My grandfather went to high school in the 1920s. While in school, he became       in the drama program, acting in various productions. He       in touch with his drama teacher.
My father went to high school in the 1960s. Like his      before him, he acted in high school. He, too,stayed in touch with his drama teacher for the rest of the teacher's       I graduated in 1997. When Hoover, my drama teacher, was      in Alaska, I didn't want her to feel like she was ending her life     , so I sent her many packages, including Drama Club yearbook photos from each year she      there in order that she could see the students whose lives she forever     .
Her nickname for our group of Drama Club was "the Throwaway Kids".      , no? She described us as that       we were nonconformists (不墨守成規(guī)者) that other teachers didn't         know what to do with. She simply      us for who we are, and that was exactly what we needed.
We have all become       members of society: reporters, lawyers, and singers, soldiers, doctors and, you guessed it, teachers. Every member of my family is a teacher. This year        the 73rd year we have taught in Alaska altogether.
      me, teaching the course is only one important part of the     job. As I returned to my classroom just before the final bell      on the last day of school in May, I thought how the most emotional part of the experience will not be seeing the recent       return to say "hello" at Christmas. That was how the     of keeping in touch with our teachers our whole life long began in my family. Honestly, learning      a lifetime.

A group of class friends, highly established in their careers, got together to visit their old university professor. Conversation soon          into complaints about stress in work and life.
Offering his guests coffee, the professor went to the          and returned with a large pot of coffee and a couple of          — porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal, some          looking, some expensive, some delicate — telling them to         themselves to the coffee.
When all the students had a cup of coffee in         , the professor said: “If you noticed, all the nice looking expensive cups were taken up,          behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is          for you to choose only the best for yourselves, that is the          of your problems and stress. Be assured that the cup itself          no quality to the coffee. In most cases it is just more expensive and in some cases even hides what we drink.          all of you really wanted was coffee, not the cup, but you consciously went          the best cups. And then you began               each other’s cups. Now consider this: Life is the        ; the jobs, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain life, and the type of cup we have does not define nor         the quality of life we         . Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we          to enjoy the coffee God has          for us. God brews the coffee, not the cups…Enjoy your coffee!”
The happiest people don’t have the best of everything. They just          the best of everything.
Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. Leave the          to God.

Once I thought love meant flowers, gifts and sweet kisses. So, I really ___ whether there is love between my parents. Every day they are very busy ___ to earn money to pay the high schooling for me. They don’t act in the ___  ways that I read in books or I see on TV, and sending flowers to each other on Valentine’s Day is even_____.
One day, my mother was sewing（縫） a quilt(被子). I asked her if there was ___ between them. She stopped her work and raised her head with ____. Then she lowered(低下)  her head and ____sewing the quilt. I was very ___ because I thought I had hurt her. But after a few minutes, she said, “l(fā)ook at this thread（細(xì)線）. Sometimes it ___, but most of the time it disappears in the quilt. If life is a quilt, then love should be a thread. It can ___ be seen anywhere or anytime, but it’s really there, and makes the quilt____.” I listened carefully but I couldn’t understand her___ the next spring.
My mother suddenly got sick seriously and had to stay in the hospital for a one-month treatment. Every morning and dusk after she___ from the hospital, my father___ my mother walking slowly on the country road. There were beautiful flowers, green grass and trees, and the sun gently shine them___ the leaves. All of these ___ the most beautiful picture in the world. ___ their eyes, I know they love each other deeply. From this experience, I ___ that love was just a  ___ in the quilt of our life. Love is _____ making life strong and warm.

