Do you often feel lonely? What do you do when you feel that way? Hide yourself away and spend your time reading, watching TV or walking around?

You might think that feeling lonely is just like feeling happy, sad or scared — that it's just one of your various moods. That is true. However, if you let yourself be lonely for too long without dealing with it, you could be making a serious mistake.

    Doctors have known for some time that feeling lonely is bad for the mind. It can lead to mental health problems such as depression, stress and reduce confidence. “Being lonely means not feeling connected or cared for, but it's not about being mentally alone,” Lisa Jaremka, scientist from Ohio State University, US, told Live Science in January. And there's growing evidence that not having friends is connected with physical illness as well.

    In 2006, for example, scientists studied 2,800 women who had cancer. They found that those who had few friends or family were five times more likely to die of their disease than women with many social contacts. Also, even healthy people had a better chance of falling ill if they felt left out by others, according to the BBC.

    The results have scientists thinking that loneliness might hurt the immune system(免疫系统), which protects the body from diseases.

    Hoping to prove this theory, Jaremka and her research team put volunteers(志愿者) through a stress test. During the test, volunteers were asked to make an unprepared speech in front of a group of stony-faced people. The researchers found that volunteers who said they were lonely in their daily lives felt more stress during the test. And their blood samples showed that all the stress had managed to cause harmful changes to their immune system.

     “Loneliness has been thought of in many ways as a chronic stressor(慢性增压器) — a socially painful situation that can last for quite a long time, ” explained Jaremka, who led the study.

    The number of people suffering from loneliness is increasing all over the world. However, solving the problem is easier said than done. It won't work to just “tell anyone to go out and find someone to love you”, said Jaremka. “We need to create support networks.”

    Kumiko And The Dragon

    Author: Briony Stewart

    Price: $16.95

    Kumiko is a little girl, who likes to listen to her obasaan's stories before going to bed. But she hates sleeping alone at night. She often begs to sleep with her mother but her mother won't hew(坚持)of it. Each day, bedtime is hard for little Kumiko as she walks upstairs with heavy steps and her frightened heart beats wildly.

    Roti Rolled Away

    Author: Anti Utarid   Price: S9. 10

    It takes place in India. Asha of about nine visits her Nard(grandmother)on top of a hill Her Nani has just made hot fresh Rotis and the Roti is given to Asha to eat. However, the Rot escapes Nannis hands and begins to roll out into the great big hills.

    The Alchemist

    Author: Paulo Coeho   Price: $8.83

    This book is about a Spaniard shepherd boy. Santiago has a dream about hidden treasure at the Egyptian Pyramids.

    The Cay

    Author: Theodore Taylor    Price:UK 5.9 pounds

    Set during the Second World War. The Cay is about the adventures of Philip who set off from the island of Curacao off the Venezuelan coast, with his mother, bound for Virginia. First published in 1969, this book has won eleven literary award and has been translated into fifteen.

    On the day the tornado hit, there was no indication severe weather was on its way—the sky was blue and the sun had been out. The first alert my husband, Jimmy, 67, and I, 65, got came around 9 p.m., from some scrolling text on the TV Jimmy was watching. He ran upstairs to find me in our third-floor bedroom, and we changed the channel from the presidential primary debate I had been watching to our local Pensacola, Florida, station.

    No sooner had we found coverage of the tornado than it was on top of us. Suddenly, the bones of the house shook, the power went out, and the wind began to roar through blown-out windows. We had three flights of steps to navigate to the relative safety of the first floor, where a closet fixed underneath a brick staircase might be the firmest place to wait things out. Everything around rattling, we struggled forward, uncertain whether we would make it.

    As we reached the last flight of steps, our front door blew out. Shards of glass flew everywhere. A three-foot-long tree branch whipped, missing us by inches.

    By the time I reached the closet, the tornado had been over us for about a minute. Jimmy pushed me down to the closet floor, but the wind kept him outside. I grasped his arm as the tornado constantly sucked the door open and tried to bring him with it. My knees and scalp were full of glass, but I felt no pain. If I had let go, Jimmy would have flown right out the back of the house and into the bay. Then everything stopped. In those first quiet moments, I couldn't believe it was over.

    The storm lasted four minutes. Four of the twelve town houses in our unit were completely destroyed. Of the houses left standing, ours suffered the most damage. Amazingly, none of us were severely injured.

