阅读理解

　　When I was growing up, I had an old neighbor, Dr．Gibbs．He didn’t look like any doctor I’d ever known．He never invited us to play in his yard, but he was a very kind person．

　　When Dr．Gibbs wasn’t saving lives, he was planting trees．He owned a large field and wanted to make it a forest．

　　The good doctor had some interesting ideas about planting trees．He never watered his new trees．Once I asked why．He said that watering plants spoiled them, and that if you watered them, each baby tree would grow weaker and weaker, so you had to make things difficult for them and pick out the weaker trees early on．

　　He talked about how watering trees made for shallow(浅的)roots, and how trees that weren’t watered had to grow deep roots in search of water under the earth by themselves．Deep roots were very important．

　　So he never watered his trees．He’d planted an oak and, instead of watering it every morning, he’d beat it with a rolled-up newspaper．I asked him why he did that, and he said it was to get the tree’s attention．

　　Dr．Gibbs died several years after I left home．Every now and then, I walked by his house and looked at the trees that I watched him plant about twenty-five years ago．They’re very big and strong now．

　　I planted some trees a few years back and carried water to them for a whole summer．After two years of caring too much, whenever a cold win blows in, they shake a lot．

　　Every night before I go to bed, I check on my two sons．Mostly I pray(祈祷)that their lives will be easy．But lately I’ve been thinking that it’s time to change my prayer．I know my children are going to face difficulties．There’s always a cold wind blowing somewhere, so what we need to do is to pray for roots that reach deep into the brave heart, so when the rains fall and the winds blow, we could face it strongly and won’t be beaten down．

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