1 . Chasing Dreams

When I was a little girl, I had always dreamt of becoming a famous pianist. The melodies that flowed _________ the keys spoke to me in a language that words could never capture. However, my family couldn’t afford a piano, and my dream _________ distant and unreachable.

But passion, as they say, finds its way. One day, while passing by a charity shop, I found an old keyboard on sale. It was nowhere close to a real piano, but it was a _________. Using my savings, I bought it and hence started a journey that was filled with ups and downs.

Every day after school, I would practice for hours, trying to perfect each note and each melody. My fingers would often _________ from the strain (软组织拉伤), but the joy of creating music was unparalleled. Mrs. Peters, my school music teacher, noticed my passion and offered free lessons _________ weekends. Under her guidance, my skills flourished.

As years passed, I started participating in local competitions. Not all were victories, but each one was a learning _________. The challenges were many, but with every setback, my resolve only grew stronger.

One day, a letter arrived. It was an invitation to an interview for the National Symphony Orchestra (国家交响乐团), a chance to _________ with the best in the country. The preparations were tiring and boring. Every evening was consumed by endless rehearsals and critiques, pushing me to my limits.

The day of the audition finally came. As I walked onto the stage, the weight of my journey _________ on my shoulders. But as I began to play, all fears disappeared. The music, as always, transported me to another world.

A week later, I received the news: I was selected. My dream, once distant and unreachable, had _________ fruits. My journey taught me that it isn’t the destination but the journey itself that shapes us. Every struggle, every hurdle was a steppingstone to my dream.

Now, as I play on grand stages, I often look back. Not in regret, but in gratitude. Gratitude for every challenge, every setback, for they shaped my __________ and made me who I am today.

2 . One bus driver for the North Elementary School can now add lifesaver to her experiences after a student started choking (窒息) on her bus last month.

On Sept.29, bus driver Raquel Baker began her work just like any other drivers and was about to drop off students at the school gate when something went wrong. Video from the school bus showed 7-year-old Preston putting something in his ________ and then dropping down between the seats, clearly in ________ .

It was hard for the boy to ________ a word but he managed to mention something about a coin. Baker ________ stood up, took hold of him and ran out of the ________ .“On my way to the sidewalk, I was actually performing the Heimlich maneuver (海姆利克氏操作法),” she said.

Preston hardly ________ and Baker didn’t waste any time to jump into action. The whole time she was saying, “Baby, breathe, baby, breathe.”

Preston was blue in the face. Baker saw a parent and asked her to call 911. “All I could think of was I had to ________ this boy,” Baker said. She had never performed the Heimlich before, but her ________ on the first aid given by the school one month ago worked. “I was ________ at the time, but I just couldn’t be scared,” she said. She didn’t even realize when the ________ flew out of Preston’s mouth until Preston said, “Miss Baker, I’m OK. I can breathe.”

Preston’s mum was ________ for Baker’s help. The school’s headmaster was also touched and ________ her for her life-saving work. “As of today, I’m still in shock. I really can’t believe that this actually happened. I didn’t really realize what a big ________ I had,” Baker said.

Until today Bake r still doesn’t know how she got the ________ to do what she did that day, ________ she knows this, “If I wasn’t there, other drivers may have done it as well,” Bake r said.

3 . Last September, Sarah, 44, slipped on a platform and ________ in the gap between a train and the platform edge. When the train left the station, it ran over her right arm and leg. Unfortunately, another train pulled in, causing further ________. A few minutes later, someone noticed her and called emergency services. They ________ to the scene and took Sarah to the hospital, but doctors were ________ to save her arm and leg.

________, Sarah is now the world’s first woman to use a £250.00 bionic (仿生) arm ________ by AI.

“It’s hard to explain but when I think about a ________ — say ‘open my hand’ — my muscles twitch (颤动) in a particular way. The sensors in it will ________ these twitches, and send signals to make my hand work. And if it ________ the fact that I point my finger often, it will learn that I like to do that and make it easier for me to do so,” said Sarah.

In February, Sarah returned to work and a few months later she attended a conference in Rome to give a speech about the accident.

“I do miss myself before the accident. But at the end of the day, I’m just ________ that AI can give me a piece of my life back. I know I am blessed to be able to keep moving forward with my family.”

4 . I was having breakfast at home, checking out social media on my phone. Suddenly, a picture ________ my eye. It was a 9-year-old dog, Charlie, who was regarded as the loneliest one in Britain. He had been in a rescue center for more than 500 days.

