Dear Princess Celestia,
A year has passed since my last letter. Since then, I have grown a lot. My parents stopped treating me like a filly since my eighth birthday, and since then, I have been helping with the farm work. I mostly just help load the wheelbarrows and plant new cacti. Harvesting the cactus takes a lot of strength, so usually Dad and Jackfruit chop the cactus with machetes while Pear and I load up the wheelbarrows. Mom pushes the wheelbarrows and empties them in the silo. After that, we all take some small pieces of cactus and plant them in empty patches of sand. It is very hard work, and there is usually no time for fun after we finish each day. The cactus fields are so big that it takes all day just to harvest and replant a tiny portion of it. I asked Mom why we needed such a huge farm just to feed ourselves, and she told me that it is because cactus grows slowly. The first day I went out with the others to work in the fields, I was excited to do something new. But I quickly got bored of loading wheelbarrows, and I got distracted and accidentally brushed against a large cactus. The needles poked my flank, and I started to cry because it hurt. Daddy heard my sobbing, and he came over and put his hooves around me and told me it would be all right. Then he pulled a small bottle of tequila from his saddlebag and poured some of the clear liquid on my bleeding flank, which stung. I yelped and jumped back. Then I asked him why he did that. He said it was to prevent infection. I looked, confused, into his dark blue eyes. Daddy sighed, took a deep breath, and told me, "Raggy, sometimes, a little pain now can prevent a big one later." That made me feel a little better, even though I didn't really know what he meant. Then he hugged me one more time and asked me to continue loading the wheelbarrows. I knew by that time that I hated working on the farm, but I didn't want my family to starve, so I kept piling cactus into the carts. Suddenly, I realized the true meaning of my father's words. A little pain now to prevent a big one later.
Your loyal subject (I wish),
Ragamuffin
P.S. - Farming did not turn out to be my special talent. I still don't have my cutie mark.