【推荐3】An elderly woman is crediting (归功于) her neighbor’s 4-year-old dog with saving her life during last week’s dangerously cold temperatures.

Tim Curfman was _______ his garbage with his dog Midnight when he felt its _______ was unusual. It had its ears held up looking at him. It didn’t _______ do that. Curfman got the feeling that something’s _______. So he observed how his dog was acting and _______ it to a spot on the other side of his house. There, he saw his 87-year-old neighbor, Noreen, _______ in the snow. She was trying to fill her bird feeder when she fell. Curfman _______ she was out there at least half an hour. She could not get up because she didn’t have enough _______ to push herself up, and there was nothing around the corner to get a _______ of, either. The temperature was one degree below zero, but Curfman and Midnight were able to __________ her quickly.

Noreen, who didn’t have serious injuries, was lucky to __________ frostbite (冻伤) even though her clothes were wet. Curfman called his wife and they together helped his neighbor up from the snow and into her __________, where his wife helped the elderly woman get into __________ clothes.

Noreen was __________ to Midnight for saving her life. “A dog like this __________ to be proud of because it’s not every dog that pays attention to things like this,” Noreen said in an interview.

【推荐1】When I was 13, my only purpose was to become the star on our football team. That meant _______ Miller King, who was the best player at our school.

Football season started in September and all summer long I worked out. I carried my football everywhere for _______.

Just before September, Miller was struck by a car and lost his right arm. I went to see him after he came back from _______. He looked very pale, but he didn’t cry.

That season, I broke all of Miller’s records while he watched the home games from the bench. We went 10:1 and I was named most valuable player, ________ I often had crazy dreams in which I was to blame for Miller’s accident.

One afternoon, I was crossing the field to go home and saw Miller ________ when he was going over a fence — which wasn’t hard to climb if you had both arms. I’m sure I was the last person in the world he wanted to accept ________ from. But even that challenge he accepted, I helped him move slowly over the fence. When we were finally safe on the other side, he said to me, “You know, I didn’t tell you this during the season, but you did ________. Thank you for filling in for me.”

His words freed me from my bad ________. I thought to myself, how even without an arm he was more of a leader. Damaged but not defeated, he was still ahead of me. I was right to have ________ him. From that day on, I grew ________ and a little more real.

【推荐2】A little girl created a perfect gift for her mother’s birthday. It was a drawing of a _______on white paper with the words “For mom: love, love, love” decorated with hearts. She folded (折叠) her letter, but then she _______it.

For most people, that would be the _______ of this story, but this story had a different result. James Carrell found the letter. He had just_______ his mother, wishing her a happy birthday. After he hung up, Carrell saw the _______ on the ground outside of a hardware store in Manvel. “I _______ it was a gift,” said Carrell. “I opened it up and saw the flower and hearts. It really _______ me.” Carrell thought the letter would _______ someone’s day and that maybe he could find the owner, so he posted it on the Internet. The message moved a lot of people, _______ one man.

“I was sitting at my friend’s house and saw a man’s ________,” said Carrell.

The comments included one from Robert Alvarado. He wrote, “I can’t ________ you found my baby’s letter.” Carrell reached Alvarado to ________ the letter. It took a few days, but the men finally met on Thursday night.

“Eventually the letter made it home,” said Alvarado. “We are ________ for what James Carrell did.” We often forget the power of ________ things, but for this family from Alvin, Carrell’s small act left a ________impression.

【推荐1】Ruby’s Roses

I can well remember my neighbor Ruby and her husband Jack. One day, I was trying to _______a ball when I fell on top of Ruby’s rosebushes(玫瑰花丛). About ten of them were badly damaged. At that moment, I _______ we should have played our softball games elsewhere to _______hurting the roses.

Jack Junior, Ruby’s son, rushed out and _______, “Look what you’ve done to our roses! I’m going to fetch my gun and _______you!”

My sister and I told Mom what had happened. She put down sewing and walked out _______. While Mom examined the_______roses, Ruby slowly walked out .She looked_________. Ruby walked over to my mother and they stood looking at each other. We girls held our_______ .

Suddenly my mother ________and hugged Ruby. “We’re sorry about the ________ . The girls will replace them if we can’t fix them. In return for all the ________they’ve caused you, they’ll help you weed the roses this summer,” she said ________.

Ruby________at my mother through her tears. She said, “When my mother came from England, she________one tiny part of her favorite rosebush. That always________her of hometown.”

She paused(停顿)a minute, then said sadly, “My mother had a(n) ________touch with flowers. Over the years that one plant grew into all these bushes. ________she died, I’ve tried to keep them up.”

“We’ll be happy to help you ________them,” my mother said. “You know, some people say I have a magic touch with flowers, too.”

Soon both women were down on their knees talking and examining the damaged bushes together. A few weeks ________ , the plants all returned with vigor(活力).

【推荐2】I was walking down a dark street one evening when I heard screams coming from behind some _________. Alarmed as I was, I _________ to listen, and panicked when I realized that what I was hearing were the sounds of a _________. Only yards from where I stood, a woman was being attacked.

“Should I get _________?” I thought.

I was _________ about my own safety, and I hated myself for having suddenly decided to take a (an) _________ route home that night. “What if I’m _________ too?” Although it felt like a century, my thought process had only taken seconds. But already the girl’s _________ were growing weaker.

I knew I had to _________ fast. “How can I walk away from this?” I asked myself.

“No.” I finally resolved (决定). “I cannot __________ my back on the fate of this unknown woman, even if it means risking my own life.”

I ran behind the bushes and pulled the __________ off the woman. Struggling, we fell to the ground, where we fought for a few minutes until the man jumped up and __________.

Breathing heavily, I got to my __________ and approached the girl, who was sobbing behind a tree. In the darkness, I could __________ see her outline, but I could certainly sense her trembling with __________. Not wanting to frighten her any __________, I at first spoke to her from a distance.

“It’s OK.” I said. “The man ran away. You’re __________ now.”

There was a (n) __________ pause and then I heard the words, said in __________.

“Dad, is that you?”

And then, from __________ the tree, stepped my youngest daughter, Katherine.

【推荐3】In February 2020, Max’s friend Rick was diagnosed with cancer. Max _________ Rick during the last month of his life, thus becoming _________ of the care provided to his friend by North Devon Hospice. “The hospital took such good care of him that I wanted to do something to show my _________,” says Max.

Max _________ a fundraising mission in March 2020. When Max first put up a tent in the yard of his house, he was 10 years old and had just _________ his friend Rick. “Before my friend died of cancer, he gave me a tent and told me to ‘have an adventure’,” says Max.

Through a years-long campaign, he became known as “The Boy in the Tent” and _________ more than £700,000 in 2023. Such a _________ allowed the hospital to _________ around 500 patients in their own homes, helping them face the _________ of an illness like cancer.

When he recalls his __________ experiences. Max says that he won’t __________ a single thing about the past three years. It’s easy to imagine, however, the past years weren’t free of __________ for Max: from collapsed tents to keeping warm throughout storms and snowy nights.

Max faced everything with his positive attitude and goal-driven mind. “One time my tent collapsed in the wind and rain at about 10:00 pm and I __________ to put it up again,” he says. “Despite all, I never regret it. I __________ love my one-of-a-kind adventure and I believe Rick would enjoy it as well if he were __________.”