1 . We all have friends that need a little advice, but one of the problems with those types of conversations is that it’s really easy to come off as a know-it-all when you’re offering help. When you do that, nobody’s going to listen.

    1     But it’s not an easy conversation to have someone, especially when you know all the extenuating circumstances of the situation. I talked with relationship and family therapist Roger S. Gil to get some advice for dealing with these situations.

Obviously not everyone is looking for your advice. Before you go offering up your point of view, make sure they’re interested in hearing it. As Roger Gil points out, often friends aren’t looking for you to solve a problem. They just want you to listen and maybe ask some questions. So, ask if they’d like to hear your input or insights on a problem, but also ask questions about why thee feel a certain way. If they say “no”, let them finish their story and listen politely.    2    Just wait for them to finish complaining before offering advice (or asking if they want). Sometimes the best way to figure something out is to do it on their own.

Speaking of listening. It’s also a good idea to figure out right away what your friends want from you. Gil describes this as differentiating between opinions, expert advice, and being a “sounding board”. Essentially, don’t pretend like you know something you don’t.     3    

Now that you know whether or not your friends or family actually want your advice, it’s time to learn how to advise without sounding like a know-it-all. This is a lot harder than you might think. As Gil points out, one way to offer advice without sounding pretentious (自以为是的) is to avoid “You should” statements.    4     By offering up your opinion clearly defined as your opinion, you remove the implication that “you know best”.

The man was kind of small, but to a five-year-old, he was a giant. Cherry-scented smoke from Grandpa’s pipe kept the hungry mosquitoes at bay. Now and again, he blew a smoke ring and laughed as I tried to target the hole with my finger.

We sat side by side on the old wooden stairs that hot summer evening, watching the traffic, counting cars and trying to guess the color of the next one to turn the corner. We watched the sun go down behind the old Texaco service station across the busy street, which I was never allowed to cross unless accompanied by an adult.

My grandfather was baby-sitting while my mother, father and grandmother went out. While my two baby brothers slept inside the house, my three older siblings (兄弟姐妹) played with friends around the corner, where I was not allowed to go. I stayed with Grandpa, and that was okay with me. “Thirsty?” Grandpa asked, never removing the pipe from his mouth. “Yes,” was my reply. “How would you like to run over to the gas station there and get yourself a bottle of Coke?” I couldn’t believe my ears. On my family’s modest income, Coke was not a part of our budget or diet. “Okay,” I replied shyly, already wondering how I would get across the street.

He stretched his long leg out straight and reached his huge hand deep into the pocket. Opening his fist, he exposed several silver coins. He instructed me to pick out one. After he deposited the rest of the change back into his pocket, he stood up. “Okay,” he said, helping me down the stairs and to the curb (马路沿儿).

“I’m going to stay here and keep an ear out for the babies. I’ll tell you when it’s safe to cross. You go over to the Coke machine, get your Coke out and come back. Wait for me to tell you when it’s safe to cross back.” My heart pounded. Excitement took my breath away.

Grandpa held my hand tightly.

My heart pounded wildly as I approached the Coke machine.

Rikki’s mom was preparing baked beans and mixing up potato salad to go with Saturday night barbecue when Rikki stormed in the front door and marched to her room. She glanced out the window and saw their neighbor Lexi walking back to her house across the road. Mother’s intuition told herself this situation might need some direction.

“Rikki, come in here. I need some help with dinner.” Rikki came out with an obstinate look on her face — the kind that kids have when they know they are wrong but have convinced themselves they are right.

“I noticed that Lexi came over but didn’t stay long. She is your age and in your class at school. Why doesn’t she stay longer?” Mom watched Rikki out of the corner of her eye as she continued to prepare food. “I don’t like her,” Rikki whined. “I wish she would stop coming over here all the time. She dresses terrible, and sometimes she doesn’t smell good. Her nose is always runny, and her hair is tangled. None of us like her.” Mom knew that “none of us” meant the popular crowd Rikki ran with.

“That’s not her fault, Rikki. I don’t know what her family is like, but maybe she doesn’t have anyone to help her. Some kids don’t have the extra things that you and your friends have. That doesn’t make them any less worthy than you.” Rikki replied that she knew that, and those things were not the real issue. “I just don’t like to play with her, Momma. She doesn’t like to do the same things that I do.”

Mom told Rikki to go on outside and play. What she didn’t know, however, was that Rikki’s dad had been watching while he was grilling. He didn’t like the fact that Rikki had ignored Lexi, so he decided to intervene. He wanted to know why Lexi was leaving with her head down and looking so sad.

A woman remarried a man from Mexico. She already had a 16-year-old daughter named Bethany, while her husband had a 14-year-old daughter named Maria. Maria and Bethany had been in each other’s lives since they were children. Their relationship as stepsisters was good until recently.

