【推荐1】All Quiet in a Darkened Library

After my mother died, my father, who was 75 at the time, began to regularly visit the local library in Epping. He loved going there _______ he enjoyed reading different kinds of books, especially reading the newspapers on Saturdays. The library had a small area, where the soft carpet, folding chairs and lap desks _______ a comfortable space for independent reading. My dad would sit there for hours. This particular wintery Saturday, at about 12 noon, after being there for two hours, my dad _______ that it was very quiet and darker than usual. He looked around, realizing that all the staff had left and he had been _______ locked in.

My dad was a “panic merchant” at the best of times, so I can only _______ what he was like when this happened. The doors had been locked from the outside and he had no way _______. He must have felt completely at a _______, since he didn’t know some _______ for handling this kind of crazy situation. My dad looked at the noticeboards to try to find a _______ phone number—a staff member or someone he could ring to help let him out—but without __________. So he rang the police station and they kindly got in touch with the head librarian.

The head librarian immediately rang my dad back at the library, and __________ that she would be soon there. She tried to __________ him and even explained how he could make a coffee if he wished. This was very nice, but my dad was in too much of a “__________” to do so.

Thankfully, the head librarian arrived __________ the hour and let my dad out. She apologized for the __________ it had caused my father and sent my father back home in person. We were very grateful, since she could easily have been __________ at having to come back to work. The next day my dad seemed to __________ from this accident. He almost forgot all about the unpleasantness, and even found his experience quite __________.

I guess the entire staff now makes extra sure that the library is __________ before they leave. What’s more, my dad has learned an important lesson by himself—never again became quite so __________ in his reading.

【推荐2】When I got married, I moved from a small town to a big city as I pursued my _________ as a radio broadcaster. We have two sons, both of whom moved with us to Ottawa when they were quite _________. They went to school there, _________ there and then, chasing their own careers, they also moved. One went to Canada’s east coast city called Halifax and the other _________ to the west coast to Vancouver. We had a dilemma; we were left in the _________.

The problem wasn’t _________ at the time because I was still working. However, as we began to think about _________, we wondered where we should _________ our final years. We couldn’t be _________ to both of our children. For several reasons we __________ on a small town on Vancouver Island. __________ we were close to one of them. However, he left Vancouver and went south later.

Only we __________ in our little west coast town. We love our little corner of paradise but we have __________ a price. We have not been there for some important __________ such as the births of two of our grandchildren. We have missed __________ each of them grow up; we have missed the normal, __________ households that have young people in them. Our home, while very comfortable, is also very quiet.

Every fall we travel to see the children. __________, both our boys are doing well and our grandchildren are growing up straight and tall. They __________ come to visit us. The distances are just too great and it is __________.

__________ has been good for our family but we have all paid a price.

【推荐3】Recently, I have been struggling to connect with my dad because our conversations have seemed unimportant to him. In a half-hearted attempt to find something that _________him, I pulled out my phone and showed him a few_________of Jay, my new pet rabbit.

“Did mom tell you I got a bunny?” It was an unusual question. To my surprise, my dad’s_________were lifted. “A black bunny!” he called out, getting closer to_________the photos. He wanted to know more, I hurried to find more photos, holding on to this_________opportunity.

I shouldn’t be_________that it was a bunny that_________the fog between my dad and I. Growing up, we never talked much. Instead, our time together centered around animals, like catching crayfish at the river and caring for turtles and crabs._________animals has always been our _________.

A few months later, I came up with more photos and videos of Jay on my laptop so my dad could see them more ____________. I had been____________that his initial interest in Jay was a one-off event, but he____________again when I showed him the new stuff.

Our love for animals is the____________that connects us. There was no ____________to start having deep conversations if that had never been our style, just finding ____________together in a photo of a bunny was enough.

【推荐2】The e-mail request came in to Ekiben restaurant in Baltimore late on a Thursday afternoon in March: broccoli topped with fresh herbs and cucumber vinegar. The man who sent the e-mail didn’t ________want the food itself. Brandon was writing on behalf of his mother in-law, Rina, a/an ________customer of the restaurant. For the past six years, every time she visited Baltimore, the first place she wanted to go was Ekiben so she could order that one dish-broccoli tempura (西兰花天妇罗). Brandon explained she was now in the final ________ of lung cancer at her home in Vermont and that he was hoping to get the ________ to make it for her there.

Steve Chu, one of the Asian fusion restaurant’s co-owners, read the e-mail and quickly replied with a/an ________suggestion. “Thanks for ________,” he wrote. “We’d like to meet you in Vermont and make it fresh for you.”

Brandon Jones, the son-in-law, was ________. “I e-mailed back, saying, ‘You do know that this is Vermont we’re talking about, right?’ ” says Brandon. “But Steve responded, ‘No problem. You tell us the date, time, and ________ and we’ll be there.’ ”

That Friday after work, a day after receiving Brandon’s e-mail, Chu________ his truck with a hot plate and a cooker filled with ________ for cooking and then headed for Vermont with his business partner, Ephrem Abebe, and an employee. They stayed ________ in an Airbnb rental and drove the next day to the house where Rina’s mother lived.

On their arrival, they ________ the gate of the truck, hooked (钩住) the hot plate to the truck’s power port, and started cooking. After neatly ________ the food, they knocked on their customer’s door.

Brandon was happy that her mother was able to enjoy her beloved broccoli with a side order of remarkable kindness one last time. “My mom cried later about their ________, and so did I,” Brandon says.

“It was an honor to help ________ the family’s wishes,” Chu says. “This is about her, not us. There was a lot of good, positive energy in doing this.”

【推荐3】I ride the bus to work every day. I'm a people-watcher，and I live in a ________town，so I see many of the same people_________the bus with me every day，on their_________ to and from work.

For many months，I__________ an elderly man get on at one of the _________，and always_________to the back of the bus.

He ________ the same clothes every day，and they were worn-out，but clean. I ________ spoke with this gentleman，but I could tell he seemed to lead a_________ life. One day，I decided to drive to work，and I noticed the gentleman on a street corner I was passing，with a sign in his hand asking for ____

I went home that day，and wrote him a _________，saying I was grateful for what little I had in my life，and that I wanted to _________some of it with him. I ________ a small amount of money and the note into a small envelope，and the next day I gave it to him_______ he got on the bus.

The next day，he_________ me a note on the bus.

The note_________：Hi Larissa. Thank you very much for your kindness. The money will be used to_________ next month's bus ticket. Your note certainly provided a very__________start to the week. I hope you continue to enjoy a cheerful ________ . –John

I will _________ his note forever！We now smile and nod to each other on the bus every morning. What a cheerful life I have！