【推荐2】In April, 1967 my brother, Harvey Cooley, met a soldier, David Lawson during basic training. In their free time, they hung out together. As the weeks went by, they grew very close, almost like brothers. However, after basic training, soldiers moved on to advanced training. They thought they would never see each other again.

One day in September, 1967, these men were both in California waiting for transport to the front. Harvey and David had an unexpected surprise when they ran into each other. They talked very briefly since they had got to report in five minutes. They agreed to meet after they were discharged(退伍)from the service. Harvey wrote a brief note which he gave to David showing the date and location they were to meet.

Harvey never made it back home. He died while saving two soldiers during enemy fire. David did not learn of Harvey’s death until the mid 1980s. he wrote a letter to Harvey after he returned home and asked if they could postpone their meeting to a later date. His letter was unanswered. David felt then that Harvey must not have made it back. He knew Harvey would surely have answered his letter if he had been able to.

While David was searching the internet for Information about Harvey, he found a poem dedicated(献给) to Harvey by me. He sent me an email and told me about his friendship with Harvey and we swapped phone numbers.

David called me and we talked about his friendship with Harvey. While on the phone with David, I learned about the note Harvey had written for him. David still had the note and sent me a copy of it.

It is amazing, to say the least, that David was able to track(追查到) me down. Even more amazing is the fact that he still had Harvey’s note after all these years. David told me it was a joy to finally hear from Harvey through me after over forty years.

【推荐3】Mark Smith and Jarryd Haines are good friends. The two boys from Sydney have known each other for most of their lives. Both of them enjoy playing Australian football.

A few years ago, when Mark was nine, he developed brain cancer. The disease robbed the boy of his sight, part of his hearing and his ability to play his favorite sport. However, throughout the years, Jarryd remained his closest friend. They still share their love of Australian football. And they still enjoy talking about the Sydney Swans, their favorite team.

Two weeks ago, I took my seat at Sydney Cricket Ground to watch the Swans. The old stadium was crowded with fans. Shortly into the second quarter, heard some great commentary(实况报道） from a boy. Play by play, Jarryd was bringing the game to life. I turned and saw him. Mark was sitting next to him.

Although he cannot see anymore, Mark still loves the Swans very much. Usually, he goes to the stadium and listens to the commentary on the radio. However, in the second quarter of that match, the radio system broke down. That was when his friend Jarryd stepped in.

I hardly looked at the Swans and Buddy, the team’s star player. Instead, I was focusing on Jarryd and Mark. “What’s happening now, mate?” Mark asked. “Don’t worry. Mark,” Jarryd replied. “Okay. Buddy’s got it. Will he go for it? He’s going for it! It’s his tenth goal! Buddy is on fire!” Mark listened carefully. He was lost in the magic of Australian football brought to life by his friend.

Sports can be competitive. However, they can also allow us to share wonderful moments with others, may they be close friends or perfect strangers. Here, Jarryd and Mark have moved me, and perhaps some other spectators（观众）, with the best commentary.

【推荐1】Betty and Harold have been married for years. But one thing still puzzles old Harold. How is it that he can leave Betty and her friend Joan sitting on the sofa, talking, go out to a ballgame, come back three and a half hours later, and they’re still sitting on the sofa? Talking?

What in the world, Harold wonders, do they have to talk about?

Betty shrugs. Talk? We’re friends.

Researching this matter called friendship, psychologist Lillian Rubin spent two years interviewing more than two hundred women and men. No matter what their age, their job, their sex, the results were completely clear: women have more friendships than men, and the difference in the content and the quality of those friendships is “marked and unmistakable.”

More than two-thirds of the single men Rubin interviewed could not name a best friend. Those who could were likely to name a woman. Yet three-quarters of the single women had no problem naming a best friend, and almost always it was a woman. More married men than women named their wife/husband as a best friend, most trusted person, or the one they would turn to in time of emotional crises. “Most women,” says Rubin, “identified at least one, usually more, trusted friends to whom they could turn in a troubled moment, and they spoke openly about the importance of these relationships in their lives.”

“In general,” writes Rubin in her new book, “women’s friendships with each other rest on shared emotions and support, but men’s relationships are marked by shared activities. ” For the most part, Rubin says, interactions between men are emotionally controlled —a good fit with the social requirements of “manly behavior.”

“Even when a man is said to be a best friend,” Rubin writes, “the two share little about their innermost feelings. Whereas a woman’s closest female friend might be the first to tell her to leave a failing marriage, it wasn’t unusual to hear a man say he didn’t know his friend’s marriage was in serious trouble until he appeared one night asking if he could sleep on the sofa.”

【推荐2】When friendships fall apart, it can feel like it’s impossible to repair them.     1     However, some can be saved. If you’d like to restart a long lost friendship, here is a four-step plan.

    2    

Start by calling or writing a note to communicate one message: “Our friendship is valuable to me, and I miss you. Is there any way to settle what stands between us?” This simple step is a way to open the doors to reconciliation (和解). Set the ground to see if your friend is willing to seek solutions as well.

Forgive as best you can.

It’s tough to let go if you’ve been wronged. Feeling the need for revenge (报复) is natural. However, the problem with revenge is that it could become a bad cycle. How can you stop this? By forgiving.     3     The problems that cause the breakdown of a friendship are not one person’s responsibility. Keep this in mind, and you will be well on your way to forgiveness.

Find out the problem.

Finding out what went wrong is important. Don’t pretend there is no problem.     4     If a friendship can’t survive such a conversation, that may be a sign that it ought to end.

Rebuild respect.

The final step is to rebuild respect.     5     Highlight those you like best about them. Next, you need to admit your mistake. Take ownership, and ask for forgiveness. If you do this, then mutual (相互的) respect is almost certain.

