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He would need little supplemental feed, except perhaps in winter months, or in the peak of summer scorchers, when grass withered to brown dust. There was more to learn than we thought, but the donkey’s gentle temperament invited our attention and affection.
    Since he had worked his way into our barn and our hearts, we knew it was time to give him a real name. In our family’s history, we’d ceremoniously christened a succession of pets: Checkers, the springer spaniel with brown and white markings; Buttons and Twix, handsome cat brothers; Wilson, the parakeet we rescued when we found him bouncing across the street like a tennis ball. And there was Angel, the red-tailed hawk Tom once had when he practiced falconry. Even the gerbils and fish had fancy names bestowed upon them during their brief lives in our care.
    The challenge had always been to find a moniker that would fit each animal’s personality, yet wouldn’t cause embarrassment if we had to yell the name in public. Over the years, Tom, on the grounds of his manhood, vetoed cutesy names like “Schmoozy,” “Fluffy,” and “Snookums” for our family menagerie, and we agreed it was a reasonable enough guideline to follow. You shouldn’t make a guy who’s most comfortable in camouflage have a pet whose name suggests it should be carried inside a pink purse.
    â€œSo what do you think we should call him?” I asked Tom,whose reflection I caught in the mirror while I did double duty   —brushing my teeth and inspecting the crow’s-feet around my eyes. “Should we go with something comical since he is, after all, a donkey for crying out loud? Or should we find something sort of stately?” We had never had much trouble deciding with our other pets, but for whatever reason, this was quite the dilemma.
    Tom sat on the bed and put on his work shoes. “Not to confuse things, but since we live in Texas, there’s also an abundance of Spanish names we could consider.”
    â€œThat’s true!” He knew how much I loved those burros from my childhood. This was getting more complicated by the minute.
    We spent some time tossing around various ideas but decided to keep thinking as we went on with our day.
    While up on scaffolding, we moved on to the silly: Brae, Harry, Eeyore.
    â€œHaving a donkey is fun, but he’s not something I want to make fun of,” Tom objected, dipping his brush into blue paint and wiping the excess on the rim of the can. We crossed those names off our list.
    The business of naming him came up at all hours of the day. In the evening, over a mass of open Bride magazines and popcorn, the girls suggested something more serious, more dignified. “What about Jefferson, or Winston? Henry? Roosevelt?” Better, but still not right.
    Maybe some biblical inspiration? At bedtime, we considered Balaam; Ichabod; and Jonah, Micah, and all the other minor prophets.
    No matter what we tried, nothing seemed to fit. He was the Nameless Braying One of the Pasture, and it bothered us. The weeks drifted by with no solution.
    â€œWe can’t just keep calling him ‘Donkey Boy,’” I said as Tom and I unloaded ladders into the barn one afternoon. “It seems a little impersonal, and just slightly like we don’t care.” We stopped to watch him mosey along, enjoying the sunshine, his hooves dragging from one end of the field to the other.
    â€œI know. But the right name is important. You don’t want to mess that up, even for a donkey that we couldn’t get five dollars for.” Tom winked and threw an arm over my shoulder, then quickly removed it in the sticky heat. “You know,” he reflected, “that guy is never in a hurry. It’s like he’s in a time warp. He could never get anywhere in a flash.”
    We looked at each other, and the light dawned. Flash! That was it!
    Flash. As in a speeding superhero who comes to the