When I was growing up as a little girl and as a teenager, I loved designing and making dogs' clothes and wanting to be a fashion designer. I took art and ceramics. I loved dance.

I was thinking as a little girl growing up that I would be there. When I look at whether we can go to Mars, it's definitely something we can do.

In fourth grade, I was interested in all areas of science. I particularly loved learning about how the earth was created.

I stayed in the astronaut program until 1993. People ask me why I left. I thought I had a lot of things to contribute that would be difficult to do if I stayed. I thought I could have a stronger voice as an advocate for space exploration. So I ended up starting my own technology consulting company.

I say this to young actors: You don't get into this because you think you're average. You get into this because you think, 'I'm good.' It's an art form, and I'm an artist. But as an artist, you know there's not a soul in the world that's going to believe in you other than yourself.

In the visual arts, particularly painting, I distrust all those abstractions, those artificial constructions. I have a very simple way of judging them: if I can do them, they are not art.

I think no artist can claim to have any access to the truth, or an authentic version of an event. But obviously they have slightly better means at their disposal because they have their art to energize whatever it is they're trying to write about. They have music.

Children do not give up their innate imagination, curiosity, dreaminess easily. You have to love them to get them to do that.