I ________ on the link of this story, and straight away, I saw Charlie’s cute but sad eyes looking at me. I was ________ and my husband Sam felt exactly the same way. The idea of taking him home appeared in our minds. It took us some time to ________ it. A few days later, we ________ an email asking us to ________ him.

On our way to the center, we had no idea of what was going to happen. We hadn’t got much information about Charlie’s ________. Since he hadn’t got along with a new ________ for a long time, we thought there might be some ________. We had been told Charlie was ________ of humans, but when he saw us, he was full of joy, wagging (摇) his tail happily and coming straight over to us. He even jumped on Sam’s lap as if they’d been best friends for many years. Later, being told that we could take him home, we were so ________.

As soon as he got to our house, he soon made himself at home. He sniffed (嗅) around and then ________ onto a chair. Charlie knows exactly what he wants, which is to be with us all the time. He’s so warm-hearted and has none of the ________ you might think of after spending a long time in a rescue center.

We get out every day on walks and we’re much closer now. He’s always so happy to see us when my husband and I come through the door. If you give dogs ________, they’ll give you a number of wonderful things in return.

5 .

It was a Sunday afternoon in May. Paul Blachut was busy working at a restaurant in scenic Augsburg, Germany. Many tourists came for food at the pretty place beside the river, where the meltwater was cold at this time of year.

A mother and her daughter were _______ the cooling water by the riverbank. They were playing with an inflatable tube happily when _______ the girl lost her footing and was caught in the river’s current. It happened so fast that the girl desperately grabbed (抓) on to the tube, which her mother was sitting in, throwing her into the river, too.

Blachut heard the sudden shout, “Two women are drowning in the river!” Then he hurried to the _______ , where he spotted them trying to grab anything they could. He was horrified to see that one of them kept sinking. Blachut’s mind _______ , “How can I help them?” _______ having no lifesaving training, he rushed down to the riverbank. Quickly he _______ his T-shirt and jumped into the river. He didn’t care about the cold; all he could think about was saving the women. It was obvious they were _______ .

As Blachut got closer to them, he could _______ that the mother seemed to be in the most trouble. She was drowning. He _______ a film in which a lifeguard grabbed a drowning victim’s body, pulling the person ashore while swimming on his back. Blachut tried this, but the woman’s clothing made her so ________ ; he kept being dragged under, too. He needed a new ________. He quickly dived under the drowning woman, ________ her upward and using that momentum (水势) to take her toward the shore. At that time, an onlooker was able to ________ the woman’s hand, pulling her ashore. Then Blachut jumped into the river again. He swam downstream, got hold of the daughter, and was able to get her out in the same way, too.

Several onlookers expressed their ________ for Blachut following the incident. However, Blachut was ________ about his role, “The whole rescue only took several minutes and I am happy to receive your praise.”

6 . I was in my home office on a cold Sunday when I heard a quick knock on the door. I _____ downstairs, threw open the door and saw my dad _____ something wrapped up in paper in his arms. Strangely, he had given no hint (暗示) of it when we spoke on the phone last night.

“Open it.” he said.

I opened it to find a yellow begonia (秋海棠). It occurred to me that it was Mother’s Day.

“But···but I’m not a mother.” I said, _____.

My dad smiled, “Well, some special people aren’t mothers. but I think they _____ to get flowers, too.” With that, he hugged me and drove off.

Later, I called to thank him and we got to talking a lot. That’s when he let me in on his little _____. He had decided that he would challenge himself to do one act of _____ per day. It had started several weeks before when he accidentally knew a friend of his was having a rough day. He knew she loved ice cream, so he drove straight to her house with a huge tub of ice cream.

“She laughed _____ when she saw it,” he said, “It really delighted me to know that I had _____ her day.”

When asked why, he added, “I already know about the importance of being _____ in the moment. So, I try to be there with each person I am spending time with. I want them to feel important and believe in the goodness in people in that moment.”

I realized my dad was making a difference in people’s lives. ______, I also want to be more like my dad, who goes out of his way to make people feel loved and cared for.

7 . I still remember the day when I came home from work at two o’clock one afternoon. Imagine my _______ when I heard my daughter Megan and her friend Joann laughing in the house since it was the right time for class. They finally _______ that they came home for lunch and never returned to school. But they said they had forgotten to look at the clock.

I told Joann to go home because I needed to speak to Megan _______. When Joann left, I _______myself and managed to ask Megan very quietly, “You forgot to look at the clock?” Megan lowered her head and said, “Well, we were just experimenting to see what it would feel like not to go back to school.” For the moment I was getting angry. I considered _______ her, but instead I said, “I’m very upset by all this. When you’re supposed to be in school, that’s _______ I expect you to be. Now I’m probably going to get a phone call from your teacher.” Megan said, “ Write me an absence note, say I was sick and then you won’t get a call.” I said, “Megan，the note has to come from you and it has to be the _______.”

