Question

My fifteen-year-old son has just returned from abroad with rolls of exposed film and a hundred dollars in uncashed traveler’s checks, and is asleep at the moment. His blue duffel(粗呢) bag lies on the floor where he dropped it. Obviously, he postponed as much sleep as he could: when he walked in and we hugged, his electrical system suddenly switched off, and he headed directly for the bed, where I imagine he beat his old record of sixteen hours.

It was his first trip overseas, so weeks before it, I pressed travel books on him, and a tape cassette of useful French phrases; drew up a list of people to visit; advised him on clothing and other things. At the luggage store where we went to buy him a suitcase, he headed for the duffels, saying that suitcases were more for old people.

During the trip, he called home three times: from London, Paris, and a village named Ullapool. Near Ullapool, he climbed a mountain in a rainstorm that almost blew him off. In the village, a man spoke to him in Gaelic, and, too polite to interrupt, my son listened to him for ten or fifteen minutes, trying to nod in the right places. The French he learned from the cassette didn’t hold water in Paris. The French he talked to shrugged and walked on.

When my son called, I sat down at the kitchen table and leaned forward and hung on every word. His voice came through clearly, though two of the calls were like ship-to-shore communication. When I interrupted him with a “Great!” or a “Really?”, I knocked a little hole in his communication. So I just sat and listened. I have never listened to a telephone so attentively and with so much pleasure. It was wonderful to hear news from him that was so new to me. In my book, he was the first man to land on the moon, and I knew that I had no advice to give him and that what I had already given was probably not much help.

The unused checks are certainly evidence of that. Youth travels light. No suitcase, not much luggage and a slim expense account, and yet he went to the scene, and came back safely. I sit here amazed. The night when your child returns with dust on his shoes from a country you’ve never seen is a night you would gladly turn into a week.

1.During the trip, the author’s son ______.

A. didn’t have enough sleep

B. ran out of money

C. forgot to call his mother

D. failed to take good pictures

2.According to the passage, which of the following could best describe the author’s son?

A. Polite and careless.

B. Considerate and independent.

C. Creative and stubborn.

D. Self-centered and adventurous.

3.What does the underlined word “that” in the last paragraph refer to?

A. It is important to listen to your child’s story.

B. It’s easy to interrupt the chat with your child.

C. The author is proud of her son landing on the moon.

D. The son no longer needs much help from his mother.

4. What can we infer from the passage?

A. Good parents should protect their children from potential dangers.

B. The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.

C. Communication between parents and children is extremely important.

D. It’s a win-win choice to give a child space to experience and explore.

Answer 1