small delights that once made you happy; they are not childish, but sacred links to your truest self.

• Guard your sense of wonder as you would guard your health, for it nourishes the spirit as deeply as food nourishes the body.

• Let no success or sorrow harden you; keep a corner of your heart soft, playful, and curious.

• And when the world grows heavy, find your “ice cream” — whatever joy first taught you to smile — and taste it again without shame.

For in that sweetness lies wisdom. As Ginger Rogers knew, the secret of eternal youth is not the denial of age, but the preservation of joy. To delight as you once did as a child is to triumph over time itself. And so, let your love — whether for dance, for laughter, or for ice cream — never leave you.