1 . Joe and Della were a new couple. They were both interested in art--one in painting, the other in music. They lived in a small flat. They loved each other and they were happy.

But one day they found that they had spent all their money. One afternoon Della told Joe that she had found a _________ and was to give her three music lessons a week. For that she could get fifteen dollars a week. But Joe was not _________ because he didn’t want to stay at home, playing with his art while Della was at work. He wanted to earn some money too.

Every day they parted in the morning and _________ in the evening.

A week _________ , Della brought home fifteen dollars, but she looked a little _________. Joe took eighteen dollars out of his pocket. They were both _________ to have so much money at hand.

The next week, Joe _________ home another eighteen dollars but Della came home with her right hand in a bandage (绷带). Joe asked Della what was the _________. Della said, “It was because of an iron-- I mean a plate of soup spilled on my _________.”

“What do you do every day, Della? Do you __________ give music lessons?” Joe asked. “Tell me the __________!”

Della cried. She told Joe that she was working in a laundry (洗衣店), __________ shirts. A girl accidentally __________ an iron on her hand and she got a __________ burn. But Della asked Joe how he had guessed that she wasn’t giving music lessons.

Joe told Della that he worked in the engine-room of the same laundry where she worked. They both let out their __________ and laughed.

2 . Twenty years ago, cable services (有线服务)were relatively expensive. When we requested our cable services be lowered to the basic package, we found the cable company had________ our service instead. After learning that we would have to pay for________, we decided to give it up altogether.

________they could no longer watch their favorite television shows, our daughter________into her bedroom, screaming about the injustice of it all. Our son looked upset while he________that the only shows he ever watched were cable-only stations.

I admit that the first week was the________. With so much time in hand, my children began________over little things. After a week of listening to my children constantly quarreling, I was almost________to re-order cable but gave up at the last minute. In the third week I was pleased to announce that no one had died of________. The children started enjoying more physical activities. We also organized________activities that requested the whole family's involvement. Besides, when I needed the children's help, I________heard, "Just a minute, Mom. I'll be there during the next________"

We found more time to talk with each other. We________the pleasure of reading, and board games had become a family affair. It truly was a________and a great way to reacquaint (重新熟悉) ourselves with one another. After all, shared activities and family affection________anything.

3 . When I was an adolescent girl, my whole family-mother, father, brother and I lived in a(n) ________ two-bedroom rowhouse. My parents often worked ________ for our well-beings, particularly at night when my brother and I fell ________. I thought it was the same thing as everybody's parents did, I found it interesting the moment I first realized that other families lived ________.

Based on American ________, what we had at the time was small. However, that never ________ me, not then, and not now.

One of my most ________ memories happened at nighttime. We piled into the car to look at the lights in the neighbourhood and then came home. At the top of our steps, there was a little table. The table was in the ________ of a triangle, which had lights ________ the sides. At night I would go and sit before it. I would ________ it on and the one little light bulb ________ it up. It looked magnificent to me.

Somehow I could feel a kind of warmth there. I could feel what it was like to be doing the best you can with what you've got. I could feel the ________ of my parents trying to do the best they could for each other and for their little ones. I could feel how ________ what they shared was-no matter how small our ________ or lack of material things, none of that mattered. What mattered is that we were all there. That created a priceless contentment of which I think even the Angels would ________ .