閱讀下面短文，掌握其大意，然后從1~15各題所給的A、B、C和D項中，選出最佳選項，并在答題卡上將該項涂黑。
I have been blessed with the opportunity in my life. It took the near-death experience of my dad to make me realize that my purpose in life is to        others. My dad suffered from leukemia(白血病) in 1998.        the pain and treatment that he put up with inspired me to be a more kind and        person. I realized life is just too          and it was time for me to make some changes — do the things in life that I wanted to do without making        why I couldn’t do them.
My dad        a bone marrow transplant(骨髓移植) operation, and after that he was able to reuse his own “cleaned” marrow, so a donor(捐獻者) was not needed. That was excellent        because donors who are a match are hard to come by. That          me to become a bone marrow donor and hopefully help someone else one day. I also         money for the cancer patients. Yet, I was not satisfied with just that. I had to do more, I        blood every other month and seek opportunities to do other acts of kindness daily. The opportunity, some days, presents itself very        and some days I have to seek it out. Either way, it comes.
I would like to        one of my favorite quotes（名言）with you all:
“In an average lifetime, a person        about sixty-five thousand miles. That’s two and half times around the world. I wonder        your steps will take you. I wonder how you’ll use the rest of the        you’re given.”
I want to use my miles to create foot prints of love in this world.

I used to live selfishly, I should admit. But one moment changed me.
I was on my lunch break and had ___ the office to get something to eat. On the way，I __a busker(街頭藝人)，with a hat in front of him. I had some ___ in my pocket，but I would not give them to him, thinking to myself he would __ use the money to feed his addiction to drugs or alcohol. He___ like that type— young and ragged. ___ what was I going to spend the money on? Only to feed my addiction to Coca-Cola or chocolate! I then ___ I had no right to place myself above ___ just because he was busking.
I ___ and dropped all the coins into his __，and he smiled at me. I watched for a while. As ___ as it sounds，I expected something more to come from that moment—a feeling of ___ or satisfaction, for example. But nothing happened.  ___ ,I walked off. “It proved to be a waste of __  .”I thought.
On my way home at the end of the ___ , I saw the busker again and he was __ .I watched him pick up the hat and walk __ a cafe counter. There he poured the ___ contents into a tin collecting __ an earthquake fund­raising(募捐) event. He was busking for charity!
Now I donate any ___ I have to charity tins and enjoy the feeling of giving.

Mark Twain said that "habit is habit, and not to be flung（扔） out the window by anyone, but coaxed(勸誘) downstairs a step at a time. " The chances of successfully changing negative behavior    when you make gradual changes that give you time to _   _ negative patterns for positive ones.
On any given day, countless numbers of us get out of bed and _   _ to begin to change a given behavior "today." Whether it be exercising more, drinking less, managing time      or some other change in a negative behavior, we start out with high       . In a short time, however, a vast majority of people fail and are soon doing    it was they thought they shouldn't be doing.
After considerable research, some researchers believe that behavior changes usually do not       if they start with the change itself.      , they believe that we must        a series of “stages” to adequately prepare ourselves for that       change. Once you have analyzed all the factors that       what you do ,you must decide which behavior-change technique will work best for you.
According to the psychologist Albert Ellis, most     problems and related behaviors arise from irrational (不理性的) statements that people make to      when events in their lives are different from what they would like them to be. For example, suppose after doing       on an exam, you say to yourself, “I can not believe I failed that easy exam. I am so stupid.”By changing this irrational “catastrophic” self-talk into rational,   statements about what is really going on, you can increase the       that positive behaviors will occur.
Positive self-talk might be     as follows: "I really didn't study enough for the exam. I just need to prepare for the next     ”.
Such self-talk will help you to recover quickly from      and take positive steps to correct the situation. Some other technique like purposefully      or stopping negative thoughts and refusing to dwell on (沉湎于) negative images can also spare you wasted energy, time and emotional resources and move on to positive changes.

I was out late watching a movie with a friend in Georgetown．By the time the    ended，it was 2 a．m．We walked to my car which was     across the street．When we arrived，I noticed something strange-the doors were    ．I took a quick    of the car and was relieved to find everything undamaged,    one thing-my briefcase was gone. After a further search with my friend，I    the fact that it was gone, I considered myself incredibly    that nothing valuable was taken and nothing else in the car was    ．
The next day I    a surprising voieemail from a man．He said he had walked his dog in the morning and    a pile of papers and bills with my name all over them．I    him back immediately．He promised to   the materials back or I could pick them up．At first I asked him to send them，but then I   ．We were in the same city and plus I didn’t want to inconvenience him．Normally，it probably wouldn’t be     to go to a stranger's house to   something up，but he gave me an    so I figured I was relatively safe．
I met the man and thanked him very much．He said he would   me if he found anything else. Words could not express my    of this stranger’s kindness. I thought to myself-there’s so much goodness in the world and there are so many people who    that inner goodness through acts kindness. Though it feels good to give kindness, it feels nice to      others want to give too.

