1 . When I was three, I had a very good friend named Gemma. She was fearless where I was anxious, rebellious where I was conservative, and _________ where I was awkward. She was also entirely imaginary. With Gemma’s support, I almost made it to the top shelf of the bookcase before my parents found me — and “Gemma said it was fine!” did not _________ me from a telling-off (责骂).

I cannot remember when or how I “met” Gemma, and, perhaps sadder still, I do not remember the _________ time I “saw” her. _________ my brain created her, she inspired me to go on adventures I would not have had the confidence to embark upon without her. It _________ me, then, that 72 percent of nursery workers believe children have fewer imaginary friends than they did five years ago, as is shown by a recent survey. This is believed to be a result of _________ screen time.

It is thought that 40 percent of us at one time or another had imaginary friends during our _________. In an essay for Aeon, writer Sophie Elmhirst found that 81 percent of those surveyed had “lost” their imaginary friends after they turned ten, but most of these friendships ended _________. Perhaps imaginary friends simply stay with us for as long as we need them. They move on when our lives become too _________ for our brains to make space to generate their own entertainment.

If you have enjoyed an imaginary friendship, I would guess that you did not __________ sit down to create a perfect pal. They probably arrived as an indication of the thoughts and ideas you never knew you had. In order to be a good __________ to an imaginary friend, you need to be able to make “what if?” into an exciting proposition. When we grow up, we are too quick to finish the sentence with “what if it goes wrong?”

Having grown up, we might not need our imaginary friends anymore, but we could still use a reminder that a little bit of boredom is good for us, and that our brains can create the best ideas when they are left to their own devices. If there are fewer imaginary friends __________ the worlds where our children live, that might lead to a future with fewer artists, writers and problem-solvers. This is a real cause for __________.

As an adult, I think of my fearless, invisible friend Gemma whenever I have to do something that __________ me — usually public speaking, rather than scaling a bookcase. However, whenever I __________ my own expectations and meet myself in a place that I did not think I could quite reach, I can hear my subconscious whispering, “Gemma made me do it.”

2 . Never had a lovely sunflower been absent to my house on my birthday, since I turned 13. No cards or notes in it. Calls to the flower shop were always ______ — it was a cash purchase.

I never stopped ______ who the mysterious giver might be. Some of my happiest moments were spent daydreaming about someone wonderful but too shy to disclose his or her ______.

My mother even ______ my imaginations. She’d ask me if there was someone who I had done a special favor and then might be showing ______. As a teenager, ______, I had more fun assuming that it might be a boy I had a crush on.

When I was 17, I failed ______ in a significant test. That night when the result came. I just ______ myself to sleep. When I awoke in the morning, my mother comforted, “Don’t be discouraged! It’s not a big deal!” Yet, I remember ______ out of the house at that time, yelling... “You just don’t understand!”

One month before my graduation from high school, my father died of a heart attack. My feelings ranged from pain to ______ so that I became completely uninterested in the upcoming ceremony. But my mother, in the midst of her own grief, would deny my ______ any of those things. Before my father died, we had shopped a party dress which made me feel like a (an) ______ Cinderella. But it was the wrong size. Later I totally forgot about the dress.

My mother didn’t. The day before the dance, I found that dress, in the right size, ______ in the box to me — gracefully, and lovingly. She just wanted her child to feel loved and showed that there still existed magic and beauty even ______ hardships.

Actually, my mother passed away one week after I got married, That year the adorable sunflower stopped ______.

4 . On March 11, 2021, World Kidney (肾脏) Day, the actress Raisa wrote on Twitter: “I’ve kept my kidney donation process pretty private. However, I think I’ve got to a point where I feel comfortable in speaking about my experience...” Showing her ________, the singer Gomez responded, writing: “Thank you for blessing me.”

In 2015, Gomez was diagnosed with a terrible disease and soon she became seriously ill. She even had to deal with the mental health problems ________ from her battle with the disease.

Although she was then living with Raisa, Gomez did not tell her long-time friend about the ________ of her health troubles. “I hadn’t asked anything. I knew that she hadn’t been feeling well,” Raisa recalled in an interview. “She couldn’t open a water bottle one day. She then started crying, and I asked, ‘What’s wrong?’” That’s when Gomez revealed that she needed a kidney transplant (移植), but that the waiting list was ________ long. Deeply ________ about her friend’s condition, Raisa decided that she would get tested to see if she could be a ________ for her. Gomez immediately refused, not wanting to make Raisa put her entire career and life ________ for her, but the actress insisted, and amazingly turned ________ to be a match indeed.

With physical and psychological evaluations (评估) taking place over the ________ of a single day rather than the usual six months, Gomez and Raisa began their ________ journey. The surgery was ________ successful. It wasn’t long, however, before Gomez’s new kidney began to turn around inside her body, which then resulted in a second surgery, ________ by a lengthy process of recovery. Gomez, now back to normal, is certain that she ________ her life to Raisa, a true friend indeed.

