1 . My two kids and I were at Dunkin' Donuts, meeting my grandfather for a cup of coffee. My boys were 2 and 4 then. When the naughty little kid ________ his ice cream in the middle of the store, I turned to my grandfather for ________. I was surprised to find him laughing. When I tried to talk to him about how ________ life with two young boys is, his reply was short, “Little kids，________ problems.”

At the time, I felt a little angry. The ________ of raising my two boys didn't feel little. I sometimes felt overwhelmed (不知所措的) by their problems and needs. Still, I knew how to ________ them. I could calm my elder son down with his favorite CD and smiled at him in the rear­view mirror (后视镜). Back then, “fixing their problems” seemed like my ________. I did it every day. And, in general, I could fix most things that annoy them.

Those boys are 24 and 22 now. And, ________ my grandfather said, their problems are bigger than they were 20 years ago. And one thing I'm ________ at this stage of parenting is how to be a mom who doesn't help them. Worried about my elder son recently, I repeated my ________ to him, but he told me to stop—told me that I wasn't being ________ and that I needed to let him be.

Honestly, I miss the days when I felt so helpful. But I also feel ________ that I've raised an adult healthy enough to ________ his own life. And so, in a ________ reversal(互换), it is my son who now calms me down，________ me and then smiles at me from his rear­view mirror.

2 . A woman is volunteering in ashelter. It all started because she missed her own _________ .

Sandy was at a loss when her beloved Angus died last year — terribly lonely, yet not quite______for a new dog in her life. ________, she decided to volunteer at the local animal shelter and spend some quality time with furry friends who, like her, were ________ their old buddies (伙伴).

Remembering that her dog had loved being read to, she brought along a ________   there.

It's now been 18 months sinceSandy first began ________ her chair beside the dog house. Shelter workers say it really calms down the dogs, but Sandy says it does more ________ to her than it does to the dogs.

Sandy was ________ that photos of her reading to dogs were spreading on the Internet until the media started calling. Kathleen, a fellow shelter volunteer was so touched by the sight of her     ____ to an old dog that she took a photo and posted it on the Internet. She was so ______ with the dogs — I watched her read to several — and they just loved being ________ by her, "Kathleen said.

Inspired by Sandy's style of _________, the shelter has announced that a reading marathon is being ________ for next September. The plan is to get kids in the neighborhood ______ in reading to the animals, with the added benefit of reading practice for the two-leggers, along with plenty of friendly _______ for the four-leggers.

3 . A scary new virus swept over the globe and the virus knocked on my door a few weeks ago when I was _______at the clinic where I work. Five days later, I got the first call from Public Health _______me know I was thought “low risk,” luckily, I could self-monitor and carry on as usual. What a _______!

But then I got the second call.…It came from Public Health revising my category to “exclusion”— a _______technical way of saying self-isolation, I felt that my _______ had been turned upside down. Everything took a _______- my family, the clinic and its patients, my income. Did Public Health _______make the right decision? After _______ the news to my family, I was greeted with love and encouragement. It was then that I lifted the weight _______my soul.

So I picked out __________ clothes from my closet, grabbed essential items and moved to the basement. I pieced together a desk to work on and I would only see my family when I went __________ to eat meals. __________meals, I sat at the far end of the dining table, at least two meters away. And my own family was __________at home as much as possible. In the basement, I used the isolation as a rare opportunity to __________many projects that I hadn’t had time for.

I had no doubt that this crisis will end, as all the crises happened before. And it was our choice on __________ it brought out good or bad results.