There was a small boy living on a farm which seemed so far away from everywhere. He was1 to get up before sunrise every morning to start his work and to go out again later to work in the evening.

    During sunrise he would take a 2and climb up on a fence, so in the distance he could see a house with golden3. He thought how4it would be to live there and began to5the modern equipment that might be6in the house. He thought, “If that is a house with golden windows, then there7be other nice things in the house.”8, he promised himself, “Some day I will go there and see this wonderful place9.”

    Then one morning his father told him to stay at home as his father would do the work. Knowing that was his10, he packed a sandwich and11across the field towards the house with golden windows.

    12 the afternoon going on, he began to realize how he had misjudged the distance.13, something else was wrong. As he came14to the house, he saw15golden windows but a place16by a broken fence which badly needed17. He went to the door and knocked. A small girl opened the door.

    He asked the girl if she had seen a house with golden windows. “18,” said the girl and invited him to sit on the porch (门廊). As he sat there, he looked19. There the20turned the windows of his home golden.

    When my wife and I decided to open our bookstore in 2012, we were a little 1.

    The challenges facing small bookstores were—and remain— 2. Aside from the obvious 3 in online selling, the increase in the popularity of e-books has had a（n）4 effect on independent providers.

    The question is why a new, small-scale（小规模的）provider would 5 enter such a（n）6 market?

    From a personal view, our reasoning was sound: we wanted to 7 our love of great books and reading for pleasure with as many 8 people as possible.

    Having done our homework, one thing became 9. In order for us to succeed, we would have to offer something that none of our larger competitors already provided.

    And so we 10 the Willoughby Book Club. We set up our website in the summer of 2012—and we haven't looked back.

    The idea of 11 is simple. We offer a range of book subscription gift packages, 12 in three-, six- and 12-month options. Our customers 13 a package, tell us a little about the person they're buying it for, and we use this information to 14 the（接收者）a hand-picked, gift-wrapped（包装的）book once a month.

    We also recently decided to 15 one new book to Book Aid International for every gift subscription sold. These books are sent out to sub-Saharan Africa, 16 the educational work there.

    Within four months of starting out, we won the Young Bookseller of the Year award at the 2013 Bookseller awards.

    Our brief 17 from new booksellers to award receivers has been challenging and 18. The biggest thing we've learned is that, despite the 19 facing independent providers, there is a 20 for then in the UK market. It's just a question of finding it.

    My l4-year-old son, John, and I spotted the coat which was hanging at a secondhand clothing store in Northampton Mass. While the other coats drooped (低垂), this one looked as if it were 1 . The coat had beautiful tailoring, a Fifth Avenue label and a(an) 2 price of $28, which was popular just then with 3 , but could cost several hundred dollars new. This coat was even better, bearing (具 有) that 4 of classic elegance. John tried it on and the fit was perfect.

    John5the coat to school the next day and came home wearing a big smile “Did the kids like your coat?” I asked. “They loved it,” he said, 6folding it over the back of a chair and smoothing it flat. Over the next few weeks, a 7 came over John. Agreement replaced contrariness (作对) and reasoned discussion replaced fierce 8 . He became more mannerly and9 , eager to please. He would generously lend his younger sister his tapes and lecture her10 her behavior.

    When I mentioned this incident to his teacher and11what caused the changes, she said laughing. “It12be his coat!” Another teacher told him she was giving him a good 13 not only because he had earned 14 but because she liked his coat. At the library, we ran into a friend. “Could this be John?” he asked surprisingly, 15 John's new height, assessing(评估) the cut of his coat and extending his hand, one gentleman to another.

    John and I both know we should never 16a person's clothes for the real person within them. 17there is something to be said for wearing a standard of excellence for the world to see and for 18what is on the inside to what is on the outside.

    For John it is a time when it is as easy to try on different approaches to 19as it is to try on a coat. The whole world, the whole future is stretched out ahead, a vast landscape 20 all the doors are open. And he could picture himself walking through those doors wearing his wonderful, magical coat.

    John's parents acquired the washer when he was a small boy. It happened during World War Ⅱ. His family never 1 a washing machine and, since gasoline was expensive, they could not 2 trips to the laundry several miles away. Keeping clothes 3 became a problem for young John's household.