Both Gomez and Raisa said it was their ________ that guided them through their emotional journey. The pair also hope that sharing their story can have a positive impact on others. “I don’t think what we went through was ________. I just hope this inspires people to believe that there’re really good people in the world,” said Gomez.

5 . For years now, I’ve been wanting to sell our home, the place where my husband and I raised our kids. But to me, this house is ________ a building.

In the front room, there’s a ________ that has hundreds of pencil lines, ________ the progress of my children’s growth. Every growth stage is marked in grey, with each child’s name and the date they were ________.

Of all the objects and all the memories, it’s this one thing in a home that’s the hardest to ________. Friends I know have returned home after work only to discover their wall of heights has been freshly painted over. A new paint job wouldn’t normally be ________ by tears, but erasing that ________ of motherhood hurts more than it should. Our kids grow in so many ways, but the wall is the ________ proof of their progress, right there for everyone to see.

Over the years, I’ve talked about how much I would ________ abandoning that wall when I moved, ________ the last marks were made 10 years ago when my kids stopped growing. So one day, my children hired Jacquie Manning, a professional ________ whose work is about capturing the beautiful things in life. She came to our house while I was at work, and over several hours, took photos of the hundreds of drawings and lines, little grey fingerprints, and old marks. ________, she managed to photograph all those years of memories perfectly. Afterwards, she put all the photos together into one image, transforming them into a beautiful ________ of my family.

Three weeks later, my children’s wonderful gift ________ its way to me — a life-size photo of the pencil lines and fingerprints that ________ the entire lifetime of love and growth.

6 . A Game of Light and Shade

It was a sunny winter day. I had gone up and down the tower when, outside the door at the foot, a blind man came over.  I looked at the ________ that said “To the Tower”, and decided to follow him.

I caught up with him in the ticket office. There I was ________ to see the attendant selling him a ticket as if he were any other visitor. Then, with the ticket in one hand and ________ the wall with the fingers of the other, the blind man reached the stairs ________ to the hallway.

“That man is blind. What would a blind man climb up the tower for?” I said to the attendant, expecting him to show some ________, but he didn’t answer.

“Not the ________ certainly,” I thought. “Perhaps he wants to ________.”

I bought a ticket and ________ up the stairs. The man hadn’t gone as far as I ________. A third of the way up the tower, I heard his ________. I slowed down and followed him at a little ________. He stopped from time to time. When he got to the balcony, I was a dozen steps ________. As I reached it, I saw him at the corner of the tower.

At last, after ten minutes, I ________ him. “Excuse me,” I said as ________   as I could, “but I am curious to know how you came up.”

He smiled. “Coming up the stairs, you will notice how not just light but sun ________ into the tower through the narrow windows here and there, so that you can feel the ________—the cool stairs suddenly become quite warm—and how up here behind the wall there is ________, but as soon as going opposite a window you can find the sun. There is no ________ so good as this for feeling the difference between light and shade. It is not the first time I’ve come up.”

The blind man seemed quite ________ just like a child who was enjoying his favorite games. He told me the truth that blind men can also find the beauty in life ________ they cannot enjoy the sights of the world.

7 . When I was a young boy growing up in North Dakota, my grandparents were farmers; And I remember the huge garden that my Grandma_________．I promise you it was about 4,000 square metres．Well, _________it seemed that way to me! She _________ the garden all by hand, with a hoe(锄头) and some water．Each spring the garden took shape from cold flat earth, which she changed through much hard work into rows of hills ready for _________．

I especially remember _________ Grandma plant potatoes．Grandma had _________ potatoes from last year．She stored them with the rest of the harvest in the outdoor cellar(地窖), where vegetables were kept safely all _________, When spring came, we _________ last year's potatoes and planted each piece into a hill of soil in the garden．I thought we would never _________ the end of the planting work even though everybody was helping!

Before long the garden became fully __________ because of sunny days, warmer temperatures and rain．__________ it needed lots of hoeing and watering by Grandma and her helper to have a harvest．It provided vegetables throughout the summer, until the final __________ when cold weather set in．

By the time Thanksgiving dinner __________, the ground at my grandparent's farm often would be covered with snow and we'd be __________ for a long winter．Warm inside the house, around Thanksgiving dinner, we looked through windows at bare(光秃的) tree branches(树枝) in the __________ garden．Our whole family would __________ potatoes and other vegetables from the __________．And of course wonderful pumpkin(南瓜) pie…I can smell it now! It's __________ how a pumpkin pie can make me __________ years of Thanksgiving dinners, and how that warmth __________ in my heart．

8 . So I went first to the gambling(赌博的) hall to seek out the table where he had been sitting, and think of his hands that I had fallen in love with at first sight the day before among all the others there. Every one of his _______ was still clear before my mind's eye, _______now he must be on that train carrying him away from this city. When I was_______in the deep guilt that I had missed that train yesterday, something strange happened. There, in the very place that I dreamed of him — there_______the man, in the flesh and unmistakable.

