Question

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.

1. 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

2. 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

3. When the author told her friends about the story, she felt ______in her heart.

A. proud    B. amusing    C. hate    D. regret

4. By writing the passage, the author speaks highly of ________

A. friendship    B. parenting

C. religion      D. culture

5. The author of the passage is probably ________.

A. a teenager

B. a primary school student

C. a middle-aged woman

D. a native American

Answer

1.B

2.C

3.D

4.A

5.C

【解析】

试题分析:本文是一篇故事，作者小时候希望圣诞老人送给自己礼物，但是没能如愿。后来她的朋友让父亲装扮成圣诞老人给作者送来了迟到25年的礼物，来安抚作者多年前因没得到礼物而受伤的心。通过这件事她深刻地体会到了友谊带给人的快乐。

1.推理判断题。根据第二段的描述可知作者在壁炉边挂了一个圣诞长筒袜，选B。

2.推理判断题。从文章首段可知作者在学了些英语之后才知道圣诞老人的故事，但是在壁炉边挂的长筒袜里没能得到希望的礼物，这说明作者的父母不了解有圣诞老人送礼物这种事情，故选C。

3. I had to make it as funny as possible, or else I would cry.可知作者给别人讲述自己的事情时，感觉非常后悔做了这种让自己失望伤心的事情，选D。

4.推理判断题。从文章末段内容可知作者对于朋友让父亲装扮成圣诞老人送礼物的事情非常感动，根据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可知作者写文章的目的是赞扬友谊的，故选A。

5.细节理解题。根据文章第五段 He said, “I’ve been looking for you for twenty-five years.”可知作者写文章的时候应该是个成年人了，故选C。

考点：考查故事类短文阅读