【推荐1】When you walk through the doors of Morton Plant Hospital on an early Tuesday afternoon,you’ll be greeted by the comforting voice of Mary Ellen Owens.

Owens, who is now 98, started _____ at the hospital after her husband died nearly 20 years ago. “My husband was a (n) _____ here, off and on for about six weeks over four years,” she _____. “Everyone at the hospital had been so good to us when he was sick.” To show her _____, Owens wanted to repay the hospital in a special way. “I don’t have several million dollars, but I can give my _____,” she said.

Owens is approaching 7,000 hours in volunteer time. “I used to give three days a week,”she said. “Now I’m _____. I don’t get around as much as I _____, so I only give one day a week.”

To get to her weekly four-hour _____, Owens receives a ride from a volunteer who she now calls her friend. “Every _____, Richard picks me up from my home and brings me here,”she said. “I don’t believe people of my age should be ______.”

In her younger years, Owens used to walk up and down the fashion runways in New York City and Richmond, Virginia. She also had a(n) ______ to be in the 1939 classic film Gone with the Wind. Because she had other work at the time, however, Owens ______ to turn it down, ______ she thought it would be entertaining.

“What I didn’t do in my life is more interesting than what I’ve done,” she laughs. ______ she’s in good health now, Owens plans to continue to live her life with a ______—greeting each patient with a smile.

【推荐2】Anansi was about to eat when his friend Turtle walked by. “Hello, Anansi,” said Turtle. “That smells great!” Anansi didn’t like to _________. But in spider culture, you always share your _________ with friends. So Anansi said, “Come in and eat with me.” Turtle sat down. But before Turtle started eating, Anansi said, “Turtle, your hands are dirty! In my culture we wash our hands before eating.” Turtle looked his dirty hands and felt _________. He apologized to Anansi and went to the river to wash.

When he got back, Anansi was _________ eating. “I didn’t want the food to get_________,” Anansi explained. Turtle sat down and he was _________ hungry. But Anansi said, “Your hands are still dirty!” Turtle looked down. Anansi was _________! “I’m so sorry! I’ll wash them again,” Turtle said. This time, Turtle walked back with clean hands. But to his _________, all food was gone! “I’m sorry, Turtle, but you took so long! I couldn’t wait,” Anansi _________.

The next day Turtle invited Anansi to have lunch. They swam to the ____________ of the river. There, Anansi saw a table covered with food. But there was a problem. Every time he tried to sit down, he ____________ back to the surface of the river. Anansi had a (an)____________. He put some rocks in his pockets and swam back. He sat down at the table and smiled. But before he could eat ____________, Turtle said, “In my culture, we____________ our jackets at the table.” Anansi saw that Turtle wasn’t wearing a jacket, and he felt ashamed. But as soon as his jacket was off his ____________, he popped back up to the surface again. On the river bottom below, clever Turtle smiled and started eating.

【推荐1】Literature was something I was interested in. At school I was that kid who stuck his hand up to _________ aloud from the Shakespeare play. Over the holidays I would visit the _________ and read literatures. While my generation was playing after school, I was in a ghetto(贫民区) learning to _________.

I lived then in Lagos. The ghetto landlords had unlimited _________. They could throw others with all their possessions out into the street. Annoyed, I wrote about _________. Those pieces were not published. Then it occurred to me to write a story about them. This began my long _________ in the rigorous craft(严谨构思) of the short story.

However, after finishing my A-levels, I had a job working for a paint company. _________ in Lagos was so terrible that it took three hours to get to work. I would wake up at 4 a.m. and write for an hour before _________ work. When I _________ I would sleep and then write till one o’clock.

The first __________ took a year. I got myself __________ from work and bought a typewriter with the severance pay(解雇金). I began __________ for many __________, who all turned it down.

Then, one morning, a letter came from Longmans’ African Writers’ series. I remember giving a cry of __________. That moment changed everything. I was 19. With the publication of Flowers and Shadows, the life I was meant to live __________.

【推荐2】My life as a tax-paying employed person began in middle school, when, for three whole days, I worked in a baking factory.

My best friend Betsy’s father was a manager at Hough Bakeries, which, at Easter time, _______ little bunny cakes for all its stores throughout Cleveland. It happened that the plant downtown needed eight kids for _______help during our spring break, for which I had no _______ beyond listening to my favorite records. I’d earn minimum wage. I’d see how a factory worked. My parents thought all of this was a grand idea and called Betsy’s dad with their _______

Our _______ in the factory were simple: Place cakes on a moving belt. Attach icing (糖霜) ears. Apply icing eyes and nose. _______ bunny from the belt. This was harder than it sounds. _______ a bit and the cakes pile up. As I told my parents at dinner that first night, it was all a little more high-pressure than I’d _______.

Dad smiled. The son of a grocer, he’d spent the summers of his childhood _______ food in Bernardsville, New Jersey. This was the sort of work that made you ________ the dollars you earned and respect those who did the work, he told me.

【推荐2】My carpenter is a competent, even gifted craftsman. But my old house still makes him feel ________. It was ________ well over a century ago, probably by very poor people, and it ________. My carpenter’s ________ to me: “Move out.” What he doesn’t ________ is that I like it here. It’s my home’s imperfections that make it interesting.

This very thought ________ me just the other day while I was sitting at the counter in a bar. The bar opened in 1931, and little about its ________ has changed over the years. The long countertop has been bent and worn down to its bedrock so ________. Once a visitor asked the owner ________ why he hadn’t ________ it. Not missing a beat and being a man after my own heart, the ________ remarked, “Do you know how many elbows it took to get it this way?” That’s it, then. An imperfect product, like a perfect one, is also the________ of our labor, and as such it needs to be ________ for what it is, rather than what it isn’t.

I’m ________ that, at root, my carpenter________realizes this. Recently, while making a new skylight (天窗) in my home, he ________ wood and had to take a piece from my scrap (废料) pile. The “________” was that my son, when he was little, had burned his name into the board with a magnifying glass. “I’m sorry I had to use scrap,” said the carpenter as we looked up at the burnt ________, “but I didn’t think you’d ________. Does it look OK?”

“Oh yes,” I assured him as I admired his handwork. “It’s ________.”