I couldn't describe my bitterness and _______, like a fly brushed_______aside by a man to whom one has offered one's whole life. A rush of anger_______me but I held it back. ''You will get up at once! '' I whispered to him in a soft but_______tone. ''Remember what you swore in church yesterday, you poor perjurer!(伪誓者) ''.

He stared at me, _______and pale. His eyes suddenly________the expression of a beaten dog. All at once he seemed to be remembering that past, and a________of himself appeared to come to him. ''Yes, yes, '' he whispered, ''Oh, my god, yes, I’m coming. Oh forgive me! '' But his hand was already________ the money together when his eyes fell once more on the Russian general, who had just made his________. ''Just a moment, '' he said, quickly throwing five gold coins on the same square. ''Just this one more game, I promise you I'll come then. ''

My patience was at end. I________him hard. ''Get up at once! You said one more game. '' But then something unexpected happened. He suddenly swung round, with burning eyes and________trembling lips. ''Leave me alone! '' He shouted. ''Go away, you bring me bad luck, whenever you're here I________. You brought bad luck yesterday and now you are bringing bad luck. ''Go away, ''________ I could react, he cried, losing all control. ''I'm not under your control, take back your money. '' And he threw me a few hundred-franc________.''Now leave me alone! ''

Out of the hall, I got as far as the bench outside, the same one on which that gambling addict had collapsed the day before. I ________ to the hard, pitiless wood, as powerless, ________,heart-broken as he had been.

9 . When we first moved into my grandparents' old house，my wife declared it a hidden danger. We planned to burn it. But I thought it prudent（审慎的）to check out the house first ______ something of value had been ______.

I walked through the tall grass where the old house sat. I felt as though I had stepped into a time capsule. Here were the ______ of my grandparents' lives: a broken chair，some old clothes. . . But the thing that ______ my eye was a ______ stuffed with papers. I ______ through its contents and was instantly ______ back in time. Greeting cards from old friends and relatives，an uncle's third-grade spelling book，now all dead and gone. I spent most of a ______ hour going through that box.

So the old house was ______ the torch.

As we hurried through our lives，visits grew ______ Then，one morning，my father died from a heart attack. Why I ______ that old house on a day shortly after my father's funeral is still   ______ me. It was as though it were ______. As I stood there once again，my eye was drawn to a pile of papers on the floor. An envelope，______ with age，lay on top. My father had served in the navy during World War Ⅱ and had written home whenever he could. I removed one letter ______ from its envelope. I ______ the familiar scrawl（潦草的字迹）. Dad asked his mother to greet everyone and said that he ______ them all. Tears ______ in my eyes as I read those words he had so carefully emphasized:“All is well here. Please don't worry. I am doing fine. ”

As I left the old house that day，I took one last ______ back at it over my shoulder. I don't care what any one thinks，I ______. That old house gets to stay there until it rots（腐烂）into the earth.

10 . WHAT are good friends? This is not a (an) _______question. But Mark and Jarryd Haines,

___________, have always been good friends. The two boys from Sydney have known each other for most of their lives. Both of them_______playing Australian football.

A few years ago, when Mark was nine, he developed brain cancer. The _______robbed the boy of his _______, part of his hearing and his ability to play his favorite sport._______, throughout the years, Jarryd_______his closest friend. They still share their love of Australian football. And they still like talking about the Sydney Swans, their favorite team.

Two weeks ago, I took my___________at Sydney Cricket Ground to watch the Swans. The old stadium_______fans. Shortly into the second quarter, I heard some great commentary (现场解说) from a boy. Play by play, Jarryd was bringing the game to ________. I turned and saw him. Mark was sitting next to him.

__________he cannot see anymore, Mark still loves the Swans very much. Usually, he goes to the stadium and listens to the commentary on the radio. But in the second quarter of that match, the radio system ________. That was when his friend Jarryd stepped in.

I ________looked at the Swans and Buddy, the team's star player. ________that, I was focusing on Jarryd and Mark. ''What's happening now, mate?'' Mark asked. ''Don't worry, Mark,'' Jarryd replied. ''Okay. Buddy's got it. Will he go for it? He's going for it! It's his tenth goal! Buddy is________!''Mark listened carefully. He was lost in the________of Australian football brought to life by his friend.

Sports can be ________. Yet, they can also allow us to share wonderful________with others,____________they be close friends or perfect strangers. Here, Jarryd and Mark have moved me, and perhaps some other spectators (观众), with their precious________.