1 . I turned 8 years old the day I skipped school for the first time. It was easily done: Both my parents left for work before my school bus arrived on weekdays, so when it showed up at my house on that cold winter morning, I simply did not get on. The perfect crime!

And what did I do with myself on that glorious stolen day, with no adult in charge and no limits on my activities? Did I get high? Hit the mall for a shoplifting extravaganza (狂欢)?

Nope. I built a warm fire in the wood stove, prepared a bowl of popcorn, grabbed a blanket, and read. I was trilled and transported by a book — it was Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises — and I just needed to be alone with it for a little while. I ached to know what would happen to Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley and Robert Cohn. I couldn’t bear the thought of siting in a classroom taking another exam when I could be traveling through Spain in the 1920s with a bunch of expatriates (异乡客).

I spent that day lost in words. Time fell away, as the room around me turned to mist, and my role — as a daughter, sister, teenager, and student — in the world no longer had any meaning. I had accidentally come across the key to perfect happiness: I had become completely absorbed by something I loved.

Looking back on it now, I can see that some subtle things were happening to my mind and to my life while I was in that state of absorption. Hemingway’s language was quietly braiding itself into my imagination. I was downloading information about how to create simple and elegant sentences, a good and solid plot. In other words, I was learning how to write. Without realizing it, I was hot on the trail of my own fate. Writing now absorbs me the way reading once did and happiness is their generous side effect.

2 . Do you remember the name of your kindergarten teacher? I do. Her name was Mrs. White.

I don’t remember much about what we learned in her ________, but my mother once told me we used to ________ a lot. And I would ________ what I wrote and my mother would look at it and see there were so many ________. But no red corrections. And always a star. Sometimes even a “Good”! That made my heart filled with ________, but worried my mother. So one day when she met Mrs. White, she asked her why she never ________ my mistakes; why she never red-penciled in the wrong ________ of words or pointed out grammatical errors.

My mother said Mrs. White said “The children are just ________ to get excited about using words, about ________ sentences. I don’t want to dampen (减弱) that ________ with red ink. Spelling and grammar can ________. The wonder of words won’t…” And maybe she didn’t ________ it exactly like that because it was a long time ago and ________ my mother told me was just what she could remember.

Thanks to Mrs. White, I ________ up learning to use words with loving ________. I had no qualms (顾虑) about writing what I meant ________ I couldn’t quite spell it out. A thought comes into my mind that if Mrs. White had used her red pen precisely, I ________ wouldn’t be telling you about this now. I look ________ now and think she must have been a rather ________ teacher — to exercise such red-pen-restraint (不纠错) — to ________ the joy, wonder and excitement of expression.

Yoghurt

It was a rough week. The price of oil skyrocketed as the temperature dropped sharply in Maine. We were looking at a high of eight degrees that week, and I had missed three days of work so my paycheck was going to be lower than normal. I was stressed, to say the least. I shopped strategically, looking for every possible way to cut pennies so I could buy groceries and keep the house warm.

My eight-year-old son didn't understand when I told him we were struggling that week. He wanted a special kind of yoghurt, but I didn't have the extra three dollars to buy it for him. It was the kind of yoghurt with a cartoon kid riding a skateboard on the front of the box, and a mere two spoonfuls in each cup. It was the kind of product that wastes a parent's money and makes me hate advertising.

I felt guilty as a parent when those big eyes looked at me with confusion, as if to say, “It's just yoghurt. What's the big deal?” So I found a way. I put something back as single mothers often do. He got his yoghurt.

On the way driving back from the grocery store, I noticed a homeless man holding a sign by the side of the road. My heart hurt, and I tried not to look at him. I watched people stay away from him on the street and walk by without even meeting his eyes. My son didn't seem to care much, either. I looked at the man closely then — bare hands grasping a piece of cardboard, snot frozen to his face, a worn-out jacket. And there I was struggling because I had to buy oil and groceries. But I decided to help. I pulled over to the man and handed him a five-dollar bill.

Seeing this, my son became confused and surprised.

On that day, my son performed an act that most adults wouldn’t have done.

4 . A boy shivers in the harsh Oslo winter, pathetically wrapping his arms around himself on a bus stop bench. He isn't wearing a coat and temperatures in the Norwegian capital regularly plunge to -10℃ during winter.

