Forgiving My Father

I grew up on a small farm. My father worked in the city as a welder (焊工). He was quiet, distant. He was a man made of leather and chewing tobacco who tried to teach me useful things, including respect. He also had a _______. I did not like him very much.

One day I came home from school. Once inside, I was told by my mother that he didn't feel well. His back hurt. Multiple myeloma, I _______, is a type of blood cancer. For the last year of my father's life, his entire day consisted of rising from his hospital bed in the living room and walking to his _______to sit and think. He was _______in that chair when I came home one day during the ninth grade. I do not remember where my mother and brother were, but the two of us were alone. He asked me to sit down.

What followed still _______me these decades later. He told me about his _______: his family growing up, what it was like in the Pacific during World War II, his loves, his heartbreaks. It was as if a pipe had _______, his inner self rushing out to me in a great flood. He had been speaking for maybe an hour or more when I realized that he was doing more than _______. He was asking to be _______. All it took was understanding that that was what he________, and I forgave everything, immediately.

When he died, I didn't ________to school for a few days. My biggest ________going back was gym class. It was poorly ________, and bullies ran the show. On my first day, I was standing there when a (an) ________voice yelled, ''Lensch! '' It was a guy who had given many of us a few lumps (包，肿块) over the years. I turned to face him and said, ''What do you want? '' The other boys didn’t say a word as they waited for the ________.

''I heard your dad died, '' he said. ''Is that true? ''

I quietly replied, ''Yes. ''

He didn't ________me. He didn't even move. Instead, he said, ''I'm sorry. ''

I was________. I'm sure I cried. Those two words are how I have remembered that kid ever since. What do you do when your ''enemies'' reveal that they are also ________? I think you either forgive and move ________or hold on to resentment (怨恨)and live in the past. I'm certainly not glad that my father got________, but at the same time, I realize that if he hadn't, I might never have come to love him.

On a sunny spring morning, a seven-year-old girl was sharpening(削) a beautiful pencil. _______, the wind was so strong as to blow open the door. The girl stood up to _______ it, but then fell on the floor. The sharpened pencil pierced (刺入) directly into the girl’s chest into her heart, and only a small part of the pencil could be seen.

The girl’s mother was so _______ that she dialed the emergency number and put the girl flat on her back. The girl _______ and asked her mother to pull the pencil out of her heart _______ it was particularly painful. The mother hesitated for a while but _______ her daughter. She told her daughter not to pull out the pencil without her permission.

In the end, the girl was _______ successfully! She had a very serious _______ but she didn’t lose too much blood. If the pencil were pulled out, the blood would have poured out from the wound, and doctors couldn’t have saved her! _______, the measures taken by her ________ were totally correct.

The mother’s comments afterwards were quite ________ “I really didn’t know what to do. My daughter was especially obedient (听话的) and she ________ my decision not to pull out the pencil. I knew she was in great pain, and her obedience was what I ________. I thought if I had pulled out the pencil, she would have believed she was ________ and might fall asleep and lose consciousness (意识). In the emergency vehicle, I simply kept asking her if it was ________. She nodded her head, which gave me great ________ because she was conscious and still felt pain. She was struggling for__________.

In the world, there are so many people struggling with different ________ When you are trapped in wild mountains, when you come across setbacks and hardships, and when you have no other way but to experience the pain by yourself, ________ask yourself. “Am I in pain?” When we feel the pain, we’ll have the courage to try our best to________and never give up.

Ryan always knew what he wanted to be when he grew up. While other kids _______ themselves becoming a NFL player or a lawyer, Ryan’s _______ was different and a little bit _______. His mother Mary is a retired airline worker, and his family flew on TWA (环球航空公司) so _______ that he wanted to be an airline _______ himself. After years of hard work, Ryan has _______ that. He’s now a captain for PSA Airlines.

Mary recently visited Virginia where Ryan is _______. When it came time for her to fly back home to Florida, the _______ for airline was clear. She couldn’t _______ to be a passenger on her favorite pilot—her son’s plane!

Yet things didn’t really go as ________. Mary arrived at the airport on time, only to be told that the flight was seriously ________. Mary decided to wait, ________ to make it onto Ryan’s flight. Other passengers got ________ throughout the long wait, choosing to take different flights, but Mary ________ the idea of waiting.

Seven hours later, Mary finally boarded the plane. She found out she was the ________passenger on it! “After a seven-hour delay, others were rebooked on an earlier flight except for one: my mum,” Ryan said. “I had the ________ of being her private pilot.”

The crew found ways to make the trip even more pleasant for Mary, who had an entire jet that day. Mary called the ________ “a day for the memory book”.

This is really the sort of story you could never even hope to ________. Mary was the one to wait, but she had a great ________ for doing so. Only the best mom would ________ her own time and comfort in order to support her child like this.