【推荐2】A series of thunderstorms damaged our area recently. ______ rains, high winds knocked down trees. I spent the afternoon ______ branches and throwing them away.

Then, just before I was getting ready to walk my dogs, the ______ came on my television that another storm was ______ our way. I took my dogs outside ______. Huge black clouds were rolling in while thunder (雷) boomed over the hills. The ______ seemed terrible. That was when I saw it: the tiniest blink (闪烁) of ______. I smiled. The first of the fireflies (萤火虫) had ______at just the time I needed to see its light. It ______ me how far their light travelled in the darkness of the night. How didn’t they seem bothered at the coming ______? Looking at the lightening fireflies, I noticed that the darkness no longer seemed so ______ and that my fear had changed into ______.

In our life, we have to ______ storms caused not only by nature but also by ourselves. We shouldn’t be ______ of them, however. We are here to ______ our light, to share our love, to drive the dark away and to make this world a better place.

【推荐3】On his 67th birthday, Dad had a heart attack. He was _________- he survived. But something inside him had _________. His passion for life was gone. He refused the doctor’s _________, and his bitter attitude made every visitor _________. Dad was left alone.

I asked Dad to come and live on our small farm, _________ the fresh air would do him good. A week later, I _________ the invitation. He criticized everything here. Frustrated, I decided something had to be done.

One day I read an article saying several depressed patients’ attitudes had _________ dramatically (显著地) when given dogs. That afternoon I drove to an animal shelter, where a pointer’s eyes caught my attention. They watched me _________.

A staff member said: “He’s been here for two weeks with nothing heard, his _________ is up tomorrow.”

I turned to the man in horror, “You mean to __________ him?”

“Madam,” he said coldly. “We don’t have __________ for every unclaimed dog.” The pointer’s calm brown eyes __________ my decision. “I’ll take him,” I said.

On arriving home, I took the dog to Dad’s room. “Look what I got you!” I said __________.

Dad frowned and murmured. “I don’t want it.” Then, suddenly, the pointer __________ from my grasp. He sat down in front of Dad.

Dad’s anger __________, and soon he was hugging the animal.

It was the beginning of a (n) __________. Dad named the pointer Cheyenne. Together they spent long hours walking down country roads and relaxing on the banks of streams.

Dad’s __________ faded, and he and Cheyenne befriended each other. Then, one night two years later, Cheyenne rushed into my bedroom as if telling something. Running into Dad’s room, I found he had __________.

Two days later, my grief __________ when I discovered Cheyenne lying dead beside Dad’s bed. While burying him near their favorite stream, I silently __________ the dog for restoring Dad’s peace of mind.

【推荐2】Susan and I are_________at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta for over a decade and in a department for 5 years. From our mutual friends, we knew our husbands were experiencing kidney_________generally just_________and said hello when we passed by one another. But a five-minute restroom_________last September changed everything.

We ran into each other in the restroom as we were_________our hands. We started_________about the transplant (移植) evalution_________our husbands were going through. And then we talked about what blood type each of our husbands _________—and realized that we could both be a potential_________for each other’s husbands.

A sudden idea__________into my head. What if we could__________our kidneys to each other’s husbands? We both agreed and got__________. I was then__________Susan was a match for my husband, Rodney, and I was a match for Susan’s husband, Lance.

Several months later, we four were able to undergo kidney transplant__________—all on the same day. Everything went smoothly and our husbands’ bodies__________their new kidneys.

“We are__________because a lot of men and women and children wait years—and I mean seven to nine years, not just one or two,” Susan said. “And sometimes, their time on the wait__________will outlive them.”

According to doctor Christina Klein, this is very__________, and she has personally never seen this happen before. Going through the transplant process together gave our families a unique__________. “We skipped friendship,” Susan said. “We bypassed friendship and we are__________family now.”

【推荐1】The early winter storm was much worse than the forecast.

“Sweetheart,” Dad whispered to Mom, “I have to get out of bed and go to _________ the turkeys.” When Dad left the _________, Mom worried that he would not be able to make it to the farm. The snowy wind was blowing _________ around our little white house.

At 7 a.m., Mom was _________ to call for help when Dad’s truck _________ into the driveway. He rushed in and nearly fell down on the kitchen floor. “Call Boots,” he _________ to say. “Have him tell his friends to come up to the _________ and get a free turkey for Christmas dinner.”

“We have at least 500 _________ birds,” he said shaking his head in defeat. With seven children to feed, he knew the loss would be financially _________.

That morning, Boots, our new neighbor, __________ the tragic (惨痛) story. He called his friends and __________ them to tell friends and former neighbors where they could get a __________.

As the sun burst forth, hundreds of cars drove up the __________ road to our Fowler farm. Every turkey was claimed (认领). Friends viewed the tragic scene __________. But as more people arrived the atmosphere __________.

Nearly all of the birds were paid for in cash. With the __________ that the tragedy was disappearing, neighbors and friends talked and __________ laughed. On Dads truck someone __________ a donation box. More was paid than what the birds would have __________ at the store.

Mom and Dad were moved to tears as they __________ hundreds of dollars and hundreds of friends.

【推荐2】It was a long drive to the nursing home (敬老院,养老院) where my grandmother was living. _________, at least twice a month I drove to see her. I’d already _________ my mom to cancer and I wanted to always remember my grandmother, especially because she was beginning to _________ me. Nanna had Alzheimer disease (老年痴呆症), which was slowly starting to eat away at her _________. Sometimes she recognized me when I visited her and sometimes she didn’t.

On one visit, I _________ my grandmother good-bye and started to walk towards my car. Suddenly a tiny hand seized mine. “James!” a _________ voice said. I turned and saw a smiling, wrinkled face. Like my Nanna, she had Alzheimer disease but was still able to walk and get around. She _________ me for her son (A nurse told me he’d died years ago). I held her hands and let her joyfully _________.Though her eyes didn’t know who I was, I saw the excitement in them when she spoke to her son through me.

On the following visits, I always took _________ to visit my Nanna as well as her. I always got a smile and sometimes even a __________ from her. The nurses told me she was always __________ and calmer after seeing her “son”.

Then one day I noticed she was __________. I spoke to the nurses and they sadly told me that she’d been dead for some days. I put my head __________ and went quietly into my Nanna’s room.

Her loss didn’t really hit me __________ I went for a walk at night. I looked at the sky, realizing something—for a while I really had been her son. Actually, in this world we’re all __________ by invisible strings of love.

【推荐3】Several years ago，we planned to move out of the city and buy a country house. The first ___________ was finding a suitable country house that we could afford. We started to ___________ the real estate（房地产）listings online and thought we had found a really ___________ one. My wife Catherine went to look at it. I was expecting a positive result. ___________，my wife told me the house wasn't suitable for us at all. While this was not the ___________ of the world，it prevented us from carrying out our plans as we had expected. So，what did we do？Could we ___________ and decide to stay where we were？No. We decided to ___________ looking.

To make a long story ___________，it took us two years of weekly visits to the real estate listings before we ___________ found three houses that might be suitable. The next ____________ seemed obvious-we had to take some time off work and drive down to ____________ these houses. So，off we went and after 15 hours of steady driving，we ____________.The next three days were tight-looking，then looking again and then finally making an ____________. The final story has a ____________ ending-we found our house，and ____________ several months later.

Sometimes, ____________ show up out of nowhere to destroy the best of plans, and some of these difficulties can be the final play. ____________, if you adopt the philosophy that every obstacle has a solution, then you can find your ____________ through. Obstacles will appear no matter who you are or what you are trying to ____________, but it is only those who know there is a solution and keep digging until they find it that will ____________ one day.