It’s a heartbreaking scene, but the actions of the ordinary people who witnessed the dilemma of 11-year-old Johanne Lonnestad Flaaten are both joyous and inspiring.

A young blonde woman sitting next to the boy notices him rubbing his arms. She immediately asks him: “Don't you have a jacket?” “No, someone stole it,” he replies. She questions him and discovers he was on a school trip and was told to meet his teacher at the bus stop. She asks him the name of his school and where he's from as she selflessly drapes her own coat around his shoulders.

Later, another older woman at first gives him her scarf, and then wraps him in her large padded jacket.

Throughout the day, more and more people offered Johannes their gloves and even the coats off their backs as they waited for their bus.

Actually, Johanne's dilemma was a hidden camera experiment by Norwegian charity SOS Children’s Village, as part of their winter campaign to gather donations to send much-needed coats and blankets to help Syrian children get through the winter. Many of the refugees have left their homes without winter clothing.

“People should care as much about children in Syria as they care about this boy,” Synne Ronning, the information head of SOS Children's Villages Norway, told The Local. She also noted that the child was a volunteer who was never in any danger during the filming.

6 . It was a bitter cold evening in northern Virginia many years ago. An old man was waiting for a ride across the river. The _______ seemed endless. His body became _______ and stiff from the chilly north wind.

Suddenly, he heard the faint, steady rhythm of approaching hooves(蹄) running _______ the frozen path. _______, he watched as several horsemen rounded the bend. He let the first one passed by without any effort to get his _______, then another passed by, and another. Finally, the _______ rider neared the spot where the old man sat like a snow statue. _______ this one drew near, the old man caught the rider’s eye and said, “sir, would you mind _______ an old man a ride to the other side? ”

Reining his horse, the rider replied, “sure thing. Hop aboard.” The horseman dismounted(下马) and helped the old man _______ the horse. The rider took the old man not just across the river, but to his ________ , which was just a few miles away.

As they ________ the tiny but cozy cottage, the horseman’s ________ caused him to inquire, “sir, I notice you let several other riders pass by without making an effort to secure a ride. Then I ________ and you immediately asked me for a ride. I am curious why, on such a bitter night, you would wait and ask the last rider. What if I had ________ and left you here?”

The old man lowered himself ________ down from the horse, looked the rider straight in the eyes, and replied, “I looked into the eyes of the other riders and immediately saw there was no ________ for my situation. It would have been useless even to ask them for a ride.________ when I looked into your eyes, that your gentle spirit would welcome the opportunity to give me assistance in my time of need.”

Those heart-warming comments touched the horseman deeply. “I’m so grateful for________ you have said, ” he told the old man. “May I never get so busy in my own affairs that I ________ respond to the needs of others with kindness and compassion.”

With that, Thomas Jefferson turned his horse around and ________ his way back to the White House.

8 . Gift shops in museums used to be the last stop of each visit, where people would buy souvenirs for themselves and their friends. But what happened last year when the British Museum opened its online store on Chinese e-commerce website Tmall says otherwise.

The store has become so popular since its launch on July 1 that some of its items have already sold out. It's even more interesting considering the fact that many of its customers in China have probably never even been to the museum before.

Perhaps French museum expert Diane Drubay made a good point when she said that gift shops have become “a point of entry to the museum”, as she told The New York Times. “Instead of being the last place people go after a visit, it can be the first.”

But you're probably still wondering: What is it about museum gift shops that makes them so different?

Each museum product contains a small piece of history. For example, in the British Museum store there are different kinds of sticky tape printed with pattern inspired by the famous Rosetta Stone. Known as the “key to ancient Egyptian writing”, the stone was discovered in 1799, and contains an inscription(碑铭)that helped historians better understand some of the most mysterious Egyptian scripts. And in the gift shops of China's Palace Museum, there are earphones inspired by the necklaces worn by ancient officials, which may also indicate the wearer’s position with the beads’ different materials and colors.

And with the design evolving over the years, museum products are no longer limited to exhibition catalogs to be put on the bookshelf or duplicates(复制品)of famous paintings to be hung on the wall. They now mean items that we can put to use every day-glasses, jewelry, cushion covers-which means we're able to not only “own” a piece of history, but also hold it in our hands, wear it on our neck, or even sleep on it.

Indeed, museum shops are no longer just about selling things. As US museum store consultant Geoff Walsky once told Gift Shop Magazine, “A great museum gift shop is an extension of the museum itself.”