Well, she wasn’t very _____ about that, but she did write a note saying she was just “experimenting” and that she wouldn’t do it again.

Although the teacher gave her a _______ time over the note, I still felt I did the right thing. I knew I had helped Megan face up to what she did and take ________.

8 . On the morning of my first marathon, I woke up before my alarm and ate a classic runner’s breakfast. I had slept eight hours. My unreliable left knee wasn’t bothering me. I was _________.

Then my girlfriend, Louisa, knocked on the door, asking whether I had checked my email. Race officials sent an email at 5 a. m. announcing The Twin Cities Marathon in Minneapolis and St. Paul had been _________ due to record high temperatures.

While I understood why the race organizers didn’t want to put runners at _________, I also knew that I had trained in the baking and humid Washington D. C. all summer. If I could start earlier than planned and finish around noon, I’d miss the worst _________ of the day.

I went to the starting line and saw many runners despite the cancellation. I joined a group of local runners who knew the route. While running, I was overfilled with _________ to still see neighbors who gathered outside their houses _________ out bottles of water as they watched runners go by. The runners and supporters made the race feel like a real marathon, during which the shared goal of reaching the finishing line and the affirmations from the crowds made me believe I could run the _________ race.

The last one mile of the route was downhill. By that point in the race, my legs felt like jelly. But from the top of the hill, I could see dozens of supporters cheering runners home, which _________ me to move on. When my smart watch finally ticked to “26.2” miles, I called out “I’m done” to Louisa, who had been giving a much needed _________ along the way. I let out a dry sob and gave Louisa a hug. After months of training, the unexpected emotion felt like a total release.

My first marathon was canceled, but I ran 26.2 miles   __________.

9 . “I knew when I saw you, I wanted to take you home,” my dad says to me. I am sitting beside him for our Saturday morning visit. While our conversation may repeat at times or be filled with silence, sometimes I get these _______ words.

My father has Alzheimer’s (阿兹海默症病人). It has been a long time since he _______ me by my name. When he says these words, my tears _______ . There is a deep-seated _______ of a father seeing his daughter when she was born. It makes me think of a rare photo I have of my father with me as a baby. In the photo, he is holding me, with arms outstretched as if inspecting me.

Another Saturday, it happens again. He is looking at a photo of me in high school. He points to the photo and says, “She’s smart. She can do anything.” I am shocked. The emotion catches in my throat. Does he _______ the same person is sitting beside him? It does not _______ . In that moment I feel his love and it’s a/an _______ of my pain.

Our weekly visits repeat. We sit. I listen. He talks.

The more I listen, the more I _______ that his words are tied to a memory from long ago. He may _______ to find a word but he finds a way to express himself. I am ________ to be by his side when he says these unexpected words. He’s giving me what he can.

10 . In 2007, Whitmore was considered one of the most successful athletes in America. However, everything changed during a triathlon (三项全能) that seemed like so many others she had _______ . “Once I got off the bike and began the running portion, it was hard to pick up my legs. I knew something wasn`t right.” Whitmore tells Reader`s Digest, “I didn`t have any symptoms (症状) as long as I wasn`t running. But every time I tried again the muscles were super tight.” Assuming she`d simply _______ herself too hard in the last race, Whitmore shrugged off the pain.

It wasn`t until a _______ night at a sports camp in Arizona that Whitmore says she knew something was _______ wrong. Then she went to hospital. After examination, she was quickly _______ . What doctors found during surgery shocked them all: Whitmore had spindle cell sarcoma (梭形细胞肉瘤). When she heard the diagnosis for the first time, Whitmore says time stood _______ . “I couldn`t breathe. They were talking about treatment and I just started crying and saying ‘I don’t want to die!’” Waking up after the surgery, she was even more shocked to find out she, a/an _______ athlete, wouldn`t have the use of her leg anymore from the knee down.

Whitmore now had drop foot and had to learn to walk again with the help of a physical therapist (治疗学家). In the following days, Whitmore endured a punishing two-month _______ , after which her scans were coming back clear of cancer. To her joy, she was pregnant with twins. Now, she is a mother of two sons and competing again, and has won a gold medal in the Paralympics. Whitmore has some words of advice for others with _______ : “Never let anyone tell you what you can and cannot do. You have to ________ yourself.”