Directions: Read the following passage. The passage has been assigned as a PDF in Google Classroom and must be annotated there. It is copied here for consistent reference while answering the Multiple Choice questions. Use information from the passage to answer the questions.
“Of course he’s miserable,” moaned Wesley’s mother. “He sticks out.” “Like a nose,” snapped his father. Listening through the heating vent, Wesley knew they were right. He was an outcast from the civilization around him.
He alone in his town disliked pizza and soda, alarming his mother and the school nurse. He found professional football stupid. He’d refused to shave half his head, the hairstyle worn by all the other boys, despite his father’s bribe of five dollars.
Passing his neighborhood’s two styles of housing—garage on the left and garage on the right—Wesley alone dreamed of more exciting forms of shelter. He had no friends, but plenty of tormentors.
Fleeing them was the only sport he was good at.
Each afternoon his mother asked him what he’d learned in school that day.
“That seeds are carried great distances by the wind,” he answered on Wednesday.
“That each civilization has its staple food crop,” he answered on Thursday.
“That school’s over and I should find a good summer project,” he answered on Friday.
As always, his father mumbled, “I’m sure you’ll use that knowledge often.”
Suddenly, Wesley’s thoughts shot sparks. His eyes blazed. His father was right! He could actually use what he’d learned that week for a summer project that would top all others. He would grow his own staple food crop—and found his own civilization!
The next morning he turned over a plot of ground in his yard. That night a wind blew in from the west. It raced through the trees and set his curtains snapping. Wesley lay awake, listening. His land was being planted.
Five days later the first seedlings appeared.
“You’ll have almighty bedlam on your hands if you don’t get those weeds out,” warned his neighbor.
“Actually, that’s my crop,” replied Wesley. “In this type of garden there are no weeds.”
Following ancient tradition, Wesley’s fellow gardeners grew tomatoes, beans, Brussels sprouts, and nothing else. Wesley found it thrilling to open his land to chance, to invite the new and unknown.
The plants shot up past his knees, then his waist. They seemed to be all of the same sort. Wesley couldn’t find them in any plant book.
“Are those tomatoes, beans, or Brussels sprouts?” asked Wesley’s neighbor.
“None of the above,” replied Wesley.
Fruit appeared, yellow at first, then blushing to magenta. Wesley picked one and sliced through the rind to the juicy purple center. He took a bite and found the taste an entrancing blend of peach, strawberry, pumpkin pie, and flavors he had no name for.
Ignoring the shelf of cereals in the kitchen, Wesley took to breakfasting on the fruit. He dried half a rind to serve as a cup, built his own squeezing device, and drank the fruit’s juice throughout the day.
Pulling up a plant, he found large tubers on the roots. These he boiled, fried, or roasted on the family barbecue, seasoning them with the plant’s highly aromatic leaves.
It was hot work tending his crop. To keep off the sun, Wesley wove himself a hat from strips of the plant’s woody bark. His success with the hat inspired him to devise a spinning wheel and loom on which he wove a loose-fitting robe from the stalks’ soft inner fibers.
Unlike jeans, which he found scratchy and heavy, the robe was comfortable, reflected the sun, and offered myriad opportunities for pockets. . . .
His domain, home to many such innovations, he named “Weslandia.”
