When we're young， we always dream of love and fulfillment，and we think perhaps of beautiful nights or walks along the beach at sunset. No one tells us that the greatest________ of a lifetime are flying， unplanned and nearly always catch us off guard.

Not long ago， as I was reading a bedtime story to my seven﹣year﹣old daughter，Annie，I became aware of her________ gaze（凝视）. She was________at me with a fascinated expression. ________ ， completing The Tale of Samuel Whiskers was not as________ as we first thought. I wondered what she was thinking about.

"Mommy，" she________，"I just can't stop looking at your pretty face." I was almost deeply moved by her words. Little did she know how many________moments the glow of her sincerely loving statement would carry me through over the following years.

Not long after，I took my four﹣year﹣old son to an elegant________， where the sweet notes of a classic love song________us toward a musician playing the piano. Sam and I sat down on a marble bench nearby， enjoying the________ quietly.

I didn't realize that Sam had stood up next to me until he turned，took my face in his little hands and said，"________with me."

If only those women________　under the moonlight knew the joy of such an________ made by a round﹣cheeked boy with baby teeth. Although shoppers________ chuckled， and pointed at us as we moved around the open space， I would not have________a dance with such a charming young gentleman if I'd been offered the universe.

When studying at the university of Pittsburgh, I went home every weekend. “Look, I got a best sportsman’s jacket!” I said. Dad _________ took his eyes off the TV. I had wanted Dad to be _________ me all my life, but that never happened. I shook off my _________ and went back to Pittburgh. A month later, Mom called and said that Dad’s diabetes (糖尿病) had gotten _________. “I’m coming home to help you,” I said.

I _________ a college near home. Every Sunday, I went home and helped Dad. He was not satisfied with everything I did. “It’s not you,” Mom explained. “His _________ makes him feel bad about himself, his anger was _________ his frustration (沮丧).” I was so surprised to hear that. Now I saw his pain went beyond the _________ pain, which made me try harder to _________ him. One day we were watching a __________ game. “I’ll bet you $2 million that Dallas wins,” I said. “You don’t have $2 million,” he __________. After that, every time we watched the game, we made __________ bets. Dad laughed more easily and accepted my help more willingly. Our relationship was __________. The night before I attended the national football league draft (选拔赛), Dad and I were sitting in the living room. “It doesn’t __________ if you make it or not,” he said. “I am proud of you.” Maybe our __________ would never be perfect. But I would never doubt that he loved me.

As my son entered adolescence, we spent most of our time in separate rooms. I know it’s _______ for teenagers to shut themselves away, but sometimes I find myself trying to think up ways to _______ him out of his bedroom.

_______ by this desire, I booked two tickets to Beijing for the September school holidays. With hurriedly packed luggage and a basic plan built around some last-minute Google searches, we _______ the airport. We landed _______ and excited at 4: 30 am. There is something very freeing about arriving in a place where you have no _______. We just walked for hours every day, _______ when we were hungry, wandering back streets, sharing more _______ than we’d shared since he was very little. Within a day he’d become the _______ , and I was the lost one. He taught me how to ________ shared electric bikes when we arrived at Xiangshan. He showed me how to accelerate and led me speeding up and down hills.

I saw him ________ in China, not the child running late for school or forgetting to eat carrots and peas, but as someone taller than me who understood when to ________ on a train so someone older could take his seat, and how to ________ buying things with his own money.

Travelling meant we were more like ________. And instead of complaining about the ________ version of him, I saw the adult he was becoming.