Growing up, I had one very specific idea of what a wedding should be, and that was the wedding of Fraeulein Maria and Captain von Trapp in 'The Sound of Music.'

Growing up, I had one very specific idea of what a wedding should be, and that was the wedding of Fraulein Maria and Captain von Trapp in 'The Sound of Music.'

It took two months from the day my fiance proposed to my first Google search for 'wedding planning: how?' Now, let me interrupt myself here and share how much I hate using the word 'fiance.' It's so fancy, and it's hard not to sound like a jerk saying it. Which is why I will be using my own word for fiance: gloob.

I have given myself dork shivers so many times that I would be an outright liar if I characterized myself as anything other than a pure, utter, and unadulterated dork.

I dropped out of school, but I didn't drop out of life. I would leave the house each morning and go to the main branch of the Carnegie Library in Oakland where they had all the books in the world... I felt suddenly liberated from the constraints of a pre-arranged curriculum that labored through one book in eight months.

I believe that education is the greatest equalizer; thus, I will continue to fight to equalize the playing field in an educational atmosphere that is not always level!

Growing up, I did quite a bit of reading on the mental side. My dad, who coached me, had us doing a lot of different types of mental work, like visualization. I read a couple of tennis books that talked about calming your nerves, belief, visualization, relaxing, breathing.

While I was there I became deeply interested in photography, and indeed the most noteworthy event in my early life was winning first, third, fourth and seventh prizes in an international competition for college and high school students.