1 . In1973,I was teaching elementary school. Each day,27kids_______“The Thinking Laboratory.” That was the __________ students voted for after deciding that “Room 104” was too________.

Freddy was an average_________,but not an average person .He had the rare balance of fun and compassion（同情）.He would________ the loudest over fun and be the saddest over anyone’s_________.

Before the school year________,I gave the kids a special ________, T-shirts with the words “Verbs Are Your________” on them. I had advised the kids that while verbs（动词）may seem dull ,most of the_______ things they do throughout their lives will be verbs.

Through the years, I’d run into former students who would provide _______ on old classmates. I learned that Freddy did several jobs after his _______ from high school and remained the same ______ person I met forty years before .Once, while working overnight at a store, he let a homeless man _______in his truck. Another time ,he _______a friend money to buy a house .

Just last year, I was________ a workshop when someone knocked at the classroom door. A woman________ the interruption and handed me an envelope. I stopped teaching and ________ it up. Inside were the “Verbs” shirt and a _______ from Freddy’s mother. “Freddy passed away on Thanksgiving. He wanted you to have this.”

I told the story   to the class. As sad as it was, I couldn’t help smiling. Although Freddy was taken from us, we all________something from Freddy.

4 . When I was a teenager, my dad wasn’t terribly interested in the music I liked. To him, it just sounded like “______ ”, while he referred to the music he listened to as“______ .” As I’ve grown older, I’ll often hear people of my age say things like “they just don’t make _____ music like they used to.”

Luckily, my ______ as a psychologist has given me some insights into this puzzle. We know that musical tastes begin to ______ when we’re teenagers. By the time we’re in our early 20s, these tastes get locked into place pretty firmly.

In fact, studies have found that by the time we turn 33, most of us have ______ listening to new music. Meanwhile, those familiar songs released when you’re in your early teens are likely to remain quite ______ among your age group for the rest of your life. There could be a biological ______ for this. There’s evidence that the brain’s ability to make subtle distinctions between different chords, rhythms and melodies gets ______ with age. So to older people, less ______ songs might all “sound the same”.

But I believe there are some simpler ______ for older people’s dislike of newer music-the “mere exposure effect”. It means that the more we’re ______ to something, the more we tend to like it.

Psychology research has shown that the emotions that we ______ as teens seem more intense than those that come later. We also know that intense emotions are ______ with stronger memories and preferences. All of this might explain why the songs we listen to during this period become so memorable and beloved.

So there’s ______ wrong with your parents because they don’t like your music. In a way, it’s all part of the natural order of things.

5 . As a doctor at Duke University Hospital, I met Beth five years ago. Her husband had just driven her to the hospital to have a brain tumor (肿瘤) _________. Beth’s surgery went _________, but after several dozen days, preparing to go home, she started to complain of a _________. It turned out brain swelling (肿胀), which was _________ to treat and required her to spend several more days in the hospital. Fortunately, she recovered well. The day she left, she was _________.

A few weeks later, she _________ to the hospital with a cake she had baked for everyone who had _________ her while she was in hospital. But the next night, her brain swelling suddenly got worse. This time, she could no longer: respond _________. We took her in for emergency surgery.

Given how _________ the brain swelling was, I decided she needed to stay in hospital for close __________ during her treatment. As she was making progress, her husband was always at her __________.

However, it was not long before the unexpected happened. A flood __________ away the road he had to take to get to the hospital. That made it impossible for him to go to the hospital for a visit. So he called me. I promised him that I would __________ Beth every day and call him to let him know her __________. To my delight, the conversation gave him great satisfaction. He expressed his __________ to me. But I thought it was something I needed to do and I was happy to give him some help.

6 . On December 20, in Newdale, a series of huge waves caused by an undersea Earthquake raced across the ocean near Goldshore. Worse still, it _______ thousands of deaths. Goldshore Beach was the only local beach to _______ the disaster without any loss of life. A 10-year-old girl, Sabrina Andron, helped around 100 people escape danger with her _______ of tsunamis.

The day began like any other on Goldshore Beach. People were walking, running or simply sitting on the sandy beach, _______ the warm sea air and enjoying the soft _______ that brushed their hair. Sabrina was one of the happy tourists until she noticed something _______ . “The water was like the bubbles (气泡) on the top of a beer,” she later explained. “It wasn’t _______. I mean it wasn’t going in and then out as usual. It just kept coming in and in and in.” It struck her that these were the _______ of an upcoming tsunami, which Sabrina had just learnt about in a geography lesson.

Sabrina was _______, but she soon calmed herself down. She warned her parents of the ________, though at first they thought she was just ________. However, Sabrina was certain that a terrible disaster was ________ and kept asking her parents to talk to a safety officer. To her great relief, the officer ________ realized the coming danger. Soon, all the people on the beach was rapidly ________ just before the huge waves ________ into the coast.

7 . At a speed of roughly 20 miles a day, the Ardines experienced practically all the extremes the United States has to offer. The brothers kept a detailed record of their _________ on the blog. With the right headlines and support of friends and family back at home, the brothers’ journey started to gain more _________. By day 60, they were already 1/3 into their _________ goal. News media started to _________ their story. In July, their news caught the _________ of Verizon Wireless, who _________ the brothers new cell phones and donated to the cause.

Along their heroes’ _________, Aiden and Louis met their own everyday heroes. A driver in Nebraska _________ them on the road in the extremely hot weather and doubled back to give them _________ drinks. In Iowa, a couple __________ them over for a hearty meal of steak and cheese. In Nevada, a woman who ran a campground let them stay __________. These actions made their hearts __________ with warmth.

Walking by 11 states, four times zones, mountains, deserts, forests, and a run-in with a black bear later, Aiden and Louis __________ the sandy beaches of San Francisco after 162 days. __________ by their parents and other supporters, the brothers were not only __________ that they achieved their goal, but that they doubled it. Thanks to the Ardines, $ 70,000 was __________ between the Restaurant Workers’ Community Foundation and the COCO Fund, nonprofits created specifically to __________ food workers hit hard by the pandemic (疫情).

Without the __________ of a huge community of people, they wouldn’t have been __________. It was confirmed that people are kind in their __________ and ready to help others at all times.

8 . Fifteen years ago, I took a summer vacation in Lecce in southern Italy. After climbing up a hill for a beautiful ________ of the blue sea, white buildings and green olive trees, I ________ to catch my breath and then positioned myself to take the ________ photo of this landscape.

________ , just as I took out my camera, a woman ________ from behind, and planted herself right ________ my view. Like me, this woman was here to stop, sigh and ________ the view.

________ as I was, after about 15 minutes, I grew frustrated. Was it too much to ask her to ________ so I could take just one picture of the ________ ? Sure, I could have asked her, but some- thing ________ me from doing so. She seemed so content in her observation. I didn’t want to ________ that.

Another 15 minutes passed and I grew ________. The woman was still there. I ________ to take the photo anyway. And now when I look at it, I think her ________ in the photo is what makes the image interesting. The landscape, beautiful on its own, somehow comes to ________ and breathes because this woman is ________ with it.

This ________, with the unique beauty that unfolded before me and that woman who “ruined” it, now hangs on a wall in my bedroom. In some ways, she lives in my house. Perhaps we all ________ in each other’s spaces. Perhaps this is what photos are for: to remind us that we all appreciate ________ , that we all share a common desire for pleasure, for connection, for something that is greater than us.