It's no secret that I've been reluctant to use my name for things.

I didn't really decide that I wanted to be an astronaut for sure until the end of college.

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

When you can feel that close to something you're used to seeing from this great distance, well, it changes a person.

Because I was a tennis player, Billie Jean King was a hero of mine.

We can see cities during the day and at night, and we can watch rivers dump sediment into the ocean, and see hurricanes form.

It was hard to become an astronaut. Not anywhere near as much physical training as people imagine, but a lot of mental training, a lot of learning. You have to learn everything there is to know about the Space Shuttle and everything you are going to be doing, and everything you need to know if something goes wrong, and then once you have learned it all, you have to practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice until everything is second nature, so it's a very, very difficult training, and it takes years.