The Ant and the Grasshopper

All through the warm summer months, an ant worked without rest, hauling grains of wheat one by one back to her nest, storing away food for the winter ahead. In the field beside her, a grasshopper spent his days fiddling and singing in the sun, watching her pass back and forth. "Why not stop and enjoy the weather with me?" he called out. "Summer is for singing, not for all this hauling and worrying." The ant barely paused. "Winter always comes," she said, "whether we're ready for it or not," and she went back to her work, leaving the grasshopper to his music. The weeks passed, the days grew shorter, and eventually the first frost arrived, turning the green field brown and bare. The grasshopper, who had not stored a single seed, found himself cold and hungry with nothing left to eat and nowhere warm to shelter. Shivering, he made his way to the ant's snug nest and knocked, asking if she might spare a little food. The ant looked out at him from her warm doorway, surrounded by the food she had gathered all summer long. "You sang through the summer," she said gently. "Now you may dance through the winter." Though she shared what little she could, the grasshopper never forgot the lesson that a season of ease is often paid for later.