Mom sat down at the kitchen table and looked at the awards dinner invitation as though she had received bad news from far away. “ Baby,it might be a mistake. Sometimes they accidentally send these things out to the wrong people.” She spoke slowly and with sympathy in her voice. I was only in the first grade; I didn’t understand the big deal and didn’t really care about a mistake.

I was embarrassed by the process of learning. On the first day of school my mom talked to my teacher for a long time while l sat at one of the little tables and met people who would be my friends for years, including Katie. I was so absorbed in my friend-making that I did not care what my mom was saying to my new teacher, and I certainly could not have known that she was expressing her concern about me possibly having a learning disability.

My academic progress was never a topic of conversation. I did not know anything about grades or scholarly competition. I didn’t care. I just liked my beautiful teachers. I loved my friends. I enjoyed doing all the worksheets and activities. My grades did not mean anything to me.

At the awards dinner, we sat by my best friend Katie and her family. She and I talked and laughed all through the meal. But Mom looked like she was still expecting bad news. She reached across the table and held my hand right before the principal started handing out awards. “Remember, sweetie, we’re just here to enjoy the dinner.”

The awards were given out by subject. Within each subject, the grade winners were announced and received a certificate, Math. No Rebecca, Science. No Rebecca. Reading. Katie got that one. She smiled broadly. I caught my mom’s face. She was near tears. She looked at me as if I were hurt. But I was fine. She was the one who was hurt, watching all the other children get awards while her own was passed over again and again.

All the subject awards were given out, and my name was not called.

A few seconds later, “Okay, the overall achievement medal for the first grade — Rebecca Youngblood.”

One sunny afternoon in June, my sister Jenny and I were walking home from school when we heard a strange sound coming from an empty box. We walked over to it and looked inside. A sad little sparrow(麻雀)was sitting at the bottom of the box and its right wing was broken. Jenny held it in her hands, cooing(咕咕地叫)to it, so it wouldn’t be afraid. And then Jenny and I took it home.

My mom took one look at the little bird and said, “No way! I’m not having another animal in the house.” But when she got a closer look at the big and sad eyes, she changed her mind.

Mom set the sparrow on the kitchen table to get a better look at it. She said its right wing was seriously broken, so she designed a splint(夹板)and carefully put it on its wing. Our dog, Buttons, kept trying to get a look at the bird, but we drove it away. Once the splint was on, we fed the bird water and gave it bits of bread and berries. At first it wouldn’t eat, but after a while, it wouldn’t stop.

The little bird got the name Peep. We kept it in a cage. Every morning, we put its cage outside, so it could get some fresh air. Peep couldn’t fly, which seemed to make it sad.

After a period of time, Peep’s wing got better. We put Peep on the kitchen table, and Mom took off the splint. Peep started flapping(拍打)its wings like crazy, and the next morning when we opened the cage, it flew about fifty feet into the air before coming back. We watched from the ground like proud parents. From then on, we left its cage outside with the door open, and Peep flew further each morning, but it always came back.

Then one morning, another sparrow stopped on the Peep’s cage.

A few months later, a sparrow landed on the window of my home.

It was the Easter holidays, and school was closed for two weeks.For me, the Easter holidays were so boring that it was impossible to find something fun to do. My mom had suggested that I do some studies since the promotion test was coming up. However, I didn’t follow my mother’s suggestion. Instead, I went outside to seek out my friends to play with. When I had successfully contacted some of my friends, none of them seemed to be much in a playful mood, but one friend Jimmy agreed to play with me. He suggested we go down to the river and just relax there. The river was not far from my home, and we arrived there quickly.

Just relaxing on the river bank with nothing but some waste logs (木头) , it wasn’t fun for us at first. Clearly what was on our minds was to jump into the river and just take a swim in the clear cool water. So we took off our clothes down to our underwear and walked into the shallow part of the water. The water was truly cool and refreshing and we were starting to have fun then, playing and laughing, as we splashed the cool water onto each other’s faces. Then we started to chase each other around on the river bank and then we ran straight into the river. We were having so much fun that we didn’t notice danger was around the corner.

Before Jimmy could know it, and before he could do anything to keep his balance, he lost his footing on a tree branch, which was in the shallow part of the water, and slipped, bringing his whole entire body into the deep water. He tried to resurface from the water but found it extremely hard to keep his head above the water.

I was scared to see him struggling in the water but I knew I must rescue him. I took a deep breath to keep calm. Looking around, I found a waste log, so I threw it to him immediately and asked him to hold it. At the same time I yelled for help, hoping someone could come to our rescue. Luckily, my mom heard my cries, rushed out of the house and raced towards us. She jumped into the water without hesitation and reached out her hands to pull him. Several neighbors also quickly joined the rescue.

Finally, Jimmy was pulled out of water by my mom and the neighbors.

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