Nothing stays the same for long. Things and people change, often for the ___________, it seems, but once in a ___________, very much for the better. I grew up on a small farm, living a life that I took for granted. I had a dog and mountains in whichever_______ I looked, and I awoke to the call of birds in the alfalfa (苜蓿) fields. My father worked in the city as a worker. He was quiet and _________. He was not _________educated, but he was smart, with an engineer’s way of looking at problems. He was a man made of leather and chewing tobacco who tried to teach my brother and me useful things, including respect. He also had a _______. I did not like him very much.
One day I came home from school and his car was already there. Once inside, I was told by my mother that he didn’t feel well. His back hurt. My father never missed work; in fact, when he came home, he went to work even more. I remember looking secretly around the corner at him as he _________ on his bed in the middle of the day. I was in _______ school. Multiple myeloma, I learned, is a type of blood cancer. It starts in the_______ that normally make antibodies for the body to use in its immune response against __________. When those cells become ill, they make abnormal antibodies like crazy, ____________ out the useful ones. As the cancer grows, the person who has it__________. The disease weakens the body’s energy, and the abnormal antibodies cause problems for other cells and__________. Over time, bones __________ look like Swiss cheese, and when they break, they may never__________.
For the last year of my father’s life, his entire day consisted of rising from his hospital bed in the living room and walking to his chair to sit and think. He was __________ in that chair when I came home one day during the fifth grade. I do not remember where my mother and brother were, but the two of us were__________. He asked me to sit down. What followed still moves me these ____________ later. He told me about his life, his family growing up, what it was like in the Pacific during World War II, his loves, his heartbreaks. It was as if a pipe had__________, his inner self rushing out to me in a great flood. He had been speaking for maybe an hour or more when I realized that he was doing more than telling. He was asking to be forgiven. All it took was understanding that that was what he needed, and I__________ everything, immediately.
1.A.wealthier B.worse C.healthier D.familiar
2.A.while B.hour C.day D.week
3.A.time B.village C.valley D.direction
4.A.warm B.noisy C.distant D.considerate
5.A.lowly B.less C.more D.highly
6.A.smile B.weakness C.temper D.friend
7.A.launched B.lay C.laid D.landed
8.A.elementary B.middle C.high D.university
9.A.carriers B.chests C.currents D.cells
10.A.invitations B.investigation C.infections D.inference
11.A.compromising B.crowding C.circulating D.clarifying
12.A.substitutes B.sneezes C.sacrifices D.shrinks
13.A.talents B.tensions C.tissues D.tunnels
14.A.fortunately B.eventually C.ambiguously D.considerately
15.A.heal B.hurt C.hesitate D.handle
16.A.predictably B.psychologically C.primitively D.potentially
17.A.alone B.abnormal C.absent D.absurd
18.A.distances B.decades C.disciplines D.dilemmas
19.A.bounced B.boarded C.burst D.bound
20.A.forget B.finance C.function D.forgave
—You know how much I am missing the days before the outbreak of the coronavirus.
—School, movies, gatherings, ________. We’ll soon be back on track.
A.no kidding B.come on C.you name it D.go for it
Doctors are fighting a________battle to save the little girl’s life.
A.modest B.flexible C.compulsory D.desperate
He would have been willing to accompany me________him how important it was to me.
A.if I have told B.had I told C.should I tell D.if I could tell
To win the trust of the employees, your factory should see to________that accounts and operations are as transparent as possible.
A.it B.them C.you D.one
—Guess what? Zark____________a company with his partner.
—Gosh! It’s no more than two years since he studied in the university.
A.operated B.is operating C.has operated D.had been operating
