The Ant and the Grasshpper

Once upon a time there was a colony of ants that lived in the ground near a tin can by a tree stump. They lived in a broad meadow which had lots of food and was a perfect place to bring up larva.

The ants were industrious, working day and night, waking with the dawn and falling into their holes at night exhausted. Not so their neighbor, George Grasshopper, who sang, played and drank throughout the day.

“You’ll be sorry, George Grasshopper,” the ants said over and over. “Winter will come and you will have no food, no home.”

But George just laughed.

As the ants kept working, they decided they needed to have ways to bring in more food and a way to pay for it. So they had a meeting in the Union Hall on the other side of the tin can.
“We should build a mall,” said Uncle Charlie Ant, as he chomped away on his cigar. “That way we can rent out the space and we’ll have enough money to buy everything we need.”

So the ants worked hard. They drew up plans. They cleared the earth. And they brought in load after load of building material. They hired the finest ant carpenters and the best ant architects. They put their top supervisors on the job.

“You’re working too hard,” sniped George Grasshopper.

But the ants smiled and worked. They would soon be done and winter was almost upon them.

Then, one chilly day, it was done. The mall was finished and the ants held a groundbreaking ceremony and they invited George as a token of good will.

But George arrived with a team of roach lawyers and a deed to the property. After a court case, he seized the mall and the grassy meadow and evicted the ants, who died by the millions in the cold winter.

The moral of the story? It’s better to be a grasshopper with income-producing property, than an ant.