My daughter and I went out for some shopping．While I was waiting to    ，my daughter asked if she could wait for me at the door．
Minutes later she returned to ask if she could give the     she had just bought to a man in the street, so there she went and     her sweets away．Another 2 minutes later, she   again to ask me for something else she could give to the man．I told her that I only had some biscuits for dessert，so she took them to the man and came back with a huge    on her face．
When we got out of the shop I       that the “man”was an old man in his 80's．It tooked like he was going to    the night there. We made eye contact(接觸)and he thanked us a lot．
On the way to the parking lot my daughter wanted to buy a drink for the old man, but I had no   ．So I went to the cash machine，took some cash and my daughter gave it to the old man，so he could buy a drink．My daughter was over    when she came back from the old man．
It was probably my daughter's first random act of    ，and that was amazing．

My friend Tom came across an accident when driving in darkness. His legs were so hurt that he couldn’t move. What was           was that he found himself unable to ask for help—his mobile phone went out of       as a result of exhausted battery. Nothing could be done but          in the cold wilderness. It was 8 hours later that day broke and then the       of the rescue team.
It is almost          that he could stand the horror in the darkness for so long. Even more surprising was his       . “First of all I checked my   conditions and found myself not in danger. As there was no        to call for help, I leaned（斜靠）back in my seat trying my best to keep the wound from       . In this way I dozed（打盹）off.”
His story put an end to my regret for the         of an exploration that happened last year. A group of young men          to explore a mountain cave and got lost.         to find a way out in the dark cave they were frightened and ran anxiously without a sense of        . Finally, they fell dead in fear and exhaustion. According to the       team that found them, the place where they got lost was only about 10 meters away from the       of the cave. If they stayed on the spot when they lost their way and tried to      themselves, they would probably have sensed a faint light glowing(發(fā)出) not far away.
Don’t you think that you can compare it with       itself? When you meet with difficulties in life, you are lost in darkness. Focus that it’s unclear to you yet and you needn’t put up struggle     . It seems to be a negative attitude,     a person who can do so must have foresight as well as a great        in the first place.

It is a true story behind a well­known piece of art.
In a village near Nuremberg lived a family with eighteen children. Merely to keep food on the table, the father worked eighteen hours a day. Despite their ___ condition, two of the children had a dream to seek their talent for ____ but they knew well their father would never be able to send ____ of them to Nuremberg to study at the Academy.
The two boys finally worked out an agreement. They would toss (扔) a coin. The ____ would work in the nearby mines to support his brother. Albrecht ____ the toss and went off to Nuremberg. Albert went into the dangerous mines and, for the next four years, financed his brother, ____ work at the academy was almost a(n ) ____ success. Albecht's woodcut and oils were much ____ than those of his professors and he soon was earning considerable fees ____ his works.
When the young ____ returned home, the family held a festive dinner. Albrecht rose to toast to his beloved brother, “Now, Albert, it is your ____ to seek your dream and l will support you”．
All heads turned to the far end of the table, where Albert sat, tears streaming down his pale face, while he ____ and repeated, “No...no.” Finally, Albert rose and ____  the tears from his cheeks. He said softly, “I ____ go to Nuremberg, brother. It is too late for me. Look what four years in the mines have done to my hands! The bones in every finger have been smashed at least once, and I cannot even hold a glass to ____ your toast.”
Today, Albrecht's masterful works ____ in every great museum in the world, but chances are great ____ you, like most people, are familiar with only one of them. Albrecht drew his brother's abused hands with palms together and the ____ stretched skyward. He called it simply “Hands”， but the entire world almost immediately opened their hearts to his great masterpiece and ____ his tribute (敬意) of love “The Praying Hands”．
Next time you see that touching creation, take a second look. Let it be your reminder, if you still need one, that no one ever makes it ____！