I will never forget the very moment that caused me to leave my gift behind because I wanted the gift that my older sister Maria had.
My family was spending a week at the beach. One morning, Maria went to the beach early, but I stayed behind to finish a drawing of a seashell. After finishing the drawing, I walked to join Maria. She was a top gymnast (体操运动员). Her show was perfect as she wheeled along the beach. The beauty of that sight froze me, and I decided immediately that I too would become a gymnast like her.
I knew that I had never been very good at sports. However, when I told my parents I wanted to take a gymnastics class, they agreed with me in surprise. The next week, I went to a beginners’ class.
If only my parents had talked me out of this misguided plan! Five minutes into the first class, it was clear that I didn’t have the gift of a gymnast. But I kept at it.
During this time, drawing and painting—which had been my two favorites—all but left my mind. It must have been hurting for my family as they watched my hopeless efforts. I blindly decided to be like Maria. I just would not give up.
At the same time, on the advice of Ms. White, my art teacher, I hurriedly handed in my seashell drawing for an art contest in our town. One night as I was having a hard time practicing, the phone rang. It was Ms. White. “Alice, you won the contest!” she said loudly.
“Really?” was all I could reply.
“Yes,” Ms. White said. “They’re going to give you a prize. And that’s not all. The winner is also accepted into Wildale’s Summer Fine Arts Institute.” I couldn’t believe what I heard. Only a handful of young artists were accepted each summer.
That night I didn’t go back into the living room to continue practicing. Gymnastics was Maria’s gift, not mine. It had taken me a while, but I realized that I had a gift of my own.
【小题1】Alice wanted to be a gymnast because ________.

I was 15 months old, a happy and carefree kid, until the day I fell. It was a bad fall. I ____ on a piece of glass that cut my eye badly. From then on, my ugly, sightless, cloudy grey eye lived on ____ me.

    Sometimes people asked me embarrassing (使人难堪的) questions. Whenever the kids played ____, I was the "monster". I was always imagining that everyone looked down on me.

    Yet mum would say to me, "Hold your head up high and face the world." I began to depend on that ____.

    As a child, I thought mum meant, "Be careful, or you will fall down or run into something ____ because you are not looking." As a teenager, I usually looked down to ____ my shame. But I found that when I held my head up high, people liked me.

    In high school I even became the ____, but on the inside I still felt like a monster. All I really wanted was to look like everyone else. When things got really bad, I would ____ to my mum and she would look at me with loving eyes and say, “Hold your head up high and face the world. Let them see the beauty that is ____ instead of your appearance (外貌).”

    My mum's love was the ____ that made me bright. I had faced hard times, and learned not only to be ____ but also to have deep compassion (同情) for others.

    “Hold your head up high” has been heard many times in my home. I tell ____ to my children. The gift my mum gave me will live on.  286

1.A. stood                   B. landed                     C. found                      D. worked

2.A. for                       B. like                           C. by                   D. with

3.A. games                           B. jokes                        C. toys                          D. sports

4.A. glass                     B. topic                        C. reply                        D. saying

5.A. immediately                 B. accidentally            C.continuously  D. expectedly

6.A. show                    B. meet                        C. behave                    D. hide

7.A. president            B. teacher                   C. teenager                 D. adult

8.A. write                    B. add                          C. cry                           D. face

9.A. beside                           B. outside          C. inside                      D. alongside

10.A. suggestion                 B. experience            C. sunshine                 D. introduction

11.A. confident                   B. unusual                   C. similar                     D. ordinary

12.A. it                                  B. them                        C. that                          D. those

My parents had some strange rules when my sister and I were growing up. For example, they never    1   us soda or juice. Our choice was water or iced tea   2   no sugar. My mom’s   3   for it was that she didn’t like kids who only drank sweet drinks, or worse, kids who did not like    4  ! She wanted to teach us to like water or    5   unsweetened drinks that did not come in a bottle. We, on the other hand, wanted to    6   a coke when we ate out. Now I can make my own decisions, but I    7  choose juice or soda. I don’t __ 8___ it. It’s not because I don’t like it. I’m just used to drinking water. Many people    9  to think that a kid needs juice. If the child can’t get it, he or she will secretly buy this kind of drink elsewhere. I found this really    10  , since I was raised    11   no juice or soda, and I didn’t really    12   only having water. Now people    13   kids to make their own choices,    14   I grew up in a family where the children’s opinions were seldom (很少) 15   for, and the parents made the final decisions.

1.                A．needed        B．sold            C．bought   D．left

2.                A．with           B．of             C．off  D．without

3.                A．decision        B．reason         C．hobby    D．experience

4.                A．soda           B．juice           C．water    D．milk

5.                A．another        B．the other        C．others    D．other

6.                A．order          B．reply           C．obey     D．achieve

7.                A．ever           B．never          C．always    D．sometimes

8.                A．think about      B．take care        C．pay for   D．think out

9.                A．like            B．seem           C．study D．get

10.               A．excited         B．difficult         C．interesting D．necessary

11.               A．on            B．with           C．by   D．for

12.               A．give up         B．care about      C．take pride in    D．agree with

13.               A．allow          B．design          C．teach     D．cause

14.               A．as             B．since          C．but   D．though

15.               A．added         B．asked          C．influenced D．regarded

The lady with the white fence（篱笆）taught me to leave the gale to life open.. .
My husband died in an accident and I became very angry. I hated being alone. One day, as I was   43   down a busy street, I suddenly noticed a new fence around a house. I pulled off to really watch it. It was such a good   44   that I was deeply touched. I could not send   45 away. The fence still smelled of fresh paint.
“Hello!" I came up and said to a lady in the back garden, “I came to see the fence. It's so beautiful!"
“Oh! The fence is not there for me," the lady explained to me in a calm voice, “I live alone. _ 46_so many people pass by every day, and I think they may be pleased to see something really attractive.     47   stop like you and come up to have a chat. "
"But weren't you sad when they expanded (拓宽) the road and everything changed so much?"
"Change is part of life and takes part in    48   us who we are. When something we do not
like happens to us, we have two choices—to become a    49   person or to become a better person."
Her reply changed my life. I carefully left the gate open and drove on   50   a new feeling inside me. I could not tell  51  it was, but I could feel the thick stone wall around my angry heart breaking off. And  52   a pretty white fence was built. I decided that I would keep the gate open for everything and everyone that came my way.