1 . Alexis, 17, sat quietly in the passenger seat of her dad’s car. She let her eyes lazily scan the landscape for wildlife. Then a deer came into view about 200 yards in front of them. “Dad, there’s a deer there!” Alexis said. It was a male deer with sharp antlers (角) on each side of its head.

As the car moved closer, Alexis saw that the deer’s head was bent toward the ground. Then she heard a scream and saw an arm fly up near the deer’s head. Alexis realized the deer was attacking a woman. Sue, a 44-year-old mother, had been out for her morning run. The deer followed her and edged closer. “I knew I was in trouble,” Sue says. She went to pick up a stick for self-defense, and the deer charged. It lifted her with its antlers and threw her into the air. Sue could feel blood flew down her leg. Within seconds, the deer had pushed her off the road.

When Alexis and her father pulled up, the deer was throwing Sue like a doll. Alexis looked into the woman’s terrified eyes, and before her father had even stopped the car, the teenager jumped quickly out of the car and ran toward the deer. “I was kicking it to get its attention,” she says. Then her father, who had followed his daughter, pushed the deer away from the woman.

Alexis helped Sue into the car, and then applied a piece of cloth to Sue’s injured leg. “We’re going to get you to a hospital,” Alexis said. Then she heard her father shout loudly. He had been knocked to the ground. Alexis took hold of a hammer from the car and ran to where her father lay on his back. She beat the deer’s head and neck, but the blows didn’t scare it away. “I was losing faith,” she says. “A couple more strikes, Alexis,” said her father. “You can do it.” Turning the hammer around, Alexis closed her eyes and beat the deer’s neck with all her strength. When she opened her eyes, the deer was running away. Alexis got in the driver’s seat and sped toward the nearest hospital.

After Sue was treated, she tearfully thanked her rescuers. “You expect a teenage girl to get on the phone and call for help,” she says, “not to beat up a deer.”

3 . The Hard Truth

One day, Marissa noticed a spider web, shining in the sunlight. A spider was spinning _________ on it. The spider wasn’t trying to be something else, like a butterfly or a bee, Marissa thought. It was happy to be exactly what it was and to do what it was good at.

What came naturally to Marissa was _________. She could paint or draw all day long and never get bored. However, a few weeks ago Marissa signed up for high jump. Because her mother had been a high jump _______ in school, she thought it would make her mother happy. But now she _______ that however hard she worked, she would never be a high jump star like her mother.

One night, halfway through her homework, Marissa fell _________. When she woke up, the clock read 1:00 A. M. Marissa got into a panic. There was still so much _________ to do, but she really needed her rest for track practice. Marissa had always been a good student, but now track was risking her _________.

Then a dark thought crossed Marissa’s mind. If she _________ some of her classes, she would be off the track team. That was one way to solve her problem.

After a week of _________ her homework, letters had been mailed out to parents listing grades, and Marissa knew the letters would show that her grades had __________ a lot. She walked home with slow heavy steps, knowing her __________ plan had worked.

Just as Marissa had __________, her mother was waiting with the __________ in her hand. “What’s happening to your grades? And more importantly, what’s happening to you?” she asked.

With tears in her eyes, Marissa admitted her __________. “I only joined the track team to make you proud of me. I hated it, __________ I didn’t want to disappoint you. I thought if I were failing in my classes, Coach would kick me off the team. What a __________ I’ve made of everything.”

Marissa watched her mother’s face turn from anger to __________. “Marissa, I was always proud of you. You didn’t need to do the high jump to make me happy. Now you have a lot of hard work in front of you because you made a bad __________.”

Marissa thought again about the spider. She realized she had lost sight of her __________ and twisted her web. Now she had to go back and __________ that web.

4 . A Good Night’s Sleep

Sleep plays a vital role in good health and well-being throughout your life. While you’re sleeping, your brain is forming new pathways to help you learn and remember information. Although we all know the importance of getting a good night’s sleep, not all of us know the best way of getting it. A sleep expert, Phil Atherton, gave some top tips for getting the most out of the night, which will leave you ready for action in the morning.

According to Phil Atherton, not eating a large meal before bedtime is important for getting a good night’s sleep. The time difference between eating and sleeping should be at least three hours. So you’d better avoid eating any food three hours before bed, as it will lower your blood sugar during sleep and help minimize damage from too much sugar floating around.

It’s also important to find ways to prepare your body for sleep. You can follow a routine like trying not to expose yourself to too much artificial light within 1 hour before bed, as your brain uses light to help set internal “body clock”. Although it might seem unnatural to schedule your sleep, the purpose is to send a signal to your body and mind that it’s time to sleep.

Another way to prepare your body for sleep is to get into a relaxed state by taking a bath or listening to soft music. Both of them will help to take the mind off the daytime pressures.

Having a suitable bed, especially a suitable mattress (床垫), is necessary for a good night’s sleep. Sleep is a personalized activity, and we all adopt different sleeping positions. Finding the mattress that suits you will reduce back pains that can result from a poor sleeping position. The bed should be four to six inches longer than its tallest user, allowing for space to move around.

The recent research is pretty clear that a good night’s sleep is a major component of good health. Since the start of the 21st century, studies have linked a lack of sleep to many diseases, such as diabetes and obesity. Taking action now will lead to long-term benefits for you and those around you.

Phelps     1     (suffer) hyperactivity (活动过度) disorder as a child and     2     (encourage) to take up swimming at seven to control his energy. Over the years he developed into a champion swimmer, beating record after record. “I was trying     3     (see) what I could really do and where my potential could go”, said Phelps.