Everyone Must Work
"Julio, have you fed the chickens?"
As Julio heard his mother's voice, he frowned, and a sulky look settled on his face.
"Julio!" It was his mother's voice again. "There's not a drop of water in these jars. How do you expect me to cook breakfast unless you get water from the well?"
"Work, work, work!" Julio muttered. "I'm tired of working and working all the time. I think I'll run away." As he said these words, he took his wooden clogs, went down the bamboo stairs, and walked out of the gate.
It was early in the morning and the breeze was cool and fresh. Julio walked rapidly, and when he thought that he was far enough away from home, he sat down under a mango tree which grew beside a little stream.
As he sat there, he watched white fleecy clouds sailing across the summer sky. "You don't have to work," Julio told the clouds. "You are very lucky."
Then he saw a butterfly with gay colors, fluttering from flower to flower. "You are very lucky too," Julio told the butterfly. "You do nothing but flit from flower to flower. How I envy you!"
Then he saw a bird twittering on a branch. The bird sang a beautiful melody, and as Julio listened to its song, his heart was filled with envy of the bird and dissatisfaction with his lot. "I want to be like you," he told the bird.
"I’m going to sing and whistle and not work anymore."
So, Julio leaned his back against the mango tree and began to whistle like the bird. By and by he heard some splashing beside him, and he noticed that a carabao was there wallowing in the little stream. The carabao slid expertly under the water, rolled around a while, and then remained half-submerged in the shallow water.
"You are very lucky too," Julio said. "You are enjoying a fine swim. But my mother expects me to feed the chickens and the pigs and fetch water from the well and cut up firewood for the stove. I wish I were a cloud or a butterfly or a bird or a carabao. Then I would do nothing except float around the sky or wander from flower to flower or sing on trees or swim in brooks."
The sun was now high up in the sky. Soon a man came. He went straight to the carabao, put a yoke on his neck and began to whip it away from the water.
"Goodbye, Julio," the carabao said. "I've got to work now. I have to plow the fields. I work very hard all day long" "Look, Julio," the bird said next. Julio looked at the bird and saw some dried grass in its beak. "See what I have been doing. I have been gathering twigs and dried grass for a nest. I am building one in a branch of this tree."
"Hello, Julio," the butterfly said, flying very close to the boy.
"Don't you want to join me? I am gathering food from the flowers. I get very little from each flower, so I have to work very hard all day long to get enough to eat."
Julio was astounded. He rubbed his eyes. Had he been dreaming? Had anyone really spoken to him? He stood up. He was feeling very hungry. How he wished he were home. By now, his mother would have finished cooking breakfast. He decided to go home. As he walked home, a light drizzle began to fall. It seemed to him that the raindrops were saying, "Hurry home, Julio, and don't ever run away from work again. Everyone must work."
Julio looked up and realized that the rain was coming from the clouds that he had envied that morning because they had nothing to do.
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