One pleasant New-year morning, Edward rose, and washed and dressed himself in a hurry. He wanted to be first to wish a happy New Year to his family. He turned up at every door of the house, and shouted the words of “Happy New Year” in an excited voice. After a quick breakfast, he hopped along the street like a happy bird, greeted and repeated the words to those he met.

When he came back, his father gave him 50 dollars, saying he could buy whatever he had been wishing for. His face lighted up as he took them. He had wished for a long time to buy some interesting books that he had seen at the bookstore. He thanked his father and danced out of the house again with a light heart, wanting to buy those books.

As he ran down the street, he noticed a poor German family, the father, mother, and three children trembling with cold. “I wish you a happy New Year,” said Edward, as he was happily passing on. The man took a look at the happy boy and shook his head sadly.

Edward stopped and said, “It seems that you do not belong to this country” The man again shook his head, a confused expression appeared over his face, for he could not understand or speak English.

But the poor man pointed to his mouth, and to the children with hungry looks, as if to say, “These little ones have had nothing to eat for a long time.”

Edward quickly understood that these poor people were in difficult situation.

He took out his dollars, and gave them all to the man.

When Edward went home, his father asked what book he had bought.

George was so excited he could hardly wait to get to the store. He walked so fast that his sister Beth had to run. “Do you have to hurry like that?” she puffed. On his way from school he had seen that baseball cap in Rogers’ store window. Only a dollar and this was the last cap! George had looked at the cap a long time. He wanted it more than anything. Every boy at school had one.

George thought of his piggy hank, into which he put every coin for running errands (差使) for his family and neighbors.

George raced home, not stopping for anything. He held the fat iron pig, opened it carefully, and poured out the coins. Ten...twenty...thirty...ninety cents. If only he had one more dime (一角硬币)!

Lost in thought, George stared out the window. “What’s wrong, George?” asked Mother George told about the money and the cap. “If you give me what you have, I’ll add a dime,” Mother said, handing him a dollar bill.

George jumped up. “Oh, thanks, Mom. That’s great!” George gave all his coins to Mother and took the dollar bill. And away went George and Beth to the store with the dollar bill in George’s pocket.

They turned the last comer. Ahead was a group of boys and girls, talking heatedly and looking down at the sidewalk.

One of the children was Ronny, a new boy who had been in this town only a short time. Ronny’s father had been sick, so there wasn’t much money for extras - like baseball cap.

“What’s the matter?” Beth asked, anxiously.

“It’s Ronny,” answered one of them. “He’s been working and finally saved up a whole dollar, and now it’s lost!”

George went over to Ronny.

“We’ll all help look. We’ll find it!”

“I was going to get that last cap in Rogers’ window. I wanted it a lot. With that cap, I could join them.” Ronny said slowly.

Suddenly George remembered how Ronny had watched the fellows playing baseball, his eyes lighting up eagerly as they shouted and ran.

George stared at the ground, thinking hard.

Forcing a smile, George showed Beth the empty pocket.

Once upon a time a daughter complained to her father that her life was miserable and that she didn’t know how she was going to make it.She was tired of fighting and struggling all the time. It seemed just as one problem was solved, another one soon followed. Her father, a chef, took her to the kitchen. He filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire.

Once the three pots began to boil, he placed potatoes in one pot, eggs in the second pot and ground coffee beans in the third pot. He then let them sit and boil, without saying a word to his daughter. The daughter complained and impatiently waited, wondering what he was doing. After twenty minutes he turned off the burners. He took the potatoes out of the pot and placed them in a bowl. He pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. He then ladled (舀) the coffee out and placed it in a cup.

Turning to her, he asked, “Daughter, what do you see?”“Potatoes, eggs and coffee,” she quickly replied.

“Look closer,” he said, “and touch the potatoes.” She did and noted that they were soft.

He then asked her to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg.

Finally, he asked her to sip the coffee. “Father, what does this mean?” she asked.

He then explained that the potatoes, the eggs and the coffee beans had each faced the same boiling water. However, they reacted differently. The potatoes were in strong and hard, but in the boiling water, they became soft and weak. The eggs were fragile (易碎的), with the thin outer shell protecting their liquid inside until they were put in the boiling water. Then the inside of the eggs became hard. However,the ground coffee beans were unique. After they were exposed to the boiling water, they changed the water and created something new.

“Which one are you?” he asked his daughter. “When the disaster knocks on your door, how do you respond?Are you a potato, an egg, or a coffee bean?”

“Father, I   want to be a coffee bean,” said the daughter,

In the end, she understands that

It was time to go home. “Remember to work on your class speeches for homework,” Miss Walker said as everyone started talking and packing their school bags. Jenny felt sick. She hated having to read aloud in class. She was sure everyone would get really bored with listening to her. Once, when Jenny was reading out her holiday diary, Lee was even looking at his watch, a silver and blue one which seemed just magical.

