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  3. When I was a kid, I never knew what my parents — or anyone else’s — did for

When I was a kid, I never knew what my parents — or anyone else’s — did for

游客2025-05-11  13
问题     When I was a kid, I never knew what my parents — or anyone else’s — did for a living. As far as I could tell, all grownups had mysterious jobs that involved drinking lots of coffee and arguing about Richard Nixon. If they had job-related stress, they kept it private. Now American families are expected to be more intimate. While this has resulted in a lot more hugs, "I love you," and attendance at kids’ football games, unfortunately we parents also insist on sharing the frustrations of our work lives.
    While we have complained about our jobs or fallen asleep in car-pool lines, our children have been noticing. They are worried about us. A new survey, "Ask the children", conducted by the Families and Work Institute of New York City, queried more than 1,000 kids between the ages of 8 and 18 about their parents’ work lives. "If you were granted one wish to change the way your parents’ work affected your life," the survey asked kids, "what would that wish be?" Most parents assumed that children would want more time with them, but only 10% did. Instead, the most common wish(among 34%)was that parents would be less stressed and tired by work.
    Allison Levin is the mother of three young children and is a professional in the growing field of "work / life quality". Levin counsels employees who are overwhelmed by their work and family obligations to carefully review their commitments — not only at the office but at home and in the community too — and start paring them down. "It’s not about getting up earlier in the morning so you can get more done," she says. "It’s about saying no and making choices."
    We can start by leaving work, and thoughts of work, behind as soon as we start the trip home. Do something to get yourself in a good mood, like listening to music, rather than returning calls on the cell phone. When you get home, change out of your work clothes, let the answering machine take your calls, and stay away from e-mail. When your kids ask about your day, tell them about something good that happened.(In the survey, 69% of moms said they liked their work, but only 42% of kids thought their mothers really did.)
    Parents can also de-stress by cutting back on their children’s activities. If keeping up with your kid’s schedule is killing you, insist that he choose between karate lessons and the theater troupe. Parents should also sneak away from work and family occasionally to have some fun. I keep a basketball in the trunk of my car. I might never be able to fix everything at work or at home, but at least I can work on my jump shot. [br] The phrase "paring them down" in the third paragraph most likely means______.
选项 A、gathering the work and family duties together
B、matching the work quality to life quality
C、decreasing the defeating commitments
D、denying to fulfill their work and family obligations
答案 C
解析 本题可根据后面的一句话来帮助选择，“It’s not about getting up earlier in the morning so you can get more done，”she says，“It’s about saying no and making choices．”(Levin说，“这并不是要你早点起床来多干些事情，而是要你学会说‘不’，学会做选择。”)，由此推知“paring them down”的意思是减少不重要的事务。所以C项为正确答案。
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