After the sudden loss of her five-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, Natalia Spencer felt she needed to do something to honor the little girl. That strong wish inspired Spencer to start what she calls a “Walk of Love”, a 6,000-mile trek(长途旅行) along the British coastline.
“Elizabeth particularly loved the beach and the sea and we visited the seaside a lot. After she passed away, I went to the seaside and it was the first time that I had felt some comfort,” Spencer said. “I knew this was what I had to do. It was something I could do and it would make life more bearable.”
On Valentine’s Day, Spencer began walking Durdle Door in Dorset, England, the last beach she took Elizabeth to before she became ill. So far, Spencer has journeyed about 1,500 miles, walking through Dorset , Cornwall, Devon and the entire coast of Wales. Every day, except Saturday, Spencer walks 20 miles. Often locals join her; many times they share stories about losing their own children.
Everything changed for Spencer on Nov. 22, 2015. Spencer noticed Elizabeth was ill with what she thought was a chest infection. But the girl’s health worsened rapidly. Doctors diagnosed her with a life-threatening immune condition where the immune cells damage the tissues and organs. This caused Elizabeth’s organs to shut down and stopped the blood supply to her arms and legs. She was moved to Bristol Children’s Hospital where she spent 18 days on life support before passing away on Dec. 10.
After Elizabeth died, Spencer struggled. In January, a friend encouraged Spencer to go for a walk and the two ended up at the Gower Peninsula in Wales. While walking provides Spencer with time to grieve(悲伤), she’s also using the trip to raise ￡100,000 for the Bristol Children’s Hospital.
Spencer expects to complete her walk next spring. She’d love to finish on Valentine’s Day, but doesn’t know if that is realistic.
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Read the following passage and summarize the main idea and the main point(s) of the passage with no more than 60 words. Use your own words as far as possible.
Editors of newspapers and magazines often go to extremes to provide their readers with unimportant facts and statistics. Last year a journalist had been instructed by a well-known magazine to write an article on the president's palace in a new African republic. When the article arrived, the editor read the first sentence and then refused to publish it. The article began: 'Hundreds of steps lead to the high wall which surrounds the president's palace.' The editor at once sent the journalist a fax instructing him to find out the exact number of steps and the height of the wall.
The journalist immediately set out to obtain these important facts, but he took a long time to send them. Meanwhile, the editor was getting impatient, for the magazine would soon go to press. He sent the journalist two urgent telegrams, but received no reply. He sent yet another telegram informing the journalist that if he did not reply soon he would be fired. When the journalist again failed to reply, the editor reluctantly published the article as it had originally been written. A week later, the editor at last received a telegram from the journalist. Not only had the poor man been arrested, but he had been sent to prison as well. However, he had at last been allowed to send a cable in which he informed the editor that he had been arrested while counting the 1084 steps leading to the 15-foot wall which surrounded the president's palace.
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