"Can I take your order?" Night after night, I had to say this as I worked in my family's restaurant. My father was a fantastic cook. He wanted me, his only son, to cook with him, but I didn't like cooking. Because of the restaurant, my father was always busy. He never had time to play football with me.

    During my high school and college years, I worked with my family at night. But I always avoided the kitchen. I couldn't wait to graduate (毕业)so that I could move away from the family business. Several days before my graduation day, my father and I started looking at new cars. Finally, we found the right car. I was sure that my father would give it to me as my graduation gift.

    On my graduation day, my father gave me a book as a gift. It was his old cookbook. I was so angry that I gave it back to him and ran out of the house. Several days later I moved away and started my business. Although I often saw my father during holidays, we never talked about the graduation gift. Then one day, I got a call that my father was ill. I went to see him because I was very worried.

    That night, I looked through my father's books and saw the cookbook that he had given me year before. I carefully opened the cookbook and went through it. Then I found something that made me cry. It was a check(支票)for$30,000 dated(注有日期) the day of my graduation. And the price of the car my father and I chose all those years ago was $30,000.

    Today was not a good day. Everything went wrong. First, I slept late and Mum shouted at me to wake up. I tried to wake up but I couldn't. I just went back to sleep, and she had to come and shout at me again.

    When I finally got out of bed, I went to the kitchen for breakfast. There was no cereal (谷类食物). I decided to have some toast (烤面包片) instead, but I burned it. I had to eat it anyway because there was no more bread. There was no juice, either. I just had a glass of water.

    When I was almost at the bus stop, I realized that I had forgotten my wallet, so I had to go back home and get it. Of course, I missed the bus and had to wait for the next bus.

    I was late for school and the teacher told me to stay in the classroom at lunchtime to catch up on (补上) the schoolwork I had missed.

    After lunch, it was the time to give the teacher our homework. I reached into my bag to get it, but it wasn't there. I had left it at home. I was in trouble again.

    When I got home, I went straight to my room to catch up on my homework. Mum cooked fish for dinner. She knows I don't like fish, but she thinks it is good for her son. I am going to bed early so that nothing else can go wrong. It was a terrible day. I hope tomorrow will be better.

It is not always easy to discover yourself. From a young age, I had a strong sense of who I would become—but an 1 changed everything.

To me, skating was more important than anything else in the world. Nothing else filled my heart with so much joy. I spent twenty-four hours a week developing my skills. I had no 2 life or interests other than skating. But I was rewarded with first place medals in nearly every competition.

Unluckily, during one competition, I fell and was badly injured. The doctor told me that I couldn't skate anymore. The pain in my back was hard to bear and even basic daily tasks became 3 .

My passion (激情) had been taken away. I lost 4 and had no idea what I would become. After eight months of suffering, something had to change. Instead of sitting around and 5 my days, I began to work with local community service projects. By volunteering as a swimming teacher and summer reading assistant for kids, I got an idea of who I wanted to become. After a few months, I found a new interest. Little by little, I stepped out of the shadow and rebuilt my confidence.

Sometimes, challenges in life will get in our way. We can 6 to stay behind or try to get past these challenges. My accident was a challenge that failed to stop me from reaching success. Today, I'm a very confident and optimistic person.