The entire family was busy planning Maria’s Quinceanera (成人礼). The woman’s husband and his ex-wife joined forces to get her a beautiful dress to celebrate the occasion. In total, the dress cost $3,000.

Bethany made it clear that she was jealous (嫉妒的) of the party. Her mom had to make her understand that in Mexican culture, a Quinceanera was a great deal, just like how she had a sweet sixteen party. However, Bethany kept comparing her party to that of Maria’s. It was a massive issue for her, and it reflected in the way she behaved around everyone at home.

Knowing how it made Bethany feel, the mom tried to spend more time with her daughter to assure her that she wasn’t being disregarded. They even got her a lovely dress for the Quinceanera, but much cheaper than Maria’s dress.

Two weeks before the big day, Maria and Bethany got into an argument regarding the TV. Bethany retaliated (报复) against her stepsister by tearing off the back part of her Quinceanera dress. After finding out what Bethany did, everyone was angry. The mom couldn’t believe what her daughter did and quickly gave her husband and his ex-wife money to get a new dress.

The mom told Bethany that she needed to get a job to pay back the total price of the dress. It was her punishment for such an unreasonable act against her stepsister. However, Bethany claimed her mom was unfair by choosing Maria over her. This made the mom question whether she was in the wrong for giving her daughter no choice but to find a job. She wrote about the story online, hoping to get opinions from others on whether what she did was wrong.

To her surprise, she got everybody’s support.

Finally, the mom was determined to teach her 16-year-old a lesson.

Farah was checking the party list with her mother. The exams were over and Farah wanted to invite her special friends for a party.

“Farah, aren’t you going to invite Hafsa?” her mother asked. Hafsa had been her best friend who lived across the street but now Farah had made new friends. “Mother, I am now a part of Purple Girls Club and we have rules about friends,” Farah answered hesitantly. “What rules?” her mother asked sarcastically (讽刺地).

“Only very pretty girls can be in our group. Hafsa is ... dark. I can’t be seen with her. It’s bad for my image.” “Farah, I can’t believe you base your friendship on appearance rather than character. I had expected better judgment from you than this nonsense,” her mother retorted (反驳)  angrily.

Farah sank into silence. In her heart she knew her mother was right. Sometimes she too felt uncomfortable with her “cool” friends.

Just then, her father called, “Farah, come here.” Farah went and paled when she saw the report card in his hands. 

“Farah, how come you failed each subject? You were my pride.” Her father questioned.

She hated to see such look of disappointment in his eyes. The truth was that the Club left her with little time for studies. The girls got together almost daily for movies, shopping, and partying. It had seemed like so much fun but now it left a bitter taste in her mouth.

“Farah?” her father asked again , but Farah just hung her head in shame and did not answer.

“Farah, you shall take supplementary (补考) papers next month.”

Knowing how strict her father could be, Farah went to her room and opened her copies.

Seeing her homework filled with red crosses, Farah felt awfully terrible. How could she have neglected(忽视)her studies so much?

She called Gina, the leader of the Club. “Gina, can you lend me your copies? I need them to complete my notes for the exams.” Gina erupted into laughter. “Exams? Who cares? Farah. There are other ways of passing them.” Farah replaced the phone quickly. Even in desperation, she could never cheat.

One by one, she called her so-called friends but no one was willing to help.

Paragraph 1: Farah sat dejected on her bed, searching hard in her mind for other names she could turn to.

Paragraph 2: Next Monday, as the two old friends entered the school together, Gina saw them and called out haughtily (傲慢地),

I always love going to school as I can meet my friends and learn from my teachers. Everyone has an unforgettable moment in their school life and mine was in junior middle school.

That day started as usual. I woke up, got ready and went to school, where I first met my friends and then we were required to gather for the daily get-together. After that, we went to our respective classes. I went to my classroom as well and settled down as usual, greeting my classmates and waiting for the teacher to arrive.

It was a chemistry class and the teacher asked us to go to the laboratory to conduct a long-anticipated experiment. I took my stuff and was ready to leave the classroom when I felt sharp pain in my stomach. I sat down for a while, with hands rubbing my stomach. I was waiting for the pain to go off by itself. However, it was in vain. The pain still remained. Unfortunately, all of my friends had gone except the class monitor, the one I had never thought to make friends with.

But anyway, I called him and informed him of my condition, asking him to help me contact my parents. Noticing my trembling voice and begging eyesight, he agreed instantly and went to contact my parents without any hesitation.

On his departure, I realized that things were getting worse. Beads of sweat dropping off my paleface, I had to lean against the desk to ease the severe pain without realizing I suddenly vomited (呕吐). Everything around me was in a total mess, including myself. At that point, I thought my life was over and was scared of all the mean words to be said by my classmates and schoolmates. At that embarrassing moment, the class monitor came back. Obviously, he knew my dilemma. I was frozen with pain on the spot, maybe awkwardness, to be accurate.

