2 . What no one ever tells college students is how little they’ll be prepared for the real world. Many graduates will not get the _________ they wanted and the one they do get will be different from what they dreamed about.

After graduating, I packed my bags and headed _________ to the big city for a well paying job with good potential (潜力). I hoped this would be my _________ to expand my professional experience and figure out what I was supposed to do with my life.

But I was _________ . Before I knew it, I was swept into the entry level job world: long hours before a_________, service calls from rude customers and repetitive work I wasn’t _________in. Having studied Psychology, English, and Sociology, I was supposed to be working in a job that _________ me to use my passion, not to _________ it. This was not at all what I had_________. So I decided to hand in my __________ .

Two weeks later I __________again and moved back to my college town. I found a full time job working with kids with special needs and began a part time __________ career. And I found out special needs kids are the greatest and that writing is__________and easy.

The key to __________ may very well be doing what you love. What you need to do is just to follow your heart and make a __________ to bring back your joy.

3 . Nixon, 59 years old, was born and grew up in St. Petersburg. Each morning, he sits on a bench, watches the sunrise, and connects with _________ from all walks of life.

Eight years ago, he decided to begin each day from a bench (a kind of chair) with an impressive view of the St. Petersburg waterfront (圣彼得堡海滨), because it made him feel calm and _________ before starting his day.

About a year later, a woman stopped to say hello, and she said something that _________ Nixon’s view on his daily visit. She said, “Every morning when I see you sitting here, I know everything is going to be OK.” That’s when Nixon _________ he needed to pay attention to the people walking past.

Instead of staring straight ahead at the waterfront, Nixon started _________ at people and talking to them. And pretty soon, some early risers began _________ him on the bench, sometimes sharing their pressure and asking him for advice about personal problems.

No matter what problem a person wants to _________, Nixon lends an ear. One day, a couple came by to talk about their problems. The husband was always working. It was destroying their _________. Nixon told him, “You have to know what’s really important.” The man admitted he’d put everything he had into his _________ for many years instead of focusing on his family. “He started to cry and agreed that he needed to __________,” Nixon says. “We hugged each other and became friends after that.”

Nixon was always happy to listen, and he listens without __________ and without any kind of return expected. “You have to listen with an open heart, because you never know who’s going to walk up,” Nixon says. He is a loving and loyal __________ to many. For those who walked past the bench, they were always __________ with a smile and asked how they were doing. No topic is off limits, but some people don’t want to talk. They simply want to sit next to someone and share the __________. Once a woman stopped and just sat with Nixon for an hour; then she said thanks and walked away. She just wanted a moment of peace and to know she wasn’t __________.

And at that moment, she truly wasn’t.

4 . Five years ago, I got an email from a well-known professor in my field in March. He invited me to________ for a position in his lab. Things went well and all I needed to do was finish up my thesis (毕业论文) and I decided to ________ it in the following months.

One night, my mother came up to my room, asking softly, “Have you ________ your thesis yet?” “Not yet, Mom,” I ________ , even too busy to look up at her. Then she mentioned that she had some ________ symptoms (症状) in her body that had never been seen before. She wanted to say something more, but my academic (学业的)________ made me hardly take her words to heart.

However, two months later, the doctor announced my mother might ________for less than a year ________cancer (癌症). It was then that I was ________that things became more serious than I had imagined. Before it was too late, I was________to stop my thesis and be there with my mother for her rest life. ________ , my mother failed in the battle and passed away at the end of the year. The next July, I finished my scientific thesis and got the________from the lab.

When looking back today, I feel ________for losing precious time with my mother. The ________ of my mother gave me a new way to think about life: If your loved ones need you, be there for them. Sometimes, just being a listening ear to them can really ________.

5 . There are always some persons in your life who touch your soft heart with kindness.

As a little girl, my favorite thing was _________. And when I thought about _________ I wanted to be when I grew up, I figured I’d be a librarian, just because the two librarians changed my life.

At that time, the town library limited the number of books a person borrowed _________ two once a week. I _________ the books in just three days. So to read more, I was _________ about what books to choose. The librarian, Mrs. Tonne, was a warm person. Every time I went into the library, she greeted me, _________. When learning about my trouble, she often _________ some better books. Thanks to her help, I _________ a lot from these books.

Gradually, I developed an interest in writing, _________ poems. When I was in fourth grade, our school librarian, Mrs. Ketelsen, encouraged me to write more. When my poem was not accepted, she __________ me with comfortable words. Once she helped __________ some poems I’d written about dinosaurs to Highlights magazine. It was my first published writing!

Later, at the University of Iowa, __________ I majored in journalism, my dream was different. I realized that I was shy about interviewing people, which made me __________. When I recalled Mrs. Tonne and Mrs. Ketelsen, I made a decision without __________ to be devoted to writing. And now I am an editor at Reader’s Digest.

