“You should get a dog.” my therapist (治疗专家) said. A dog? I couldn’t even look after myself. I took a deep breath and carefully considered the idea of welcoming a canine (犬科的) friend into my life. This seemed like too easy a solution to the fact that I couldn’t leave the house without bursting into tears.
Adopting an animal during the height of the pandemic was far from easy. When I found Simba, his adoption profile made him out as the perfect puppy. I filed out the paperwork and had a few weeks to prepare for his arrival.
When he came home, it became increasingly obvious that Simba didn’t understand “no”, “stop it’ or “don’t do that”. He was the worst-behaved dog I’d ever seen. I was beginning to doubt my therapist’s advice.
At home, I found him sitting on my bed comfortably. Jumping from the sofa to the tea table was his favorite game every day. He fought tooth and nail to get a bite of my meals and ate anything that fell on the floor. What was worse, dog waste and urine were seen everywhere, which annoyed me most. But his curiosity and vigor really impressed me. Training him to behave well kept me busier than I’d ever expected.
I decided to start taking him for walks. I could barely leave the house before, but my heart couldn’t say no to Simba. Simba showed me what bravery looked like. He didn’t stop to consider every possible outcome of a situation. He simply went for it. If there was a dog at a park, he would run toward it. He always leapt forward and explored the unknown by sniffing here and there unless I called him. He loved adventure. I found myself mirroring his behavior after a while, jumping out of bed without a second thought. I began to find the motivation to get out of bed in the morning.
注意：1. 续写词数应为 150 左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Ten minutes later, Simba and I were walking in the nearby park.
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As time went by, I found myself totally changed.
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Lunch hour. Escaping from my office, I fled down Main Street in pursuit of freedom from the routine of the day. An old bell clanged(叮当作响)against the door of a dusty used bookstore when I pushed it open.
Looking through the horizon of shelves and lots of magazines, my eyes suddenly met his and my heart began to race. They were the blazing(闪烁) orange eyes of an African lion on the cover of a National Geographic magazine. I hadn’t seen those eyes in thirty years, but their impact on me hadn’t faded. As a kid I used to dream about Africa, living with wild animals.
The opportunity of spending a “gap year” volunteering in Africa or joining the Youth Corps had long since passed. Or had it? Yes, it’s true I couldn’t go to Africa for several months, but maybe I could volunteer in Africa for a few weeks.
Over the next several weeks I began to budget and save, determined to make it happen. The big day came. I arrived and met my boss, a young South African ranger(护林员)named Gary. He said, “Let me guess, you’re here because you dreamed of Africa.”
“Yes!” I smiled.
“Well it’s time to wake up. This is a working game reserve. These are wild animals.”
“Okay.”
“You’re going to have to get out of your comfort zone, take some risks, Have the courage of a lion.”
The next morning when we began our patrol(巡逻)in an open-air jeep, giant African elephants appeared in the morning mist. I was no longer dreaming in the pages of a National Geographic magazine. I was living them.
Moments later Gary parked the jeep and handed me a heavy shovel(铲子) and said, “Time to shovel dung(粪).” Elephant dung. Mountains of it. It will be used as fertilizer in the reserves sustainable vegetable garden.
Within fifteen minutes my back was aching, and my new work gloves were stretched out and so slippery with dung and sweat that they refused to stay on my hands. This wasn’t the dream of Africa I had.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Paragraph 1:
I began to question myself.
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Paragraph 2:
But at that moment I remembered Gary’s words “step out of your comfort zone”.
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I sat at the breakfast table with my four-year-old son, Andy, trying to ignore the ache in my stomach. “Mama, want to play?” “Not today, baby.” I shook my head. These days I could barely get out of bed. I was still recovering from an operation. I hoped for strength and happiness. But the future seemed so hopeless.
Suddenly Andy jumped up from his spot on the kitchen floor. “Bird!” he shouted, rushing to our courtyard. Sure enough, there was a white dove seated in a tree. It sat there for a few moments, and then flew away. Strange, I’d never seen one in our neighborhood before.
When I dragged myself to the kitchen the next morning, the dove was back. This time it was with a mate carrying sticks, “Look, Andy,” I said, pointing to the tree. “They are going to make a nest.” The doves flew in and out of the courtyard all week, building on top of the tree.
Andy could hardly contain his excitement. Every morning, he’d run into the kitchen and take his spot by the door, talking to the birds while they worked. His happiness was influential. Much as I was sad, I couldn’t help but look forward to the doves’ visit too.
Then it all went wrong. The courtyard was a safe enough spot for a nest, but the tree is broad, thin leaves were far from stable. One night, a strong wind blew, throwing the doves’ nest to the ground. I heard the twigs(细枝) break apart.
I examined the damage. Nothing good ever lasted. I wouldn’t blame the doves if it never came back. But they returned. They started again from the beginning. Again, though, the wind destroyed all their hard work. The next day, and the next, they started again, as if nothing had happened.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
I knew I had to do something.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“It works! The birds are back!” Andy announced.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Alexis Langlois, who manages a large farm, heard her neighbor crazily knocking on her front door on a Monday afternoon.
“There’s an emergency”, Amber Countryman yelled. “The horses are stuck in the water.” Langlois was struck with “absolute panic”. She threw on her winter boots — without socks — and rushed toward the small pond on the 80-acre property. She was surprised by what she saw: four horses were in the water up to their necks in 10 feet of ice water.
She immediately called 911.While waiting for help to arrive, “people just started showing up,” she said. “Neighbors were pouring in. People came with ropes, chainsaws, shovels and pick axes.”
“I grabbed a bunch of supplies,” said Countryman, whose two teenagers and their friend also as sited with the effort.
