While children are dogs-loyal and affectionate (情深的)— teenagers are cats. It’s so easy to be a dog owner. You feed it, train it, and boss it around. It puts its head on your knee and gazes at you as if you were a Rembrandt painting. It jumps indoors with enthusiasm when you call it.
Then around age 13, your adoring little puppy turns into a big old cat. When you tell it to come inside, it looks amazed, as if wondering who is so boring. Instead of following your doorsteps, it disappears. You won’t see it again until it gets hungry — then it hunts through the kitchen long enough to turn its nose up at whatever you’re serving. When you reach out to touch its head, in that old affectionate gesture, it turns away from you, then gives you an indifferent (冷漠的) look, as if trying to remember where it has seen you before.
Since you are the one who raised it, taught it to fetch and stay and sit on command, you think that you did something wrong. Filled with guilt (内疚) and fear, you redouble your efforts to make your pet to do things in a right way.
Only now you’re dealing with a cat, so everything that worked before now has the other side of the wanted result. Call it, and it runs away. Tell it to sit, and it jumps on the counter. The more you go toward it, waving your hands, the more it moves away.
Put a dish of food near the door, and let it come to you. But remember that a cat needs your help and you love too. Sit still, and it will come, seeking that warm and comforting lap. It has not entirely forgotten. Be there to open the door for it.
One day your grown-up child will walk into the kitchen, give you a big kiss and say, “You’ve been on your feet all day. Let me get those dishes for you.”
Then you will realize your cat is a dog again.
32. When you call a dog, how will it probably react to you?
A.Excitedly. | B.Curiously. | C.Angrily. | D.Calmly. |
33. What does the word “it” refers to in the third paragraph?
A.A dog. | B.A parent. | C.A situation. | D.A teenager. |
34. What can we learn from the passage?
A.Children like cats can easily obey parents’ orders. |
B.Parents should try their best to leave their children alone. |
C.You can’t expect children to care about their parents’ feelings. |
D.Parents should consider what they do wrong to educate their kids. |
35. What is the main purpose of writing this passage?
A.To tell us how a dog changes into a cat. |
B.To tell us how to deal with teenagers aged 13 or so. |
C.To tell us the similarities between pets and children. |
D.To tell us how to keep pets like cats and dogs. |