My family moved from Taiwan to a small town in central Georgia, where my dad got a visa for his family and a job. I had just learned English, and from what little I could gather from my classmates, Santa Claus would come down one’s chimney(烟囱) and put toys in one’s stocking on Christmas Eve! What a great country, I thought. After I looked up “stocking” in my Chinese-English dictionary, I knew what I had to do.
On that fateful night, after everyone went to bed, I took my longest, cleanest knee sock and attached it to a nail already on the mantel(壁炉). Obviously, the previous owners of this house were no strangers to this Santa character.
I woke up before everyone else on Christmas Day and ran to the fireplace. To make a sob story short, I was hit with the reality of an empty sock and the biggest lie ever told. I burst into tears, quickly took down the sock, and stuffed it in the back of a drawer. Santa was dead.
Every December since then, the topic of Christmas memories would unavoidably come up, and I would amuse my friends with my poor-little-me story. I had to make it as funny as possible, or else I would cry.
How could I know that Santa was just late? Nine years ago, on Christmas Eve, an older man with a white beard and a red cap knocked on my front door. He said, “I’ve been looking for you for twenty-five years.” He handed me a bulging red stocking, winked, and left. On top of the stocking was a card. It read: “For Becky—I may have missed you in the second grade, but you’ve always lived in my heart. Santa.”
Through tear-blurred eyes, I recognized the handwriting of Jill, a friend I had met just two months before. I later discovered that the older man was her father. Jill had seen the hurt little girl underneath the thirty-something woman and decided to do something about it.
So now I believe that Santa is real. I don’t mean the twinkle-eyed character of children’s mythology(神话) or the creation of American holiday marketers. Those Santas annoy and sadden me. I believe in the Santa Claus that live inside good and thoughtful people. This Santa does not return to the North Pole after a crazy delivery but lives each day purposefully, really listens to friends, and then plans deliberate acts of kindness.
What does the underlined part “what I had to do” in Paragraph 1 refer to?
A.Waiting for Santa Claus. |
B.Putting a stocking on the mantel. |
C.Asking for gifts from her parents. |
D.Looking up “stocking” in the dictionary |
It can be inferred from the passage that the author’s parents ____.
A.didn’t love their child at all |
B.didn’t know the previous owners of the house |
C.didn’t know much about Christmas tradition |
D.didn’t have enough money to buy the author Christmas presents |
When the author told her friends about the story, she felt ______in her heart.
A.proud | B.amusing | C.hate | D.regret |
By writing the passage, the author speaks highly of ________
A.friendship | B.parenting |
C.religion | D.culture |
The author of the passage is probably ________.
A.a teenager |
B.a primary school student |
C.a middle-aged woman |
D.a native American |