2 But there's something about me that makes me not so normal. I have a hearing loss and a constant ringing in my ears that, unless some medical miracle happens, I'll suffer from these impairments forever. My ear problems are so severe that I feel I need to warn you: You have to protect your hearing as much as you can.

Read this sentence from paragraph 2 of the passage.

“I have a hearing loss and a constant ringing in my ears that, unless some medical miracle happens, I'll suffer from these impairments forever.”

What is the meaning of the word impairments?

a.
physically weakened

b.
having medical symptoms

c.
strange feelings

d.
greatly mistaken

the answers are:

1. dolores driscoll - b. first person minor

dolores is a minor character who happens to be driving the bus at the time of the accident. she narrates picking up each of the children and her last memory is the children being thrown around the bus.

2. billy ansel - a. first person major

billy loses his twins in the accident. he tells his own story, how he witnessed the accident and how he tried to the rescuers. he is a major character, as he is at the center of the story.

3. mitchell stephens - c. first person observer

mitchell enters the story after the accident. he is a lawyer who learns about the accident based on other characters observations. though he tells the story from a first person perspective, he is just an observer.

as for matcthing the message or lesson posted with the person who said them:

1."obviously, you can't control everything, but you are obliged to take care of the few things you can. i'm an optimist basically who acts like a pessimist. on principle. just in case." - dolores driscoll

2. "i could no longer believe even in life. . for me now the only reality was death." - billy ansel

in the short story the slip-over sweater by jesse stuart, the main character and narrator shan is friends with grace, an intelligent girl he has known since childhood and with whom he used to be in love.

at the beginning of the story, shan believes he’s no longer in love with grace, but loves jo-anne instead. in order to buy a slip-over sweater and have jo-anne wear it so that the other students would know she loved him too, shan takes a loan at the bank.

while jo-anne is wearing shan’s sweater, his friend grace starts to wear another popular boy’s one, roy’s sweater. because of that, the other students begin to pay attention to grace and compliment her perseverance and effort. they admire her for walking 5 miles to school every day, despite the weather, and still getting the best grades. shan, who knows all of that for a fact, says, as the narrator, ‘and i knew she had the durability and the toughness of a storm-battered mountain oak.’ he compares his friend’s strength – not only physical, but also of character – to an oak tree, whose wood is known for being sturdy.

as the story goes on, shan changes his behavior out of concern for the debt he has to pay at the bank. his new girlfriend jo-anne never asks him what is wrong nor offers any sort of . instead, she breaks up with shan for not being as fun as she thought he was supposed to be. grace, however, not only asks about shan’s problem, but him make the money he needs. shan can’t but notice how different the girls are and what a wonderful person grace is.   even though he used to find jo-anne prettier at the beginning of the story, he now says, ‘grace was as beautiful as our mountain was in april, prettier than a blossom of wild phlox or a mountain daisy.’ his comparing grace to a mountain or something that exists on a mountain (such as a mountain oak or daisy) certainly has important meaning since shan loves the mountain and everything about it and he knows the mountain thoroughly. shan also loves and knows grace as completely as he does the mountain.