Whenever I think of the help from them, how __________ I am. It is their kindness that makes me what I am.

6 . Like many young people, Jessica wants to travel the globe. Unlike most of them, this 25-year-old is doing it _________. She and her husband have spent the last two years traveling the world, stopping everywhere from Paris to Singapore. It might sound like one long, expensive _________, but the couple has an unusual way to make their travel _________.

They’re part of a new form of the _________ economy (经济): an online group of house sitters.

Throughout their no-cost stays in _________ homes, they feed pets and water plants in the homeowner’s _________.

It’s not all sightseeing. The two travellers carefully _________ their trips, scheduling their days around the pets that are sometimes difficult to _________. But house sitting also offers a level of _________ they can’t find in a hotel. “It’s like __________ at a friend’s house,” Jessica says.

The couple has a high __________ rate in getting accepted as house sitters and they always go beyond the homeowner’s __________. For Jessica, that means __________ plenty of pictures of happy pets, keeping the house __________ and leaving a nice small gift before heading to the next house. “You want to make the homeowner feel that they made the right, __________” she says.

7 . Do you have a best friend at work? A person once said, “Relationships _______ more than work. Years from now, you will forget all the _______ of the work you did, but you still _______ the people there and the relationships you built.”

We hear a lot about this and it’s true. We spend more time with our co-workers than our families. Getting along well with workmates is the _______ to our success in the job.

Gallup, our employee engagement survey provider, has been asking us to _______“Do you have a good friend at work?” for 30 years. He has discovered a strong _______ between having a good friend at work and performance on the job.

I’ve worked with a lot of people over my career. The most _______ achievements were with _______ that I felt a strong social connection with. We were not only working as a team but also spent our spare time _______ with each other and caring for each other’s normal life. I do believe that our success ________ strong social connections at work.

I’ve been through a lot with many people I would ________ my best friends at work. We’ve celebrated our work ________, promotions (升职) and retirements together. We have supported each other through marriages, adoptions, illnesses and even deaths.

Good relationships and a sense of ________ are a part of work culture that we shouldn’t ignore. ________, I have been working with amazing people over the years. Can you imagine going to a ________ every day where there is no fun, laughter or friendship?

8 . Two old beggars (乞丐) were sitting on a busy street corner of a big city. They watched ____ as a lot of people walked by without looking at them. Sometimes, a kind-hearted woman or a small child would ____ a few coins (硬币) in the hats in front of them.

Today was not a ____ day for begging. The men were able to ____enough for a big meal. As it was getting dark, they started to pack their things.

Just as they were getting ready to leave, they ____ a man walking toward them. He was a _____ man-they could tell that from his fine clothes. The first beggar said to the second with ____ , “He’s coming our way!” The man stopped, ____ into his pocket and took something out. What looked like a piece of hard ____ , wrapped (包裹) in white paper, hit each of their waiting hats. The man turned and continued his way.

“He could have easily left us a few ____ or a bill, but he laughed at us with a piece of rock candy (硬棒糖),” said the first beggar. He looked at the offering ____“There’s no way we can eat this-we have no teeth.” With these words, he picked up the thing and threw it away. Then he collected his things and ____ .

The second beggar wanted to do the same, ____ a second thought made him change his mind. “I haven’t had anything like this for ages,” he thought. “How nice of that man to offer me something so sweet!” With that, he opened the white paper. To his ____, there was no hard rock candy inside. ____ , a shiny white pearl (珍珠) worth thousands of dollars fell into his hand.

9 . When you are a young active person with a clean bill of health, you never really expect to be hospitalized for two weeks. And you certainly never expect you will_______ it.

I was put in the _______ and then into surgery after I had been in a motorcycle accident a week earlier. At that point, a few thoughts had _________ my mind about possibly losing my leg, but the staff were all so_______ to cure me of my leg.

After almost a week at that hospital, I got_______ to a little hospital. The nurses there weren’t nearly so busy and they had more time to stay and_______.

One night when I couldn’t sleep, I got out of bed. Then a nurse saw me and she just gave me a hug and asked what was wrong.

“I’m_______,” I said quietly. She invited me to sit at the desk with the other nurses there.     One of them talked to me about university that wasn’t something I really wanted to _______right then, but I stopped crying _________, and ended up going to bed with a smile. Nobody had said anything in particular that __________ me down, but those nurses treated me with such ________ and love, which made me forget for a while why I was so upset.

It took lots of __________ for my leg to heal, but it did. I have quite a __________on the skin of my leg and I love it. It ________ me of the goodness in people that made a huge ________ to this dumb kid who went looking for ways to scare herself.