When I was seven, my parents gave me a doll, a doll’s house and a book. The Arabian Nights, came wrapped in red paper. I was just ready to read when my mother walked into my room．

“Isn’t your doll just beautiful?” my mother asked. I looked at the doll, with fair hair in a pink dress----I’ll have to call her “she” because I never gave her a name. I folded my lips and raised my eyebrows, not really knowing how to let my mother down easily.

“This doll is different.” My mother explained, trying to talk me into playing with it.

Thinking the doll needed love, I hugged her tightly for a long time. Useless, I said to myself. Finally, I decided to play with the doll’s house. But since rearranging the tiny furniture seemed to be the only active possible, I lost interest. I caught sight again of the third of my gifts The Arabian Nights, and I began to read it. From that moment, the book was my constant companion.

Every day I climbed our garden tree, nestled among its branches, I read the stories in The Arabian Nights to my heart’s content. My mother became concerned as she noticed I wasn’t playing with either the doll or the little house. She insisted that I take the doll up the tree with me.

Trying to read on a branch 15 feet off the ground while holding on to the silly doll was not easy. After nearly falling off twice, I tied one end of a long vine around the doll’s neck and the opposite one around the branch, letting the doll hang in mid air while I read. I always looked out for my mother, though. I sensed that my playing with the doll was of great importance to her. So every time I heard her coming, I lifted the doll up and hugged her. The smile in my mother’s eyes told me my plan worked.

The inevitable(不可避免的) happened one afternoon. Totally absorbed in the reading, I didn’t hear my mother calling me. When I looked down, I saw my mother staring at the hanging doll. Fearing the worst of scolding, I climbed down in a flash, reaching the ground just as my mother was untying the doll. To my surprise, she didn’t scold. She kept on staring at the doll．

The next day, my father came home early and suggested he and I play with the doll’s house. Soon I was bored, but my father seemed to be having so much fun, I didn’t have the heart to tell him. Quietly I slipped out, picking up my book on my way to the yard. So absorbed was he in arranging and rearranging the tiny furniture that he didn’t notice my quick exit.

Almost 20 years passed before I found out why the hanging-doll incident had been so significant for my parents. By then I was a parent myself. After recalling the incident, my mother said all those years she had been afraid whether I would turn out to be a most loving and understanding mother to my son．

My mother often thanks God aloud for making me a good parent, pointing out that with education I might have been a rich dentist instead of a poor poet. I look back on that same childhood incident, recalling my third gift, the book in red-paper, and I take advantage of the experiences that have made me who and what I am. Sometimes I pause to wonder at life’s wonderful ironies （讽刺）.

1.Why didn’t the author give the doll a name?

A. Because the gift was given by her parents.

B. Because the girl didn’t care much for the doll.

C. Because her parents would give the doll a name.

D. Because the doll had little in common with her.

2.The author’s account of a childhood incident shows that, as a young girl, she viewed her parents as people who         .

A. hoped to shape their children’s future  

B. were unconcerned about their behavior

C. ruined their children’s dreams completely

D. might withdraw their love at any moment

3. What can we infer from the last paragraph?

A. The mother is now satisfied with her daughter’s career.

B. The daughter now regrets what she did when she was a girl.

C. The mother thinks the daughter’s achievements are unsatisfactory.

D. The daughter wishes that she had been allowed more freedom as a child.

Jerry stood up and looked at the crowd of people making their way through the station. He looked for the girl whose heart he knew, but whose face he    36  , the girl with the    37  . The story had begun twelve months before in a    38  . Taking a book off the shelf he found himself    39   by the notes penciled in the margin. The soft handwriting    40   a thoughtful soul and an insightful mind. In the front of the book, he discovered the    41   owner’s name, Rosanna.

During the next year the two grew to know each other through the    42   . Each letter was a seed falling on a fertile heart. The day finally came for their first    43   - 7:00 PM at the station.

A beautiful young woman was coming toward me, her    44  tall and slim. I started to walk toward her with delight, entirely forgetting to    45   that she was not wearing a rose. I    46  made one step closer to her, and then I saw Rosanna, a short and fat woman well past 40, was standing almost directly    47   the girl. The girl in the green suit was walking quickly away.

I felt   48   I was split in two, and there she stood. My fingers gripped the worn leather copy of the    49   that was to identify me to her. I knew this would not be     50  , something perhaps even better than love. I felt choked by the bitterness of my     51  . “I’m Jerry, and you must be Rosanna. I am so glad you could meet me; may I take you to    52  ?”

The woman’s face broadened into a big smile. “I don't know what this is about, son,” she answered,” but the young lady in the green suit who just    53   begged me to wear this rose on my coat. And she said    54  you were to ask me out to dinner, I should go and tell you that she is waiting for you in the big   55 across the street. She said it was some kind of test!”

1.                A．hadn’t        B．wouldn’t       C．couldn’t D．didn't

2.                A．rose           B．flower          C．book D．notes

3.                A．restaurant      B．meeting room    C．library    D．station

4.                A．absorbed       B．surrounded      C．interested D．burdened

5.                A．reacted        B．reflected        C．responded    D．repeated

6.                A．previous        B．nice           C．thoughtful D．beautiful

7.                A．phone         B．telegram        C．book D．e-mail

8.                A．dining          B．meeting        C．walking   D．talking

9.                A．legs           B．face           C．figure    D．hair

10.               A．observe        B．conclude       C．notice     D．say

11.               A．carefully        B．eagerly         C．luckily D．easily

12.               A．behind         B．past           C．over  D．before

13.               A．as long as       B．even though     C．no matter how  D．as though

14.               A．newspaper      B．book           C．magazine  D．note

15.               A．a meeting       B．happiness       C．love D．a dinner

16.               A．relief          B．sorrow         C．disappointment D．unwillingness

17.               A．a walk          B．your home      C．a party    D．dinner

18.               A．went by        B．called me       C．came here D．dropped in

19.               A．when          B．supposing       C．unless D．since

20.               A．market         B．restaurant       C．building   D．library

Jerry stood up and looked at the crowd of people making their way through the station. He looked for the girl whose heart he knew, but whose face he    36  , the girl with the    37  . The story had begun twelve months before in a    38  . Taking a book off the shelf he found himself    39   by the notes penciled in the margin. The soft handwriting    40   a thoughtful soul and an insightful mind. In the front of the book, he discovered the    41   owner’s name, Rosanna.
During the next year the two grew to know each other through the    42   . Each letter was a seed falling on a fertile heart. The day finally came for their first    43   - 7:00 PM at the station.
A beautiful young woman was coming toward me, her    44  tall and slim. I started to walk toward her with delight, entirely forgetting to    45   that she was not wearing a rose. I    46  made one step closer to her, and then I saw Rosanna, a short and fat woman well past 40, was standing almost directly    47   the girl. The girl in the green suit was walking quickly away.
I felt   48   I was split in two, and there she stood. My fingers gripped the worn leather copy of the    49   that was to identify me to her. I knew this would not be     50  , something perhaps even better than love. I felt choked by the bitterness of my     51  . “I’m Jerry, and you must be Rosanna. I am so glad you could meet me; may I take you to    52  ?”
The woman’s face broadened into a big smile. “I don't know what this is about, son,” she answered,” but the young lady in the green suit who just    53   begged me to wear this rose on my coat. And she said    54  you were to ask me out to dinner, I should go and tell you that she is waiting for you in the big   55 across the street. She said it was some kind of test!”