Mr. and Mrs. Brown were teachers. They lived in a big 1.Last year they went to the countryside for their summer vacation. They 2 it very much because it was a quite clean place.

    One day they went for a 3 in the morning and saw an old man. He sat in the 4 sun in front of his house. Mr.Brown went to him and asked, “Do you like 5 in this quiet place?”

    The old man answered, “Yes, I 6.”

    Mr. Brown asked, “What are the 7 things about it?”

    The old man answered “Well, 8 here knows each other(互相) well. They often come to see me, and I often go to visit 9, too. Also, there are lots of children here.”

    Mr. Brown said, “That's interesting. Well, 10 are the bad things?”

    The old man thought for a short time and said, “Well, the same things.”

    A bird went to look for its happiness in a faraway place. It flew and flew when it suddenly saw a little dying (垂死的) flower, whose face was full of smile. Not knowing why, the bird asked the little flower, "You're going to die. Why are you still so1?" "Because I will achieve (实现) my dream," said the little flower. "2 is your dream?" "To produce (产出) sweet fruit. "Then the little bird saw it Happiness is a3 in the heart.

    The bird continued flying and saw a lame (瘸的) duck help a little duck find the way back home.4 it was disabled, it had a smiling face. "I'm happy because I can help5 ,"said the lame duck. So the bird saw it: happiness is a love in the heart.

    The bird kept flying and suddenly saw a spider climbing up a wall. The spider fell of the wall halfway, 6 it kept climbing again and fell off again. Even So, the spider didn't7. The little bird asked the spider in surprise, "you8 again and again, why don't you have pain (痛苦) but happiness on your face?" "As long as I keep making my efforts (努力)，I'm able to climb up it.9 this, I'm so happy," said the spider. The little bird saw it: happiness is a faith (信念) in the heart.

    So the little bird10 looked for happiness because it had seen the truth: happiness is not in the faraway place but in your own heart.

Holidays are not necessarily for fun or rest. Doing something meaningful can also get special pleasure. When the final bell rang, the 1 were reminded that there was no school on Monday —Labor Day.

Kayla was excited about the news. She loved breaks. She wanted to go out to play with her friends. When the school bus 2 Kayla off, she ran into the house and told her mother happily,"Mom, I am excited about no school on Monday."

Kayla slept in the next morning. Saturday was her 3 day of the week. She could enjoy playing video games all day. On Sunday, her friends came 4 and they played basketball for several hours.

Then it was Labor Day — the extra(额外的) day off that Kayla was looking forward to. But her dad 5 Kayla early that morning. He told Kayla that in honor of Labor Day, the family would be cleaning both inside and outside the house. Kayla couldn't believe it. As Kayla wiped (擦) her eyes, she began to wonder if this was just a bad 6 .

When she sat down at the kitchen table, Kayla asked her parents, "Are you 7 about working today? Isn't Labor Day a holiday?"

"Yes, Kayla. It is,"replied her dad,"but your mom and I thought working hard today would make 8 know why Labor Day was celebrated in the first place."

At first, she was against the plan from the bottom of her heart, but she had no 9 . First, Kayla was arranged(安排) to wash the breakfast dishes. After that, she was asked to give their dog a bath. It was a hard 10 and needed a lot of tiring, careful and patient work. So she slowly got down to the work with great unwillingness(不情愿).

11 things began to change as she was doing. 12 the dog, she found it was a lot of fun with so many soap bubbles (气泡). In no time, she got the work done with great 13 .

When they finished all the work, Kayla enjoyed 14 in her tree house, drinking the lemonade. "Does Labor Day make the lemonade taste even more 15 ?"Kayla thought. What a meaningful day it was!

It was a cold afternoon. I was training（训练） a football team for first graders. It was the day of our first practice. I seated the kids on a long bench on the grass. Any time I was training a new team, I spent a few minutes getting them to 1 one another, each kid saying his name and the names of all the kids sitting to the left of him.

A few minutes later, I decided to choose Alex to start at the end of the bench, go up to each kid, say that kid's 2 and then shake his right hand.

Alex was doing well and he went down the row（一排）—Dylan, Micah, David and Beau—until he reached Ben. He said Ben's name and reached out his right hand, but Ben just 3 there with his right hand 4 in his jacket. "Ben, why don't you let Alex shake your hand?" I asked. Ben stood up and said, "But I don't have that 5 ." He pulled his jacket away from his right shoulder. Ben's arm ran from his right shoulder but his arm 6 at the elbow（胳膊肘）. No forearm, no hand, no fingers! I got shocked（震惊） and could think of 7 to say, but the little kids were curious（好奇的）.

"What happened to your arm?" Alex asked. "Does it hurt?"

Ben took off his jacket to 8 the kids what they all wanted to see. He explained（解释） to them that he had always been that 9 and that there was nothing special. What he meant was that he wanted to be treated（被对待） like everybody else.

And he was. From that day on, he was 10 Ben, one of the players on the team.