Over the summer I thought that I would seek out non-Americans as friends, just for diversity's sake. Now I find that I want to be around Americans - people who I know are thinking about our country as much as I am.

I've tried really hard to care about things that were very different from my parents. I was curious if I could care about [money] on some fundamental level, and I couldn't. That wasn't the metric of success I wanted in my life. I've talked about this to my friends who are doctors and whose parents are doctors, or who are lawyers and their parents are lawyers. It's a funny thing to realize I feel called to this work both as a daughter and also as someone who believes I have contributions to make.

My grandmother, who passed away at the beginning of November, had a core adage in her life that life is not about what happens to you but about what you do with what happens to you. She recently had been cajoling me and challenging me to do more with my life. To lead more of a purposefully public life.

My mother has often said that the issue of women is the unfinished business of the 21st century. That is certainly true. But so, too, are the issues of LGBT rights the unfinished business of the 21st century.

I'm a big health-food freak and a vegetarian devotee.

At the fourth grade level, girls at the same percentages of boys say they're interested in careers in engineering or math or astrophysics, but by eighth grade that has dropped precipitously.

I've always been incredibly proud of both of my parents and proud of the work I had done privately as a person, professionally and academically.