1 . It was a sunny day. I had gone up and down the tower when, outside the door at the foot, a blind man came toward me. In a moment, he disappeared up the stairs. I looked at the sign that said “To the Tower”, and decided to _______ him.

I caught   up with   him in the ticket office. There I was _______ to   see the attendant selling   him a ticket   as if he   were any other visitor. Then, with the ticket in one hand and _______ the wall with the fingers of the other, the blind     man reached the stairs _______ to the hallway.

“That man is blind. What would a blind man climb up the tower for?” I said to the attendant, expecting him to show some _______, but he didn’t answer.

“Not the _______ certainly, ” I said. “Perhaps he wants to _______.”

I bought a ticket and _______ up the stairs. The man hadn’t gone as far as I _______ . A third of the way up the tower, I heard his _______. I   slowed down and followed him   at a little _______ . He   stopped from   time to   time. When he got to the balcony, I was a dozen steps _______. As I reached it, I saw him at the corner of the tower.

At last, after ten minutes, I _______ him. “ Excuse me,” I said as politely as I could, “but I am curious to know _______ you came up.”

He smiled. “Coming up the stairs, you will notice how not just light but sun _______ into the tower through the narrow windows here and there, so that you can feel the _______ —the cool stairs suddenly become quite warm—and   how up here behind the wall there is _______, but as soon as going opposite a window you can find the sun. There is   no _______ so good as this for feeling the difference between light and shade. It is not the first time I’ve come up.”

The blind man seemed quite _______, just like a child who was enjoying his favorite games. He told me the truth that blind men can also find the beauty in life _______ they cannot enjoy the sights of the world.

2 . I knocked lightly on Mrs. B’s door. “I’m Barbara, a hospice (临终安养院) volunteer.” I said nervously. It was my first week on the job, and my biggest ________ was figuring out how to begin with a patient.

“Please, sit down,” Mrs. B said, indicating the chair beside her bed. We chatted ________ about the framed ________ on her windowsill—her two daughters, many grandchildren, even great-grandchildren. Then she grew ________.

“What were you thinking about when I walked in?” I asked, sensing she might be waiting to see if I would ________ her to the truest place where this conversation could go.

“I know I’m not going to be around much ________. I’m at peace with that. But my grandson called yesterday. He’s ________ that he can’t make it to see me before I pass.”

“Have you thought about writing him a(n) ________?”

Mrs. B seemed to ________ a little. “I can dictate (口述) if you’d write for me,” she said.

I walked down the hall and ________ pens and paper materials. Mrs. B ________ her grandson’s letter and decided to dictate others — for her daughters, the other grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Then she ________ her church community and her bridge club too.

She asked me to put away the letters before I left. “I asked God to send me a(n) ________ this morning,” she said. “Now I know it was you.”

At that very moment I came to realize that we all ________ a loving spark. Kissing Mrs. B on her forehead, I knew simply showing up might be a precious ________.

3 . Since springing up in 2008, Chinese SNS websites have been growing rapidly. While building perfect and complete platforms, SNS websites have been attracting a greatly increasing number of users as well as enormous advertisers’ attention.

The birth of SNS websites brought us a new concept of socializing online using one’s real identity. Furthermore, the popularity of SNS websites has made real-identity online interaction (相互作用) a daily routine for almost all the Internet users. Blogs, photos, virtual gifts, games and other SNS applications have increased real emotional interaction among Internet users.

Obviously, real-identity online communication has become a major competitive advantage of SNS websites. Many experts conclude that SNS websites have created a network of real socializing and have solved people’s daily problems in communication. Therefore, solving real life issues and keeping friendly interpersonal relationship are the critical factors that ensure the survival and growth of SNS websites. Data report shows that Renren. com has helped 63 users find a friend every second during the whole year of 2009 and created a billion friendships.

In addition, celebrities, institutions and organizations have gradually become members of SNS websites. Information sharing becomes more diverse, and the emergence (出现) of social games satisfies users’ need for interactive entertainment.

By gaining users in 2009, the SNS profit model has gradually grown clearer. According to the CNNIC annual report, 80% of SNS profit comes from Internet advertisement, 15% from VAS and another 5% from other sources.

As the real marketing value of SNS was discovered by more businesses, many successful partnerships emerged. Advertising professions believe that the foundational qualities of SNS include participation, interaction, self-expression, and emotional communication. These qualities are the basis of SNS marketing activities, and they will promote the birth of more marketing models.

4 . Every year on my birthday, a white gardenia (栀子花) was ________ to my house. But no card or note came with it. Calls to the flower shop were always ________ — it was a cash purchase. After a while I stopped trying to discover the sender’s identity and just ________ the beauty and sweet scent of that one magical, perfect white flower lying in soft pink paper.

But I never stopped ________ who the giver might be. My mother ________ to these guesses. She asked me if there was someone for whom I had done a special kindness who might be showing ________. I had more ________ imagining that it might be a boy I fell in love with or one who had a crush on me even though I didn’t know him.

One month before my high-school graduation, my father died. My feelings ________ from sorrow (悲伤) to fear and anger: my dad was ________ some of the most important events in my life. I became completely ________ in my coming graduation, the senior-class play and the ball (舞会). But my mother would not hear of my losing any of those things. Mother and I had gone shopping and found an impressive dress, but it was the ________ size. When my father died, I forgot about the dress.

The day before my ball, I found that dress — in the right size — hanging over the living room sofa. It was ________ to me so lovingly. I didn’t ________ if I had a new dress or not. But my mother did. She wanted her children to feel ________, filled with a sense that there was a beauty even in the face of ________.

My mother died ten days after I was married. The following year the gardenia stopped coming.

6 . My faith in human nature has never been so great as it was last weekend after our family get-together in the town of Vail.

On Saturday, we all went to the market right in the middle of the town. Near the end, we all _______ at the fountain near the bridge, and the kids waded (蹚水) around in the fountain until we _______ . This is one of the busiest walking streets.

After we returned to the hotel late in the afternoon, my 7-year-old son Ponder _______ that nowhere could he find his backpack, which _______ his Gameboy and his watch. After a thorough _______ we determined that he must have left it at the fountain.

Ponder has never lost anything. So we just take for granted that he needs no guidance on managing his _______.

He was upset, not about the Gameboy, but about the watch. “But Dad,” he said, through massive _______, “they don’t make that kind of watch anymore.” We were all very sad.

Our dinner reservation was at a restaurant just on the other side of the bridge, so I _______ him that we would not only search the area around the fountain when we went back for dinner, but we would also find the police and ask them if the backpack had been _______ .

As we exited from the parking garage, we could see the fountain as we walked down the long staircase. I saw something black ________ there, but it was right next to a woman standing by the fountain, so I could not ________ what it was or if it was hers.

“See it, Dad?” Ponder shouted. “Don’t get too excited because that may not be it,” I said. But that was it. It had been five or six hours since we left the fountain, and it was still there. There was no ID in it, and it looked like someone had looked through it and then set it right out where all could ________ it.

I literally ________ when we reached it and it was his! Everyone in our party was blown away by this “miracle (奇迹)”. In my wildest ________ , I would never have imagined that this could happen nowadays.

What a charmed life, eh? I believe this was a perfect lesson for a child in losing something important. . . lose it and feel the full ________ of that loss, and then to miraculously get it back.