The fact that I was going to be the first American woman to go into space carried huge expectations along with it.

My parents must have done a great job. Anytime I wanted to pursue something that they weren't familiar with, that was not part of their lifestyle, they let me go ahead and do it.

On both of my flights, everything went very well.

It was a real honor for me to get to be the first woman astronaut. I think it's really important that young girls that are growing up today can see that women can be astronauts too. There have actually been a lot of women, who are astronauts, that that's a career that's open to them.

The most important steps that I followed were studying math and science in school. I was always interested in physics and astronomy and chemistry and I continued to study those subjects through high school and college on into graduate school. That's what prepared me for being an astronaut; it actually gave me the qualifications to be selected to be an astronaut.

I love the John Glenn model... I may call NASA in 25 years or so, and see if they'd like to send me to Mars.

I have a lot of common sense. I know what needs to be done and how to approach it. I have an ability to work with people on large enterprises.