I touch the future. I teach.

I cannot join the space program and restart my life as an astronaut, but this opportunity to connect my abilities as an educator with my interests in history and space is a unique opportunity to fulfill my early fantasies.

What are we doing here? We're reaching for the stars.

Sometimes when things get kind of frantic, it helps to call [my husband] because I think he's got a real good sense of where everything's gonna be in a few years. He'll say, 'Christa, just hang in there. People are going to try to do a good job for you.

I have a box of papers at home of [my own press coverage]. When I'm sixty, maybe, I'll look at my pile of papers and wonder, 'What really happened that year?' "