2 . The next morning Alex was waiting in the FMA president’s suite when Jerome Patterton arrived. Alex filled him in quickly on the Jax report. Then he said, “I want you to give an order to the trust department to sell every share of Supranational we’re holding.”

“I won’t!” Patterton’s voice rose. “Who do you think you are, giving orders---“ “I’ll tell you who I am, Jerome. I’m the guy who warned the board against in-depth involvement with SuNatCo. I fought against heavy trust department buying of the stock, but no one---including you ---would listen. Now Supranational is caving in.” Alex leaned across the desk and slammed a fist down hard. “Don’t you understand? Supranational can bring this bank down with it.”

Patterton was shaken. “But is SuNatCo in real trouble? Are you sure?”

“If I weren’t, do you think I’d be here? I’m giving you a chance to salvage something at least.” He pointed to his wristwatch. “It’s an hour since the New York stock market opened. Jerome, get on the phone and give that order!”

Muscles around the bank president’s mouth twitched nervously. Never decisive, strong influence often swayed him. He hesitated, then picked up the telephone.

“Get me Mitchell in the trust department… Mitch? This is Jerome. Listen carefully. I want you to give a sell order immediately on all the Supranational stock we hold… Yes, sell every share.” Patterton listened, then said impatiently, “Yes, I know what it’ll do to the market. And I know it’s irregular.” His eyes sought Alex’s for reassurance. The hand holding the telephone trembled as he said, “There’s no time to hold meetings. So do it! Yes, I accept responsibility.”

He hung up and reached for a glass of water. “The stock is already down. Our selling will depress it more. We’ll be taking a big beating.”

“It’s our clients---people who trusted us---who will take the beating. And they’d have taken a bigger one still, if we’d waited. Even now we’re not out of the woods. A week from now the SEC may disallow those sales. They may rule we had inside knowledge that Supranational was about to be bankrupt, which we should have reported and which would have halted trading in the stock.

3 . Every year, high school students aged 15-19 from all around the world make a huge decision. They ______ their home and go to another country to study for up to a year. An exchange year is known as a time when new experiences ______ students about a different way of life. Sometimes there will be ______ and bad moments, but those are the moments when the students ______ the most.

“An exchange year isn’t a year in your life; it’s a life in a year,” said Isabela Seixas, an 18-year-old exchange student from Brazil.

Seixas has been living in Saint Joseph this year. Her year didn’t start ______ the way she was hoping. Seixas had trouble making friends and she couldn’t ______ with her host family.

“I had the worst and the best time here. The beginning was terrible. I didn’t open up and no one talked to me. I was even ______ to go home before the year ended,” Seixas said.

When the year 2020 started, Seixas ______ her host family and gave the U. S. one more chance. She also changed her ______. Now she has a great relationship with her host parents and has a lot of friends. She’s ______ her time.

“I love all the seasons, watching the changes and the changes in me. I learned that it’s important to talk to people and start building connections with them. I’m glad that I ______ my comfort zone,” said Seixas.

Exchange students grow a lot during their exchange year and they see the world in a ______ way. They will have difficulties they need to ______ by themselves but they will go back to their home more mature and ______.

“You will have bad days, but if you open your mind to new experiences and share your ______ with people, you will have the best time of your life,” said Seixas.

4 . I had never been away from home, at least not for more than three days, much less two whole weeks. When I got the chance to go to Journalism Camp, I was ________.

What if I had to go home during camp time because I wouldn’t be able to ________? What if my roommate and I didn’t ________? What if I didn’t know how to use a washing machine?

Well, after the first night, nearly all of my ________ were answered. The students were amazing, and my roommate was ________. She always listened to me patiently!

The two weeks nearly flew by, and I learned to take ________ for myself: washing clothes, cleaning and allocating (分配) my weekly pocket money to ________ it for all meals.

However, in the process I didn’t realize how ________ I had become to the routine of waking up early, running to get to the newsroom in time, and coming back to a waiting room.

On the last day, I couldn’t get myself to ________ in my room keys. It couldn’t be over. I become emotionally tied really easily, and it was ________ for me to pull away. I couldn’t ________ away my tears.

Returning home, I was in the state of ________ for a few days. I kept to myself, sleeping through most of the day so I wouldn’t have time to look back.

This was my ________. Yet I needed to get adjusted to life at home again. I had to learn to ________ that the camp was over and that not all things ________ forever. I could still keep in touch with my new friends and look forward to other experiences I will have.

5 . One Second Every Day

I’ve been in advertising for eight years and used to work a lot of late nights and weekends for numerous projects.     1     One day I watched a talk called “The power of time off”. It’s about how every seven years, the speaker takes a year off from work so he can do his own creative projects.     2     I decided I had to do that. I need to take time to start my own creative ideas.

The first project ends up being something I call “One Second Every Day”. Basically I record one second of every day for the rest of my life, combining these moments into one single continuous video until I can’t record them anymore.     3     There’re many things I have no recollection of unless someone brings them up, and I think, “Oh, that’s something I did.”

    4     On a good day, I’ll have maybe four seconds I want to choose. I’ll just have to narrow them down to one, but even narrow them down to that one allows me to remember the other three anyway.

I don’t use any filters (滤镜), just trying to catch the moment as much as possible as it is. I started a rule of the first person view. Early on, I thought I should have a couple of videos where people would see me, but I realized that wasn’t the way to go.     5    

The project has many possibilities. I encourage you all to record just a small piece of your life every day, so you can never forget that day and treasure every moment.

Broken Shells

It was a warm summer afternoon at the Jersey shore. My four-year-old son and I just loved walking along the beach just before dinner. With a bucket in hand, we’d hit the sand and start our adventure.

I remember the days not so long ago when a trip to the beach was just unbearable for my little boy. My son, Will, was diagnosed with ASD (孤独症). His sensitivities to sights, sounds, and touches would prevent us from enjoying everyday activities. The beach is now one of his favorite places to visit.

Presently, we are able to walk along the edge of the water almost daily in the summer months, looking for seashells to fill our bucket. On this particular day, there didn’t seem to be too many shells washed up on the shore. Will began picking up whatever shells he saw lying in the sand. After a while, I looked into the bucket and saw nothing but broken shells. “Will,” I said, “all of these shells are broken and no good.” “You need to find shells like this,” I continued, as I held up a perfectly shaped shell. Will gave me a puzzled look and continued on his way, gathering whatever shells he saw and dropping them into the bucket.

I continued my search for some time, and again, I stopped, but this time I asked in a firm voice, “Will, why do you insist on filling our bucket with shells that are broken?” He looked up at me and replied, “Mom, there are more shells on the beach that are broken than there are perfect ones that you are searching for. We’ll get the bucket filled faster with the broken ones.” True, I thought, but who wanted a bucketful of broken shells? Will stared at me as if he knew what I was thinking. “Mom, these shells are broken. but they are still beautiful.” he added. Just then he began commenting on different shells’ uniqueness. “It has the color purple on it. Mom, none of yours have purple on them. It reminds me of a clown (小丑). This one is like the sun, and these ones are like butterfly wings,” he said with such pride.

Touched by what he said, I realized changes are to be made to our shell trip.

Back home with great joy, we agreed to make more shell trips and build a “broken shell garden”.