1 . Jim owned a store. A customer once asked him how he managed to stay ________ all the time. His answer was, “When I wake up in the morning, I know that the day will have good and bad ________ for me, but whatever happens, I’m going to choose to be in a good ________.”

Then one day, something ________ happened. Jim was about to leave the store when an armed robber came in, held him up at gunpoint, and made him open the ________. As he was trying to open it, Jim’s hand ________. The robber saw this and probably thought, “He’s about to attack me!” The robber ________ and fired his gun.

Jim was rushed to the hospital. In the ambulance, he felt ________ because the paramedic (医务辅助人员) kept telling him, “I’m sure you’ll be OK.”

But when Jim was in the operating room and he saw the faces of the doctors and nurses, he got the feeling that they thought he was ________ dead. He knew he needed to do something to change their ________.

There was a ________ who was asking him lots of questions, very fast. One question was, “Are you ________ to anything?” “Yes!” Jim said loudly and everybody stopped what they were doing. There was total ________. “Bullets!” Jim said, and all the doctors and nurses burst out ________. And then Jim added, “Please operate on me thinking that I’ll live, and not that I’ll die.”

Jim survived, thanks to the skill of the doctors and nurses. But what also helped was that he managed to remain an optimist even in the most ________ moment of his life.

2 . In 2012, I had just recovered from a serious illness when I received an invitation to a writer’s conference in Orlando, Florida. My family persuaded that a(n) _______ might be just what the doctor ordered, so off I went.

Arriving in the Sunshine State was rather tiring, but I _______ to catch a taxi to my _______ and settle in. Next morning, I took another _______ to the shopping center to buy a few souvenirs. Later, I went to a café to have lunch, but all the tables were _______. Then I heard a friendly voice saying, “You can _______ my table.”

I gratefully sat down with the _______ lady and we had a happy lunch together. As the meal drew to a close she asked how long I would be in Orlando. I had already told her that I hadn’t _______ a car, and hadn’t realized how _______ taking taxis would be. After a while she said, “My dear, don’t use any more taxis. I’m retired and it would be my pleasure to drive you wherever you wish.” I told her that I couldn’t put her to that ________ , but she brushed aside my protests (反对). She asked me where I was ________ and next morning she was waiting at my apartment at the ________ time to take me to Disney World. She spent some time with me before leaving me to ________ alone. At the end of the day, she ________ to take me back to my accommodation. I offered her money but she refused to take any.

I’ll never forget that wonderful lady who, through her ________, filled my brief holiday in Florida with wonderful memories.

5 . Anger Is a Gift

“Mom, where are you? I’ve been waiting for 10 minutes.” I shouted into the phone.

“Honey, sorry. I left the office a bit late and the _____ caused really bad traffic, but I…”

I hung up. Conversations like this happen every week. Being a teen is _____ enough, and my parents often make me feel less important than their work.

In second grade, I broke my arm on the slide. When the school nurse called my mom, she was too _____ to answer. When the phone call reached my father, he sighed (叹息) and said, “I’m in the middle of research.” I sat in the nurse’s office for hours, before my parents finally _____ to take me to hospital.

I wished my parents could keep me company. To make my parents take me seriously, I screamed. I tried to establish my own authority by ignoring their schedule. My mom did everything possible to solve the problem, but nothing _____ until she met that adviser.

One day after I shut my door in her face, my mom didn’t complain or cry. Instead, she knocked and said, “I have something to tell you.” I opened the door. “Today I met a really good adviser. He said that every time your daughter is angry, she is just saying: I _____ you.”

It dawned on me that my anger was merely a mask for me to _____ my loneliness and disappointment. But facing one’s _____ need is the first step towards being happier. This concept not only helped things between my parents and me but also enabled me to handle conflicts and emotions. I started to pay attention to other people’s _____. When an angry customer approached me at my volunteering job, he was saying, “I need more service.” When a homeless person shouted to me in a parking lot, he was simply saying, “I need food and help.”

I am now able to see through the fog of anger and see the real face and heart of other people.

Five minutes after I hung up on her, my mom’s car finally appeared through the fog. She rolled down her window and said, “Let’s go to a hotpot place, shall we?” I ______, “OK, but promise me you won’t be late again.”

6 . In 2008, Calvin Lowe’s four-year-old son Tyler needed to have a serious operation.

On the appointed day of the _______, he and his wife brought Tyler to Children’s hospital Colorado in Denver. “As we sat in the waiting room, waiting for someone to _________ us back to the surgery area, there was a lot of _________ in our hearts,” Lowe remembered.

When a nurse called the family back, Lowe’s fears _________. A young doctor walked into the room and told the couple that he would be _________ the surgery. As the doctor began to _________ how the surgery would proceed, Lowe’s mind went to the worst possible _________. But then the doctor did something _________. He looked both Lowe and his wife in the eye, put a _________ hand on each of their shoulders, and said, “Today, your son is my son.”

After the surgery was over, the __________ came back to the family with a big smile and said, “Our son is just fine, and you can __________ him here in a few minutes.

Tyler is now 19 years old and hopes to become a professional photographer. All these years after the surgery, Lowe still __________ the young doctor’s kindness. “I will never forget that,” Lowe said. “Because that was indeed a __________ of stress then. I can’t tell you how __________ we both were for what he said to us that day. It was very __________ and meaningful.”

7 . In mid-January, Jacky Hunt-Broersma, a native of South Africa, set her goal of running. And since then she has been running 26. 2 miles every day, about the _______ of a marathon. On Saturday, she completed her 104th marathon — a (n) _______ she expects to be confirmed by Guinness World Records. If so, she would then hold a world record for 104 back-to-back (连续的) marathon runs, two more than her previous _______.

Hunt-Broersma lost half of her left leg _______ a rare form of cancer in 2001. “The biggest ______ was accepting that part of my body was gone,” she said. “Until five years ago, I was not very _______. But after looking into running, I decided to give it a try.” Currently, she keeps running on a false leg made out of carbon fiber. The carbon fiber blade (刀锋) she uses, designed specifically for running, costs about $10,000.

But Hunt-Broersma says her investment (投入) has been well worthwhile. “Running really _______ my life,” she said. “It gave me a sense of freedom. I fell in love with the process of _______ my body further just to see what I could do.”

Hunt-Broersma is hoping to _______ a single thought in others — “You’re ________ than you think and you’re capable of so much more.”

9 . In the first class of college, our teacher gave us a special task — get to know someone we didn’t know before. When I looked around, I found a wrinkled, little old lady _________ me. She said, “Hi, my name is Rose. I’m eighty-seven years old.” “Why are you in college at such a young, innocent age?” I asked _________. “I’m here to meet a rich husband, get married, and have a couple of kids...” she replied. “No seriously,” I asked. I was _________ what may have motivated her to be taking on this _________ at her age. “I always dreamed of having a college education and now I’m getting one!” she said.

From that day on, we became _________ friends. We left class together and talked nonstop. I was always _________ to listening to this “time machine” as she shared her wisdom and _________ with me.

At the end of the term, Rose was invited to _________ a speech. I’ll never forget what she taught us. “The secret of staying young _________ being positive and pursuing dreams persistently. You’ve got to have a dream. When you lose your dreams, you die,” she went on. “Anybody can grow older. That doesn’t take any __________ or ability. The elderly usually don’t have __________ for what they did, but rather for things they didn’t do. The only people who __________ death are those with regrets.”

Finally, Rose finished the college degree successfully. A month after graduation Rose died __________ in her sleep. Thousands of college students attended her funeral (葬礼)__________ the woman from whom we can learn a __________ that it’s never too late to be all you can possibly be.