【推荐2】"What kind of stuff do you write? ''one student asked on my first day at the University of Massachusetts. After a decade away from the classroom, I was back to _______.

"I write creative nonfiction," I said, “as you'll be doing.”

It was a _______. I couldn't remember when I'd last written a _______ essay. But it must have been before my mother fell ill, leaving me feeling my family story wouldn't end _______. It seemed that nothing I wrote could change that. _______ I couldn't write my own stories, I could _______ my students to tell theirs. "You're going to keep a _______ in this class, and I want you to tell your stories like they _______ ."

“Why do they matter? ^” a boy named Michael asked. Looking out at the roomful of students, I _______. No one said a word. Many of them, I learned, worked while in school. Most didn't know their stories did matter. They didn't even realize their stories were as __________ as their own lives.

Finally, I looked at Michael. “They matter because they' re what you have. Stories allow us to make meaning of what we've __________ I said. Michael didn't look __________, but he didn't challenge me, either.

In his first essay, Michael wrote about how his high school English teacher seeing his __________and helped him fill out a college __________. I had Michael read his essay out loud. After he finished, the class went so __________ that we could hear the sound of each other's ____________. I looked at him and saw a small __________ in his dark eyes. Then, I said, "That's why you tell your stories."

I went home that night and __________ my journal from where it lay, dusty and __________. For the first time in months, I had to __________ .

【推荐2】My grandparents actively practiced simplicity. They both grew up in very large families and _______ the Great Depression. Saving for a rainy day was their life philosophy. They chose to spend really _______ life together with their family rather than seeking _______ through material items.

Over the years my grandparents have noticed _______ changes in their community. Every year more farmland was _______ to build larger and larger homes. As real estate(地产) prices rose, many of their neighbors _______ their little homes and land. Soon theirs was _______ little house surrounded by the sea of mansions(大厦). Lots of family members _______ my grandparents to expand their little old house. But they didn’t want a bigger one. They loved their little house and were _______ with what they had.

My grandparents ________ consumptive(消费的) lifestyle by painting and repairing the house themselves. They lived in a little home, but had a huge ________. They loved and enjoyed planting ________ it greatly improved their health, ________ their grocery bill, and gave them a（n）________ to be outside. They also ________ everything. For instance, they had driven the same car for over 15 years and didn’t buy a new one until the old Chevrolet was ________.

Through their example, I learned an important ________: it is possible to live a simple life. My grandparents taught me that living simple life isn’t about self-deprivation(自我牺牲). ________, it’s about giving yourself the time, freedom and money to pursue(追求) your dreams. Becoming debt free, living in a ________ building and going out on foot are good ways to ________ your life and start pursuing your dreams.

【推荐3】“Mom, stop. STOP!” yelled my mom outside my bedroom. At 7 am, I ________ to her yells. It was the weekend and I wanted to sleep. ________ a loud knock on the door ________ my chance of sleeping. “Maggie, get up quickly and help with your grandmother,” my mother ________ me eagerly.

I quickly entered my grandmother’s room and ________ her when we were going downstairs as she walked slowly. We ________ made it to the living room. Now, I had to get her to sit down to watch TV quietly. “ I have to go to work!” she argued, ________ toward the front door. “ I have to go and meet with Fran!” she ________, referring to her daughter, who lives nearly one hundred-twenty miles from here. This argument continued ________ I convinced her to sit down.

I poured out a ________ from a medicine bottle. She hesitated, and then swallowed it down with a glass of water. We returned our ________ to the TV and soon she fell asleep. 15 minutes later, she woke from her nap, becoming ________. The rest of the family came in to greet her. She smiled at everyone, and made jokes, like a ________ person.

My grandmother is________Alzheimer’s（阿尔茨海默症）．One out of five people develops the________by age 80. Symptoms include forgetting words. They also________ to recognize friends and family members or perform________tasks like dressing themselves. As of today, Alzheimer’s is too ________ to defeat, but there are treatments to alleviate（减轻）the symptoms.

The disease affects both the________and the family members. It's________. But it's someone in love. We are willing to fight it with love, which is just as powerful.

【推荐1】I was raised in a house where my mother did not trust my sisters and me to manage our own appearance. As a result, there were _______,and trends were largely ignored.

A few years ago, I was home for a visit when my mom, now in her early 70s, called me into her bedroom. “I don't know what to wear”, she _______from her couch. “You girls always look so good. ”

I looked at her, wondering if I'd _______."What do you mean?” I asked her. “You know what to wear.”

“No.” she answered in the couch. “I don't. Can you pick something?”

I was so _______.

This was the same woman who had told my younger sister she wasn't allowed to wear a pair of ripped(有破洞的) jeans; the same woman who, in high school, called me while I was out at a party to ask if my hair was up. “Don't do that, because you look _______ with it down,” she told me, before I could _______.

I realized, suddenly, that my mother-always so strong-not only wanted my _______,but needed it.

I pulled a pair of blue jeans from the closet. “This _______ your black shoes perfectly,” I told her. She did. My mother certainly doesn't need anyone to take care of her. In fact, she still _______my grandmother who lives with her. But with that ________, my mother and I started the role reversal(转变)that happens with all parents and all children, from caregiver ________

Now, if I'm visiting or we're together, it's ________ for her to wear anything without checking with me fist. I'm still always a bit surprised by the admission of her ________ But every so often, it seems like she asks me just to be able to________ my answer and pick out something on her own. And ________ she does, I just tell her what I think of the way she looks. Sometimes it's “great”. And sometimes it's “awful”.

【推荐2】Mom and I pulled our artificial Christmas tree out of the box together. Mom hoped the lights all worked. Actually I didn't_________whether we even had a tree or not when I was_________the next day. It was our first Christmas without my father. My_________was too heavy to enjoy anything. How I wished would decorate the tree that Dad and I had_________together the year before. That_________had been perfect, like everything about that Christmas.

Throughout my childhood, my father was in and out of the hospital_________from leukemia(白血病). My grown-up brother and sisters had memories of him when he was younger and full of_________. But the dad I loved was almost always_________.

Until suddenly in time for Christmas, like a_________, my father seemed to get better. Dad took the__________to make the most of every good day he had.

"Are you thinking about the tree last year?" Mom asked, "Yes, Mom." I__________.

The tree had been Dad's__________. A real tree, not our artificial one. Dad and l drove to the Christmas tree farm to get it. In his truck, he__________his Christmases with me on the way there: "My brothers and I used to go to the woods to__________our tree, and we decorated our tree with something from the farm as well," Dad__________, "One year we did earn enough__________from the sale of crops. So we could__________some beautiful lights from the supermarket. "When Dad and I returned home with our tree, I asked him if we could__________it as he had when he was a boy, "Sure we can!" Dad agreed__________.

Mom had decorated the artificial Christmas tree. Looking at the shining tree, I thought the Christmas would never be__________after Dad passed away.