    A family friend joined the army, and his wife 4 to go with him. John's family 5 to store their furniture while they were away. To the family's 6, the friend suggested they use their Bendix. So this is how they 7 the washer.

    Young John helped with the washing, and across the years he 8 a love for the old, green Bendix. But 9 the war ended. When the friends came to take it back, John grew terribly 10. His mother 11 him and said. "You must remember, that machine 12 belonged to us in the first place. That we ever got to use it at all was a gift. So, instead of being mad at it being taken 13, let's use this 14 to be grateful that we had it at all."

    The lesson turned out 15. Years later, John watched his eight-year-old daughter die a slow and painful death of leukemia (白血病). Though he 16 for months with her death, John could not begin getting over from the 17 until he remembered the old Bendix.

    His daughter was a 18. When he realized the simple fact, everything changed. He could now begin recovering from the death of his daughter. He started to see her as a marvelous gift that he was fortunate enough to 19 for a time. He felt 20. He found strength and recovery. He knew he could get through the valley of loss.

The famous composer, Rob Stewart, didn't have a good start in this career. However, he achieved a great deal of success as a result of a1. Stewart's parents died when he was eight and he went to live with his2. As a little boy, he fell in love with music and3himself about it by reading through the family collection that his mother kept,4which there were a lot of related books.

Three years later, Stewart's grandfather died, and his mother's sister decided to5him. Her husband was a kind man and6for young Stewart's music lessons. One summer vacation at a Belgian seaside added a second7to his life——the sea. Then he studied to be a naval cadet, but still took time to study8.

In the French Navy, he and two friends found time to9a band, playing the works of Beethoven and other10. Stewart also began composing. On Christmas Day 1892, he had his first chance to11as a composer, which turned out to be a success.

That success12Stewart to write a wedding march, and one of his navy friends13to show it to the famous conductor, Edouard Colonne. When Stewart's friend14with the manuscript, he reported that Colonne had advised Stewart to15his naval career and devote his life to music.

Not long16he was 25, Stewart decided to17Edouard Colonne's advice. He gave his heart and soul to his composing and18a major force in the twentieth century's French music. Because of Edouard Colonne's inspiring19, Stewart devoted his life to music, but Stewart's20friend later admitted that he had made it up. He said he had never ever shown Stewart's manuscript to the famous conductor.

When I first heard about the improv(即兴表演) classes, I was torn. As an introvert, I feared getting on stage and improvising in front of strangers. However, I knew I wanted to work as a science communicator after finishing my Ph.D. , so it seemed like the perfect opportunity to improve my speaking ability and gain confidence thinking on my feet.

During our first class, we learned a core concept of improv: "yes, and." It means that, as improvisers, we accept what fellow performers say. If someone says that rhinos(犀牛) are librarians, for example, then rhinos are librarians. We do not question the logic; we say "yes" and continue with the scene as if no him is wrong.

I got a taste of how difficult that was when acting out my first scene. My classmate turned to me and said, "Mom is going to be so mad." Mad about what? My mind spun out ideas, and my inner critic shot them all down. We broke the car? No, that's too easy. We failed a test? No, you don't want your classmates thinking you're stupid on the first day. I finally landed on an answer: "Yes, we're going to be late for dinner." The scene proceeded from there, and we eventually finished as two sisters who lost their way on a hiking trail.

The first few scenes were hard, but as weeks turned into months, I became more comfortable thinking on my feet and even started to enjoy our classes. I never silenced my inner critic entirely, but over time, I didn't police my words with quite so much effort. I also became better at listening, relating to my conversation partners, and communicating clearly in the moment.

That training proved useful 6 months ago, when my experiments generated unreasonable data. Early on in graduate school, I would get stuck when this happened; my inner critic would assume I had made a mistake. But then, after embracing the "yes, and" concept, instead of getting discouraged, I kept exploring the data and ended up identifying a new type of cell—one that wasn't behaving as expected. If I hadn't accepted the possibility that the results were real, I would have missed out on the most exciting finding of my Ph.D. so far.

All scientists can benefit from this lesson. If the data say rhinos are librarians, then it's worth investigating whether rhinos are, in fact, librarians. Our job as scientists isn't to generate data that support a preconceived(预想的) story. Our job is to say "yes, and."