“It was-8℃that day,” she said, adding that she brought out handwarmers and water for the helpers.
Everyone was determined to get the horses out of the pond — which is about 15feetwide.
Beneath a six-inch layer of ice, the water was “just barely above freezing”, said Chris Yerkes, the South Kalispell Fire Department chief who rushed to the pond with about a dozen volunteer personnel.
When the firefighters arrived, neighbors had already attempted to pave a path through the ice toward the edge of the pond using pick axes, sledgehammers and shovels, and “we continued with that effort.” Yerkes said. Unfortunately, “as we got closer to the edge, we realized there was about three to four inches of mud.”
The thick layer of mud — which the rescuers couldn’t cut through — blocked the horses from climbing out. Firefighters enlisted additional support from Flathead County Animal Control, as well as staff from local equestrian organization Rebecca Farm.
“There had to have been at least 60 people here,” Langlois said. “It was very swift action on everybody’s part.”
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Paragraph 1
It took nearly two hours to find a workable solution that could bring all four horses to safety.
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Paragraph 2
To get the horses out, they used a powerful tractor (拖拉机) to get the animals out of the mud and ropes to pull them over the edge.
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I was a bad boy in a village in India. At least I was labeled that way because I had no interest in school or studies. I used bad language, hung around with other “bad” boys, skipped school and ran through the fields. No one thought I would do anything worthwhile with my life. And I’d heard many people in our village talking. “Why bother going to school? These kids end up back on the farms anyway. He’ll never amount to anything.” My parents and teachers were disappointed with my average marks.
My mother envisioned a different future and knew the value of education to create a better life. By the time I entered the 12th grade, I had taken a good look at myself and realized the life I was creating. The bad boy image troubled me. I didn’t believe I was a bad boy. I didn’t want to be a bad boy. These realizations forced me to acknowledge that my mother was right — education was my only way out. I worked hard to finish my high school, and then I decided to apply for higher education in university. But this village bad boy faced too many challenges.
Firstly, my family had very limited money. In addition to that, my grades were not good. There was very little chance I’d gain admission to a university. Still, I took a chance and applied. The last day of admissions, I visited the university to check my result. I looked down the list, and there it was, “Parashram J. Patil”. Finally, I’d been admitted. Now, it was the last day to pay, so I had to find money to cover my fees.
注意：1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Helpless, I sat outside the department head—Professor Parth’s office.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________From then on, things changed.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________The Perfect Christmas Tree
In our house in Middle Cove, Newfoundland, the tradition was to find the perfect tree before Christmas Eve. And this year, my brother Gilbert and I were being trusted to do it entirely on our own. And we took the challenge very seriously. So, axe in Gilbert’s hand, saw in mine, we set out for all the spots we imagined we might find a magnificent fir (冷杉树).
We were young, but we knew the rules. Trees could not be taken from personal land and not near any road.
We started out with the best of intentions. We were on Pine River Lane, and looking at the firs in the fields, but none of them looked quite good enough. It was getting dark but we still had no luck. On the way home, it was Gilbert who stopped, grabbed my arm and said, “I see it!”
“You see what?” I said.
“Right there, look. It’s perfect.”
And he was right. It was a young tree, two metres tall, standing alone. It was the classic Christmas tree. In all my years, I had never seen such a perfect one.
Perfect except for one small problem. The tree was pretty close to the road. Also, it was behind a fence, so the tree was in someone’s yard. And not just any someone. It was in the yard of Timmy Green, my best friend.
However, the chances of our finding another one like it were slim to none.“You stand guard,” Gilbert said. And with that, we were over the fence and on our bellies crawling toward the target. I lay in the snow and put the Greens’ house under surveillance (监视). I was to whistle or cough if I saw anyone coming.
Within a few minutes, it fell.
“Grab the end,” Gilbert said, and we lifted it over the fence. Now we were on the road.
注意：1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2.续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好；
Suddenly Gilbert’s eyes widened. “Our footprints!” he said.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________So it shocked me when I found Mr. Green in our house with my parents, drinking tea on Christmas Eve.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“You’re not important, you’re not important, and you’re not important. “The words escaped from my lips as I pointed to Andrew, the kid with glasses, Jason, the boy who wants to be a skater, and Randy. the thin guy with buck (龅牙的) teeth.” I just need to ask Billy a few questions for this survey,“ I continued, pushing through the group as I searched for their leader, my friend Billy. As I questioned Billy, I saw some boys keeping a soccer ball moving around the football field. Jason, Randy, and Andrew leaned against the metal chain-link fence, almost in a daze (茫然) under the glare of the mid-May sun.
After I finished chatting with Billy, I happily walked away without another glance at the guys that he called his friends.
Many months after I had forgotten the events of that day, I somehow developed an interest in skating and even the wannabe-skater, Jason. When I asked Jason to teach me skate, he was happy to agree. At the news of Jason teaching me to skate, Andrew, Jason’s friend, was less excited. Fortunately, I recognized that Andrew hated me. Since I could not imagine what unpleasant things I had said or done to arouse such feelings, I asked Jason to explain.
“Dani, don’t you remember that day last year when you came over to us and asked to talk to Billy? Do you remember not talking to the rest of us and telling us that we weren’t important?” Jason inquired. Suddenly I felt as if my heart had dropped to the bottom of my stomach — I clearly remembered that day, but I never once considered the effect I had on Jason and his friends. Immediately, I began to realize that if Andrew remembered my disdainful (轻蔑的) words, Randy, Jason, and anyone that I ever made fun of probably remembered my unkind words as well. But why had I laughed at my classmates? I laughed at them only because they were different from me. My statements were completely unreasonable.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150个左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Day by day, Jason and his friends became increasingly important to me.
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Today, almost four years later, I can see a big change in myself.
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