Question

Mum, it’s me. Hopefully, this Mothering Sunday you will get to hear those three words. I will, of course, try to phone you. I hope we will be able to speak for the allowed 10 minutes. But I suspect many inmates will be using the phone, so if I don’t call and if we don’t speak, then this is what I would have said:

It’s not your fault that I am here. I know that deep in your heart you have questioned whether my current circumstance is somehow your fault, if the reckless stupidity of my past is somehow a failure on your part. It is not. Only one person is to blame, only one person should hurt — me. You have always taught me that when the room goes dark, you can wait for the lights to be switched back on or you can search in the dark and turn the light on yourself. You are my light. You always have been and always will be. There is nobody I admire more, nobody I have strived harder to please in my life, which is why my current failure hurts me so much.

I am so sorry that I will not be there to see you, but I want you to know that now, as always, you are here with me. In my darkest hours, and in the coldest loneliness of my past few months, my mind has so often wandered to the past, to when it was you and me — and I have been able to smile. Yours is the strength that I draw upon.

A parent’s job is to make sure that they pass on the best of themselves to their children. You have done that. It is the inner you in me that will get me through this.

I have failed you so epically, but you have never failed me. If I think back to the tears I shed when Dad left, all those years ago, I see you through their misty glaze. You holding me and you telling me we’d be OK, and we will be. We are and always will be the best team.

Childhood heroes such as footballers, actors and rock stars are clichéd. If the job’s done right, a child’s heroes should be their parents — you are mine. The strength you showed after the divorce from Dad to find your biological parents, to go to university and get your teaching qualifications, to begin your life again, is the strength that I draw on now. It is the belief in myself, it is the belief you have in me, that tells me that once I am released I can and will rebuild my life. I will make you proud again. I will make you happy to have me as your son. Yours is the will that gets me through every day.

I don’t believe you can judge a person for the mistakes they make, as we all make them, but you can judge them for what they do afterwards. And after this, when it is all over, you will still have a son with the same hopes and dreams. They have not diminished. If you can dream it, then you have to believe it can happen — right?

So this Mothering Sunday, please think back to that morning in the 80s, the first Mother’s Day without Dad, when a six-year-old me got up early and made breakfast for you. Do you remember it? Could you ever forget? A slice of bread a doorstep thick and a wedge of cheese equally dense. You didn’t have to eat it, but you did, chewing every dry mouthful. I know now why you forced yourself — because it had been made with love. Well, things don’t change this year — this letter is that bread and cheese (it sure has plenty of the cheese!).

I love you so much. I am sorry I have let you down, but you have taught me that we will always pick ourselves up and become better than we were before. Thank you for everything and this year, more than ever:

Happy Mothering Sunday.

Love, your son

1.According to the passage, what made the author most upset at present?

A. Losing his freedom temporarily.

B. Being unable to phone his mother.

C. Failing to live up to his mother’s expectations.

D. Having no chance to spend the weekend with mother.

2.What does the underlined word “this” in Paragraph 4 refer to?

A. Mothering Sunday. B. Dark time.

C. His mistake. D. Near future.

3.What did the author do in the loneliness of his past months？

A. He summed up the causes of the failure in his life.

B. He planned to help his mother find her birth parents.

C. He recalled the fond memories of being with his mother.

D. He prepared himself to go to university for further studies.

4.Which of the following is closest in meaning to the underlined word “clichéd” in Paragraph 6?

A. Ridiculous. B. Liberal.

C. Explicit. D. Common.

5.Which of the following can best describe the author’s mother?

A. Selfless but stubborn. B. Guilty but determined.

C. Selfish but responsible. D. Caring but envious.

Answer 1