2 . It was a busy morning, about 8:30, when an elderly gentleman in his 80s came to the hospital. I heard him saying to the nurse that he was in a hurry for all appointment(约会)at 9:30. The nurse had him take a _______ in the waiting area,_______ him it would be at least 40 minutes_________someone would be able to see him. I saw him_______his watch and decided, since I was_______busy—my patient didn’t_______ at the appointed hour, I would examine his wound. While taking care of his wound, I asked him if he had another doctor’s appointment. The gentleman said no and told me that he_______to go to the nursing home to eat breakfast with his_________. He told me that she had been_________for a while and that she had a special disease. I asked if she would be____________if he was a bit late. He replied that she __________ knew who he was, that she had not been able to __________ him for five years now. I was____________, and asked him, “And you__________go every morning, even though she doesn’t know who you are?” He smiled and said. “She doesn’t know me but I know who she is”. I had to hold back __________ as he left.            

Now I __________ that in marriages, true love is____________of all that is. The happiest people don’t__________have the best of everything, they just__________the best of everything they have. ____________isn’t about how to live through the storm, but how to dance in the rain.

3 . We were designing a wheelchair for the engineering course. Based on my experience making sculptures with soda cans and creating jewelry with wire, I believed steel would be too _________ and that aluminum (铝) would be light, but my partner who once worked at a bike shop insisted on using steel. A few days later, when the steel wheelchair arm kept _________ because of its weight, I felt I had been _________.

I liked crafting, but when I took engineering in college, I put this _________ aside because I didn’t think it was _________to my academic work. Although the wheelchair project was a _________ that my interest, crafting, might be important and relevant (相关的), I continued to _________ bringing it up in professional fields.

My _________ didn’t change until one day when I felt restless and _________ crafting as an outlet(发泄途径). While putting liquid into a mold, I __________ “injection molding”—a standard engineering manufacturing process. I suddenly realized that although this art is not injection molding in the technical sense, it shares the spirit and probably some __________. Maybe my crafting was something I should hug rather than hide.

Soon I saw more examples of __________ between engineering and craft that I had previously __________.I saw how crafting taught me to consider the __________ as a learning experience. So I took up crafting again and also stopped __________ it from others.

4 . Six months after my car accident, I finally returned home. ______, that’s when the reality of the situation became clear to me. I realized my life was now so ______, unable to use a phone, feed or bathe myself. I couldn’t hold anything — a fork was too heavy to ______. I had lost my entire independence and had to ______ on others for any help. I ______ so much that I could fill up buckets with tears. Yet I had no choice but to ______ it. No matter how difficult things were, I never gave up my faith.

Shortly after returning home, I could finally wiggle (摆动) a toe and scratch my nose. I realized the little things we get used to so often ______ the most. Small victories are huge and important leaps.

In these past few years, I’ve made progress in my ______. I had to learn to be ______ with myself and to enjoy every moment going forward. I ______ hard in my recovery and still do to this day. I’m now moving my legs and arms on my own, and sometimes work out in a gym. All of this is turning the page from the impossible to the possible. I’m presently working to ______ my independence and mobility.

This event has been entirely life-changing for me. Every day I am struggling to improve my ______, hoping to recover from paralysis (瘫痪). My unshakable faith, ______ family and friends encourage me to continue to work harder. I believe it is a chance to become stronger, and keep on fighting to hopefully ______ someone else not to give up. Never give up ______. Never give up hope.

5 . When I was 14, I invited some friends for a party at our home out in the country. I planned it well, but something _________ happened. When it was time for us to ride the bus, Nora, one of my friends, didn’t _________.

I felt _________. Why would she tell me she’d come to the party and then _________ without letting me know? So, I decided to call Nora and get some _________. I needed no apologies but I demanded to know why.

Nora _________ she had to stay away from school because she was sick. Anger still seized me and I _________ to listen. “What kind of friend are you?” I said. Nora began crying on the phone, hurt and surprised. For the rest of the school year, I _________ hung around with her again, and I forgot about my _________ call with Nora. __________ had happened between us at some point, but I shrugged it off.

Years later, I began to reflect on that ugly phone conversation. I __________ it. I recognized how selfish and __________ I’d been, caring only about myself. I wanted to make things __________. I composed a letter of apology to Nora and soon got her __________. So finally, we restored a __________ relationship, healing both of us.

6 . In my younger years, my mother gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. “________ while you’re still young,” she told me, “as much as possible.”________ whenever I have days off, I usually travel somewhere. And thanks to this ________ I met Sato Taeko, a Japanese film producer, on the Isle of Skye in the UK.

I still remember the moment Taeko and I first met. Skye is a mountainous and isolated (偏远的) island in Scotland ________ public transport is inaccessible (难到达的), so I joined a ________ tour on the island and arranged to stay at a local bed and breakfast.

We didn’t meet until breakfast the next morning. It was so ________ to see an Asian face on this isolated island, so we started to talk. From our ________, I learned that Taeko was traveling around Europe ________ she and her colleagues had attended the 67th Cannes Film Festival in France with their film An American Piano (2014).

After chatting for only 20 minutes, our friendship took ________. We exchanged phone numbers and left ________ our separate bus journeys after breakfast. ________, afterwards, we reunited with each other again and again in different cities in the UK.

Taeko is an elegant and friendly lady who always speaks to people in a ________ voice. Although there’s a huge age difference between us, we still ________ many interests. Taeko told me her husband was a ________ in American literature at the University of Tokyo. They met one another at a party in their 20s, with a mutual love for literature ________ them together.

But ________, her husband passed away 18 years ago, and Taeko has remained ________ since then. She produces films, runs marathons, travels around the world and makes global friends. You can never tell ________ she will be tomorrow.

Once, I asked her if she ever felt lonely, ________ she said she never did. ________, she feels fulfilled. She’s been doing exactly what she likes to do: be happy.

9 . “A” for Attitude

English was always my favorite subject. In my freshman year of high school, I could write a killer composition. In my second year, my teacher _________ me to give spelling tests to the class. I had a _________ time of my junior year. Mrs Alexander _________ me to sit at her desk and take over the class when she had to leave the room. But my senior English class was _________, as we had a teacher right out of college who _________ college-level work. Every student received a “C” or “D” grade the first quarter. But English was still my favorite subject.

I graduated from high school, _________ early and had children. _________ about my English, I often helped my kids with their English homework. And I wrote long articles and beautiful poetry as a columnist (专栏作家) for a newspaper. Fifteen years later, I went to college, and because I had been an “A” student, I remained an “A” student. I _________ up to my own expectations.

Yesterday, I _________ my high school report cards when I was reading old papers. That bundle of report cards __________ back the old days. I remembered sitting in my advisor’s office, __________ that I had always be excelled at English, and recommending that I did not deserve a “D” from that inexperienced teacher of my senior year. The advisor was __________ but unable to change a(n) __________. Reading through my old report cards revealed something else too. I wanted to __________ them or hide them. I was not an “A” student in high school English! Somehow, I had __________ myself of this, when the grades clearly reflected an average student with an __________ “A” or “B” but mostly “C” s.

If I had denied myself according to those grades, I would have never confidently __________ my writing career. If I had __________ my early grades instead of myself, I would have allowed my fear of failure to __________ enthusiasm and damage my creativity. Instead, I __________ my younger self as an “A” English student, except for that undeserved “D”.