Jenny watched Lee walk ahead of her as they left school. He seemed so clever, and he had a certain sort of shining confidence. He was just one of those people who were good at everything. Jenny sighed. As she turned the corner, she saw Lee’s watch lying right in the middle of the path.

Jenny picked it up and wanted to return it to Lee, but she couldn’t catch up with him. When she arrived home, Jenny put it on, thinking about the magic. She was surprised that it fitted so well. She walked to the mirror and started practicing her speech. Words just flooded out of her. “I’m going to talk about swimming. I have been lucky. I’ve won lots of competitions. But when I’m in a race, I’m not really thinking about winning. I’m just loving the feeling of being in the water…” Jenny laughed with excitement. She walked across the room. She suddenly seemed to have a certain sort of confidence. Turning back to the minor, Jenny saw a flash of light from the watch in the glass. The flashes of silver seemed almost magical. So maybe Lee’s watch really did have something magical.

The next day, as the lesson began, Miss Walker ask cd who was going to be brave and go first. Nobody moved, Jenny slowly raised her arm. Before Miss Walker could say something, there was a shout “She’s stolen in y watch!” Lee said angrily. “It went missing at school yesterday.”

Everybody was fixing their eyes on Jenny, waiting for an explanation,

Miss Walker smiled and asked the class lo listen lo Jenny’s speech first.

Be a true runner

For me, it was normal to feel lost at the inter-camp track. Four camps of kids were ready to lead their teams to a blue ribbon and win the day. Not me. I was too little to be the leader and too skinny to be an athlete. I knew this by the time I was twelve, because my camp counselors（辅导员）and the other kids reminded me of it every chance they got. So when our camp needed a fourth runner in the two-mile race around the lake, I knew I was no one’s first choice.

I hid in the shade of a maple tree as they called the names of the runners, my body tensed as I heard a counselor call, “Fred! Where is Fred! He is in this race!” It was Barry. He spotted me under the tree. “Fred! We need a 12-year-old who hasn’t been in other events to run the two-mile!”

He gave me a push towards the starting line. Having no confidence and trying to save myself from the shame of taking the last place as four camps watched, I pleaded with him.

“But I don’t know the way around the lake!”

“You’re in. Just follow Bill!” Barry smiled.

Bill was my friend and the fastest runner in our camp. And then Barry said, “When you make it to the last stretch（最后一程）on the field, just throw your head back and run.”

At the starting line, I stood next to Bill and trembled.

“On your mark… Get set...” The gun cracked and sixteen of us took off. I stayed close on Bill’s heels, a little too close for Bill, I guess. He shouted at me, “Back off!”

I did. Two guys passed me, but I kept my eyes on Bill.

It was tiring. The distance was widening between Bill and me. We made the turn from the dusty road onto the muddy, wooded trail that would go around the lake back to the field. Through the trees, I saw Bill trip over a tree root and fall. A runner from another camp passed him.

In a moment, Bill was up again and running.

I didn’t know when I crossed the finish line.

My father asked me to chat with him for a while. Actually, I was unwilling to listen to his talking endlessly as he always did. My father was a lawyer, but I never wanted to go to law school or follow his path through life.

As was expected, he cleared his throat and started to say, “Er... What... What do you really want to do in the gorgeous(灿烂的) future?”

I was silent for a moment playing with the cell phone. I kept thinking, “Should I tell him my true thoughts? What if he gets angry? What if I let him down?” later I replied, “Well, I want to be a writer.”

I guessed this may be not the answer he would expect. But surprisingly, “Interesting idea!” he answered. I was shocked, speaking in a low voice with hesitation.

“Are you serious, dad?”

“Well, you need confidence and good preparations, and you still have plenty of time. You need to find out what you really enjoy now. Look, it’s late. Let’s take the boat out tomorrow morning, just you and me. Maybe we can catch some crabs (螃蟹) for dinner, and we can talk more.”

Early next morning we packed up the equipment and set off for the coast. We didn’t talk much, but enjoyed the sound of the seabirds and the sight of the coastline.

There were no big waves and blinding sunlight at that time. “Let’s see if we are lucky,” he said, picked up a web basket with a rope tied and threw it into the sea. We waited a while, then my father stood up and said, “Give me a hand with this,” and we pulled up the crab cage onto the deck.

To our joy, the cage was filled with dozens of soft shell crabs. Squatting (蹲) down, we watched them for a moment. At first they fought against each other to climb out hard, trying to escape. Many were pulled back into the cage. Later, some gave up, but there were still some crabs trying to escape again and again.