However, he considerately helped me to go to the toilet.

After fully recovering from the food poisoning, I returned to school.

I wanted to go to a party. Who wouldn’t? Especially as this was no ordinary party. It was a beach party. It had been almost the only thing my friends had been talking about for the last couple of weeks. But there was a problem…and a big problem. My mom had said no. I was desperate, and the more desperately I asked, the more firmly my mother said no. I begged that everyone was going. However, my mother replied that she didn’t care who was going and that I was not going. I was disappointed. I was heartbroken. This was my best friend’s party.

Sunday dinner came around and my grandmother joined the family for the meal. Gran noticed how unhappy I had been looking during the meal but didn’t say a thing. It was my turn to wash up and Gran asked me there as on while the rest of the family shifted into the living room to watch TV.

I said sadly to Gran that my mom wouldn’t let me go to my best friend’s party. Gran asked if my mom had explained why. I replied no. Gran said that I should put myself in my mom’s position for a moment and consider what objections I would have if I were my mom.

After thinking for a moment or two, I told her that maybe my mom didn’t trust us or thought we would get into trouble at the beach party. I also suggested that maybe she was worried we would drown, but added that we all knew how to swim and look after ourselves.

Gran asked if there would be any adults at the party. I said no and added that who wanted their parents hanging around when trying to have fun. Gran suggested that my mother might just be concerned and didn’t want anything to happen to me. I objected that nothing would happen. “Maybe you’re right,” said Gran, “but may be Mom’s worried in case it could.”

“Maybe think of some solutions,” suggested Gran.

Then I ran to my mother in no time.

Grandma tried to straighten out her fingers.“You know, Ann, I think I am done knitting.” she said.“My fingers just won’t do what I tell them any more.”

I looked at her hands.When I was little, she had taught me how to sew dresses for my dolls and how to embroider (刺绣) the faces of my dolls on the dresses.

But now she can hardly bend her fingers.The doctor said she should keep her hands warm.I made her cups of tea to hold and moved her chair closer to the fire.But it didn’t work.

I wasn’t used to seeing her hands so still.When I came downstairs, her quiet hands made even her voice stay still.I missed her voice more than ever.

I tried to help her find her voice.“Grandma, tell me about when you were a little girl,” I begged, knowing she loved to tell stories.“Tell me about Peti and Zoe.” Peti and Zoe were her brother and sister.“That was so long ago, Ann,” whispered Grandma.“I can barely remember.” But I still remembered her story about Peti cutting off Zoe’s two beautiful long braids (辫子) and then hiding them in the closet.Were those words still moving silently in her head?

Mom was sorting through our clothes for spring.“Ann, take these out to the trash,” Mom said.“There’s no need to keep worn-out clothes.”

I looked sadly at the pile of sweaters and then picked it up.

“Wait,” Grandma said as I walked by her and put the pile downstairs.“Let me see those.”

“Ann, wind the yarn (纱线) of the old sweater into a ball, like this.Then you can use the yarn to knit something new.” Grandma wrapped yarn around and around her fingers, first in one direction and then the other to keep the ball round.

After dinner Grandma fell asleep in her chair.

Mom came downstairs with an old pair of gloves with small holes to add to the pile of sweaters.

Suddenly, the pair of old gloves gave me an idea.

“Your family,” I said, handing the gloves with the faces of Peti and Zoe to Grandma.

My Amazing Brother

Mark was the most popular boy in his class. He had top grades, was a star athlete and was everyone's friend. He was so perfect. He also happened to be my little brother.

My brother and I had always been close, yet I had long felt inferior(自惭形秽) to him. He just seemed to have everything, I, on the other hand, was shy with relatively few close friends, I was sure 95 percent of the class had no idea I even existed,

High school started. Mark and I were at the same school; he was a freshman, and I was a senior, We got closer than ever that year, I didn't know whether it was the rides to school when we sang along to the songs on the radio, or the fact that we were both on the swim team,

I helped him with his math problems, and he read my papers and made sure that they were A+ quality, We listened to CDs every night and danced on the floor. We joked about our parents. We even hung out with each other at the movies.

One night, my brother and I were discussing the upcoming semi-formal dance, Mark, of course, would attend it, I hadn't even planned on going. I never had a friend for anything and I accepted that nothing was likely to change that. When Mark asked who I wanted to go with, I was shocked.

"What do you mean you're not going? You have to go, It's your senior year!" Mark didn't understand why I wasn't going.

"Well, there's not one person who would want to go with me, " I told him, using the reasoning I'd repeated to myself over and over.

"You're joking, Care.There isn't anyone in the whole school that would turn you down. ""How do you know?" I asked, wondering where my brother got such silly ideas.

"Because you're the coolest girl in the world, " Mark answered.

The rest of the year went by in excitement.