I forgot the name of the old lady, who was a customer (顾客) on my newspaper route when I was twelve. Yet she taught me a _________ that I shall never forget.

On a winter afternoon, a friend and I were throwing stones onto the roof of the old lady’s house near her garden. I found a perfectly smooth (光滑的) rock and threw it. The stone was too _________, however, so it slipped (滑) from my hand as I let it go and headed straight for a small window on the lady’s door. At the _________ of broken glass, we knew we were in trouble. We ran faster than any of our stones flew off her roof.

I was too _________ of getting caught that first night to be concerned about the old lady with the broken window in winter. However, a few days later, when I was sure that I hadn’t been discovered I started to feel guilty (内疚的). She still greeted me with a smile each day when I gave her the newspaper, but I was no longer able to act comfortably when seeing her.

I decided that I would _________ my paper delivery (送) money, and in three weeks I had the seven dollars that I thought would cover the cost of her window. I put the money in an envelope with a _________ saying that I was sorry for breaking her window and hoped that the seven dollars would cover the cost of repairing it.

The next day, I _________ the old lady her paper. She thanked me for the paper and gave me a bag of biscuits she had made herself. I thanked her and ate the biscuits as I continued my route.

After several biscuits, I _________ an envelope and pulled it out of the bag. When I opened the envelope, I was shocked. Inside were the seven dollars and a short note that said, “I’m proud of you.”

In Ben Elton’s book Gridlock, aliens (外星人) come to our world to learn about people. They look at the places where we live and work, and how we travel. But they don’t understand cars. They see that every morning hundreds of millions of people get into big boxes. These boxes take people many kilometers to their workplace. But often, the big boxes can’t move because there are so many of them. Then, in the evening, the people get into their boxes and slowly drive home again.

The aliens think this is really strange. Why don’t people travel in the faster boxes they call trains or buses? Or live near their workplace? Do they like to sit in boxes for hours? Or aren’t they very smart?

The aliens are right. Why don’t we live near our workplace?

It’s often because houses are too expensive in the city. People who lived in the city before have to live outside it now. But many jobs are in the city center. Cheaper houses in cities are a possible answer to traffic problems.

“Fall” and “Autumn”

What season is it in October? If you ask people from UK, they will tell you it’s “autumn”. But if you go to US, you will find that people use “autumn” or “fall”.

According toDictionary.com, both words have been around for a long time, but neither of them was first to describe this season. During this season, crops would become ripe（成熟）and farmers would have a big harvest. So in Old English, this season was simply called “harvest”.

Then, in the 1600s, more people left their farms and moved to cities. With fewer people farming, the word “harvest” became less useful. English speakers needed a different name for the season. They knew leaves fell from trees during the season, so people started calling it “the fall of the leaf”, or “fall” for short.

But at the end of the 1600s, autumn, from the French word “autompne” and the Latin “autumnus”, came to English. “Fall” as the word for this season disappeared slowly.

At the same time, people in UK were making their first trip to North America. They brought the words “fall” and “autumn” with them. That’s why today Americans have two names for one season.

学校的英文公众号正在开展主题为“我与北京传统文化 (traditional culture)” 的征文活动。请你结合自己的经历，写一篇短文投稿，谈一谈你去了哪里，做了哪些体验北京传统文化的事情，以及你的感受。

Beijing is the capital city with a long history and rich culture. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________