    I live in the center of the city and there is a largeparking lot full of parking spots nearby. Rain is a rare occurrence in LA,so cars easilycollect pollutants and dust. Together with my friends,I decided it shouldbe a kind gesture to surprise the owners with a car wash.So we bought carwashing supplies and brought out all the bath towels we could find.With all the suppliesin hand, wewere able to convince another roommate to help out as well and we beganwatering down the cars.

    Every once in a while, someone would come by and asked usseemingly stupid men, "Who told you to wash the cars?" or, even better, "who paid you to wash their cars?" Weexplained we just wanted to do something kind. But our response was often me with aneven more confused look.

    As the afternoon went on, some other friends that came byunderstood our goal of the spontaneous event and started helping out with someof the duties. Firstone friend then two, and by the time we had cleaned the entire lot,we had an entire carwashing crew with independent individually assigned tasks and duties.

    I wasn't cleaning cars to be able to afford a new phone.I was cleaning carssimply because I wanted to offer the car owners kindness.There was noequipment to weigh our value created. We couldn't measure our success indollars earned over the time spent washing cars when we could have been earningtwice as much at work.

    I now realize, first hand, that there is a special energy createdwhen you choose to think bigger than yourself and act in service of others andmaybe, likeme, you'llfind it's actually the greatest gift you' you'll ever get.

    When my family moved to the United States from Colombia, I was 9 years old and knew little about English. As time passed, teachers finally knew all of their students and slowly everyone began to head inside, except for me. No one called out my name, and no one seemed to know I existed. I spent the next month in my new classroom quietly. I felt a wave of fear, loneliness and sadness came over me.

    It turned out the school administration never cared that I didn't speak English, but something else was teaching me English. Every morning when my aunt drove me to school and picked me up, she always had 106.7 Light FM on. It was this station that introduced my young ears to the English sounds of R&B, soul, jazz and much more.

Because of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, I learned the difference between "witch" and "which". While watching the TV show South Park, I was attracted by the funny characters. I related "You bastards!” to anger and saved it in my mental word bank. In fact, thanks to pop culture, the world of English became not so hard to me while it was being turned down at school.

    I also learned how to express my emotions thanks to pop culture. One day at school, we were taking a math quiz and the whole class was quiet. Suddenly, the tip of my pencil broke and I yelled, “You bastards!" Everyone held their breath in surprise and I laughed to myself because something at that moment told me I had just learned my first bad word in English.

    Four months passed before the school placed me into an ESL program. By this time, I was speaking broken English and making myself understood. Finally, I learned how to speak and write English at a more advanced level, and I owe it all to pop culture.

Volunteer Chances for Teens

    About Learning Buddies

    Learning Buddies is an education program for K-5 students at the Beacon Hill, Columbia, Douglass-Truth, New Holly and West Seattle Library branches (分馆). Teen volunteers and kids read together, learn math and play educational games with support from librarians.

    If you are a high school student who enjoys math, reading and helping kids succeed in school, please consider volunteering as a Learning Buddy. You will get service learning experience and earn(获得) community service hours for school.

Learning Buddies teaches kids once a week. Volunteer chances are offered at the following Library branches, October through December and March through May.

    Beacon Hill Branch: Tuesday, 4:15 p.m. to 5:45 p.m.

    Columbia Branch: Thursday, 4:15p.m. to 5:45 p.m

    Douglass-Truth Branch: Tuesday, 4:15 p.m.to 5:45 p.m.

    New-Holly Branch: Tuesday, 4:15 p.m. to 5:45 p.m.

    West Seattle Branch: Tuesday, 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.

    Become a Learning Buddy

    High school students must be at least 14 years old and live close to a Library branch that offers the Learning Buddies program.

    You can ask for a volunteer application (申请书) and attend an interview at one of the following Library branches at least one month before the fall or spring Learning Buddies series.

    Beacon Hill Branch: call the Teen Services Librarian at 206-684-4711.

    Columbia Branch: call the Teen Services Librarian at 206-386- 1908.

    Douglass-Truth Branch: call Services Librarian at 206-684-4704.

    New-Holly Branch: call the Supervising Librarian at 206-386- 1905.

    West Seattle Branch: call the Teen Services Librarian at 206-684-7444.