On a small farm lived a donkey who never said no.
When the fence broke, he stood there all night so the goats wouldn’t wander off. When the cart got heavy, he leaned into the straps until his legs shook. When the other animals were tired, he carried their load too. They called him dependable. They never called him happy.
Over time, the farm looked better. Fields stayed neat. Work got done. The donkey grew thinner.
One season, his back finally ached too much to pull the cart. The goats complained about the delay. The chickens laughed. The farmer walked past him and didn’t notice the limp. The farm kept running, just louder and less kind.
That night, the donkey stood alone by the fence he once guarded. He wasn’t proud of the animal he had become. Not because he was weak, but because he had forgotten to stop. Helping everyone had slowly erased him.
The next morning, he didn’t pull the cart. He watched the farm figure itself out. It was messy. It was noisy. It survived anyway.
The donkey stayed by the fence, breathing, learning that carrying everything is not the same as being valued. Sometimes the loneliest creature on a farm is the one who always helped.