For some people, music is no fun at all. About four percent of the population is what scientists call "amusic." People who are amusic are born without the ability to recognize or reproduce musical notes (音调). Amusic people often cannot tell the difference between two songs. Amusics can only hear the difference between two notes if they are very far apart on the musical scale.

As a result, songs sound like noise to an amusic. Many amusics compare the sound of music to pieces of metal hitting each other. Life can be hard for amusics. Their inability to enjoy music sets them apart from others. It can be difficult for other people to identify with their condition. In fact, most people cannot begin to grasp what it feels like to be amusic. Just going to a restaurant or a shopping mall can be uncomfortable or even painful. That is why many amusics intentionally stay away from places where there is music. However, this can result in withdrawal and social isolation. "I used to hate parties," says Margaret, a seventy-year-old woman who only recently discovered that she was amusic. By studying people like Margaret, scientists are finally learning how to identify this unusual condition.

    Scientists say that the brains of amusics are different from the brains of people who can appreciate music. The difference is complex, and it doesn't involve defective hearing. Amusics can understand other nonmusical sounds well. They also have no problems understanding ordinary speech. Scientists compare amusics to people who just can't see certain colors.

Many amusics are happy when their condition is finally diagnosed (诊断). For years, Margaret felt embarrassed about her problem with music. Now she knows that she is not alone. There is a name for her condition. That makes it easier for her to explain. "When people invite me to a concert, I just say, ‘No thanks, I'm amusic,'" says Margaret. "I just wish I had learned to say that when I was seventeen and not seventy."

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    My friend Susan has a huge-hearted husband. He is once again on the front lines of fighting the fires in Northern CA. As a Chief Battalion leader, his job is very dangerous and his time away from his family is often for weeks at a time during "fire season".

Every time before he leaves, Ethan, Susan and each of the three teens hold one another and thoughtfully each shares the best of their traditions — each promises to do the tasks that will keep the family a well-oiled machine while Ethan is away.

    Ethan has brought back animals that lost their homes in the fires. By now, a gray rabbit, two parrots and a small group of Nubian goats have been added into the family.

    When Ethan is on duty, Susan keeps checking her cell phone for Ethan's text messages. His substantial (大量的) white facial hair is often mistaken for that of Father Christmas by children who are carried out of their burning homes by him.

    For each rescued child, a toy bear is waiting to be matched with him/her. For each adult, Ethan provides clean clothes. He finds pleasure in doing his job well. He is grateful to be often on the front line with frightened people and their poor pets.

    I am mentioning Ethan because by now the big fire has been spreading widely for a week. It has caused 55 deaths and left 500,000 people homeless. Now I am here at my school site, and the smoky air is keeping our students inside, waiting for rescue.

    Born in Detroit, Michigan, on January 10, 1928. Philip Levine was formally educated in the Detroit public school system. After graduation from university, Levine worked a number of industrial jobs, including the night work in factories, reading and writing poems in his off hours. In 1953, he studied at the University of Iowa. There, Levine met Robert Lowell and John Berryman, whom Levine called his "one great guide."

    About writing poems, Levine wrote: "I believed even then that if I could change my experience into poems I would give it the value and honor that it did not begin to have on its own. I thought too that if I could write about it, I could come to understand it: I believed that if I could understand my life-or at least the part my work played in it-I could write it with some degree of joy, something obviously missing from my life."

    Levine published (出版)his first collection of poems. On the Edge in 1961, followed by Not This Pig in 1968. Throughout his life. Levine published many books of poems, winning many prizes. A review said: "Levine writes poems about the bravery of men, physical labor, simple pleasures and strong feelings, often set in working-class Detroit or in central California, where he worked or lived."

    He taught for many years at California State University, Fresno, and served as Distinguished Poet in Residence for the Creative Writing Program at New York University. After retiring from teaching, Levine divided his time between Brooklyn, New York, and Fresno, California, until his death on February 14, 2015. His final poem collection, The Last Shift, as well as a collection of essays(短文)and other writings, My Lost Poets, A Life in Poetry, were published in 2016.

    Pop music is the name for different forms of popular, commercial (商业) music. It had its beginning in the USA and spread throughout the whole world during the 1950s and 1960s. It is widely liked by the young people. The best known early form of pop music was “rock' n' roll”; another was “blues”. A more recent development is “folk-rock”.

    Pop music has taken the place of native music in many parts of the world; it has caused the number of people for jazz to become much smaller than it was in the 1950s and earlier, and it has now begun to rule musical stage productions. It's a big industry. Much pop music is without artistic value, but the work of some pop singers, e.g. the Beatles, Bob Dylan, the groups like Floyd and Crosby, Stills and Nash, is on a higher musical level. And there is still a great interest in it today. Pop music concerts and festivals take place all over the world.