【推荐3】Farmer John and Farmer Bob were neighbors. For more than 30 years, they had been getting along very well.

Then their good relationship broke. It began with a small thing, then bitter words, and then weeks of silence. One morning Farmer John woke up to find a stream between the two farms. “It must be Bob,” John thought.

Then one day there was a knock on John’s door. He opened it to find a carpenter(木匠) standing at the doorway.

“I’m looking for a few days’ work,” the carpenter said.

“I do have a job for you,” John said. “Look across the stream at that farm. That’s my neighbor Bob. He dug a stream between the two farms. I want you to build a fence—an 8-foot fence. I don’t want to see his place or his face any more. I don’t have such a neighbor!”

Farmer John helped the carpenter get the materials ready and then he was off for the day. About sunset when the farmer returned, the carpenter had just finished his job. The farmer’s eyes opened wide. There was no fence there at all!

It was a bridge! And the neighbor, Bob, was coming across, with his hand outstretched(伸出). “Hi, John! You’re quite a fellow to build this bridge!”

Then they met in the middle, taking each other’s hands. “I’m terribly sorry for what I have said and done. We should be good to each other,” said Farmer Bob.

Then they turned to see the carpenter, who was ready to go. “No, wait! Stay a few days. I have a lot of other jobs for you,” said Farmer John. “I’d love to stay,” the carpenter said, “but I have more bridges to build.”

【推荐1】It has become a daily routine(常规) for the students on bus No.7 in Arlington, Washington to wave to the “grandma in window”.

Every day for the past five years, you could find the old lady Louise Edlen sitting at her dining room table having breakfast as the kids were passing by. But one day in early October this year she was not found sitting in her usual place.

The kids didn’t see their old friend for a few days. They got worried. Finally, they learned that she had suffered a stroke(中风). “It was kind of heartbreaking to us because she was always there in the past five years,” seventh-grader Axtin Bandewerfhorst said.

But she was upset and was obviously still thinking about the 20 boys and girls who passed by her home every day. The day after the bus driver Carol Mitzelfeld brought a bouquet of flowers from the students to Edlen, the kids looked out of the window to find a sign reading “Thank you”.

“That really made me happy,” 10^th-grader Cheyanne Holt said. “It shows how much we mean to her.”

So to welcome Edlen home from the hospital, they made her a sign of their own: a photo of the kids waving from inside the bus.

“Carol told us that a lot of times she even does not remember her daughter’s name, but she always remembers to wave to the kids on the bus,” Bandewerfhorst said. “That made me feel really special.”

Louise’s husband, Dave Elden, said, “The students’ daily move gives her something to look forward to every day.”

Elden has returned home, and is back to waving to the students every day.

【推荐2】Joy Mangano is now an American inventor. She was divorced and had three kids under age 7 when she was 33, and was barely keeping up payments on her small two-bedroom home by working extra hours as a waitress. “There were times when I would lie in bed and think. I didn't know how I was going to pay that bill,” Mangano says.

But she had a special ability for seeing the obvious thing. She knew how hard it was to mop the floor. “I was tired, of bending down, putting my hands in dirty water, wringing (拧) out a mop,” Mangano says. “So, There's gotta be a better way.”

How about a “self-wringing” mop? She designed a special tool you could twist in two directions at once, and still keep your hands clean and dry. She set out to sell it, first a few at flea markets.

Then Mangano met with the media. But would couch potatoes (电视迷) buy a mop? The experts on shopping TV were less than certain. They gave it a try, and it failed Mangano was sure it would sell if they'd let her do the on-camera display. She said, “Get me on that stage, and I will sell this mop because it's a great item.”

So QVC, a multinational corporation specializing in televised home shopping, took a chance on her. “I got onstage and the phones went crazy. We sold every mop in minutes.”

Today she's president of Ingenious Designs, a multimillion-dollar company, and one of the stars of HSN, the Home Shopping Network. Talking about the household invention, Mangano says, “It is as natural for me as it is for a parent to talk about their child.”

【推荐3】When Capt. Greg Galeazzi joined the Army seven years ago, he was well aware of the risks of injuries or even death he would face. In 2011, the risks became Galeazzi’s reality — he got terribly injured in an explosion where he lost his double legs. “I was a shell of a man,” he said. “Who I was, was gone.”

Before his injury, playing the guitar had been a special pastime for Galeazzi. Music had always been important to him. He felt deep sadness because he thought he’d lost his ability to play music.

However, everything changed when Galeazzi joined MusiCorps, a music rehabilitation (康复) program for severely wounded soldiers who are recovering at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. “We match the injured troops with professional musicians,” said Arthur Bloom, who founded the program in 2007. “They help wounded soldiers play music and recover their lives.”

Bloom, a graduate of the Yale School of Music, offers his services to patients at Walter Reed who have an interest in playing an instrument. Program participants practice technique, write and record music. Or they may just get together for a jam session (即兴演奏会).

The journey to recovery for many soldiers is a long one. It can require dozens of operations and many years spent in hospitals. There’s so much downtime at Walter Reed, and that’s what they fill up with music.

Since 2007, Bloom and his group have helped hundreds of wounded soldiers. For Galeazzi, joining MusiCorps has helped restore his confidence and made him more optimistic about his future. “Something survived that horrible injury in Afghanistan,” Galeazzi said. “Arthur and his program changed my outlook on what is possible.”

“I’ve seen guys going through such a hard time with their injuries that they are very withdrawn,” Bloom said. “The music becomes their new way of communicating. It can be just as powerful as the spoken word. By injecting music into this space, we can inject life.”