【推荐2】I got out of the car that rainy Tuesday, already tired, and headed toward the rehab center where I work as an acupuncturist. It had been a _________ morning with my son, Adrian, who has ADD (过动症). By the entrance, something caught my eye — a _________ . Where did she come from?

_________ of my colleagues knew anything about her. But a client told me she had been _________ the last few nights. At the end of my _________ , I saw her in the same spot, cold and _________.   “Go find your family,” I said.

It rained the next day. When I _________ out for a break, there she was, getting rained on again. Halfway home that evening, I made a turn back to the rehab. I _________ the chicken and drove home, her beak (喙) on my shoulder the entire _________ .

I asked online if anyone had lost a chicken. A week went by. No one __________ her. My rescue made her __________ — even laying eggs in my couch.

The biggest surprise was how Adrian took __________ her. His illness makes him lose temper frequently. But not with the chicken. I’ve never seen Adrian so __________ before. It’s a blessing to see the __________ between them. That Tuesday, I told the chicken to find her __________ . Little did I know it would turn out to be us!

【推荐3】My life is being held hostage by a 4-pound, 22-year-old black cat. Her name is Inky, and I ________ her from my father, who was terribly worried about how she would fare (生活) after he ________.

He adored dogs but refused to ________ one because it might destroy the delicate ecosystem he’d ________     for Inky, who lives a life of supreme ________. In the mornings, she would sit on The Times as he read it. My father found this annoying ________ delightful. In the afternoons, she would loll (懒洋洋地躺着) about his ________     until he threw open the front door and whistled to her to come in for dinner. Who whistles to a cat?

And then, after they had spent 20 years together, my father died. Inky was ________ and confused. For six months, she ________ to come upstairs to the bedroom. When I carried her up, she would bolt back downstairs as if she’d seen a ghost.

I had promised my dad that I would always ________ Inky, no matter what happened. He ________ that I would. And so I did.

But it has not been ________. In her grief and dislocation, Inky peed on every rug and all the wall-to-wall carpets in the house. She ruined the living room rug, the dining room rug, and then went to work on the second floor. She howled for her breakfast while I was still asleep. She headbutted (以头撞) my hands impatiently when I opened a can of Fancy Feast, the only wet ________ that suits her taste.

Sometimes I ________ her so much. And then she sidles (悄悄地走) up to me, purring and asking for love. And I give it to her. I can’t ________ my dad.

【推荐1】On a Sunday morning, Tim Abernathy walked off the dance floor at the Barn Dance and sat down in a chair to rest with his wife, Rachel. Then something felt wrong. His _________ got tight, then tighter. He grabbed Rachel’s hand, then _________ to the floor.

“His eyes had _________ back,” said Rachel. “His lips were getting darker.” The band stopped playing. People started yelling, but nobody _________ to act.

Someone _________ did. It was Johnny “Digger” Tucker. He swiped (挥动) his fingers through Tim’s mouth, thinking he could be choking. He started beating on Tim’s chest and began mouth-to-mouth. More _________ . More mouth-to-mouth. Then finally, Tim _________ a breath. The paramedics (护理人员) came, and Johnny quietly left.

“If Johnny hadn’t been there, I would be _________ my husband now, “said Rachel. Folks say Johnny Tucker is the type of man you’d call at 2 a. m. Maybe it’s because he knows more than most how _________ life is. Every day, he faces __________ .

Johnny is a gravedigger. He has dug the final resting places for about 20, 000people, each grave __________ a half feet deep in __________, frozen ground. “I treat everybody as if it were my family I’m burying,” he said. He is so respected that funeral directors arrange their schedules around his __________ .

So maybe it’s not __________ that Johnny often finds himself in a position to lend a hand. That night Johnny and his wife were __________ when the band played an old song. They turned around for one more slow dance. Minutes later, the gravedigger saved a life.

【推荐3】I was with my father at a clinic near his home for a routine blood test. An elderly woman came in and sat on a ________ room chair. She settled into the seat opposite my dad and smiled at him and he smiled back ________. He was 77 years old and had been living with Alzheimer disease for several years. It’s a disease that ________ your loved ones, slowly, day by day and the memory loss is painful and ________.

After a while, she started singing the tune My Heart Will Go On. Since Alzheimer disease also has a(n) ________ to damage a person’s patience, I couldn’t help thinking that this little woman was playing with fire. Her singing began gently. I glanced at Dad to see his ________. His smile was gone, and he was ________ right at her. I couldn’t read his expression initially, but it seemed to be something like ________. I wondered if he was lost somewhere in his memory, or maybe he was trying to figure out whether this was someone he should ________. Slowly, the woman’s singing got louder and her eyes closed with ________. Now Dad looked a little shocked. Still, I watched nervously, noticing the ________ of an angry outburst and was considering my options on how best to ________ in. Instead, his face changed, and the tension ________ in his eyes. He no longer looked confused.

When her song ended and the waiting room became ________, the woman opened her eyes. My dad was still looking directly at her. “That was beautiful,” he said. ________, she smiled and said, “Thank you.”