10 facts, all true:

1. My ancestors were shepherds. My grandfather once gave me a black sheep as a birthday gift.

2. I was born 9 months after my parents went on a pilgrimage, desperate to have a child. I blame my serendipitous, idealistic nature on this. 

3. I was a French punk as a teenager. I played the guitar in a very short-lived, all girls’ band that did covers of the Ramones. 

4. I studied art history in Paris, then California and Japan, specializing in post-WWII Japanese visual culture. I graduated with a Ph.D. but decided academia was not hands-on enough for me. 

5. I converted to Judaism in my 20s. I wanted to find my tribe and still love this stiff-necked people. 

6. I have been married to S. for close to two decades. Marriage is a lot of work and requires more patience than I thought either of us had, but look at that. 

7. We have four children. Raising children is like eating growth-inducing, hair-pulling, blood-pressure-raising, Serotonin-generating psychedelics every morning for breakfast. People think I’m either crazy or a saint for homeschooling them; both are true.

8. If I could change just one thing about my life, we would be living in the country, under big open skies, instead of the stupid suburbs. 

9. If I could change the tune to which our contemporary world dances, I would just break the boombox and start fresh with bongos.

10. Plants make me happy. They feed us, clothe us, heal us, and occasionally make us high. Gardens take us back to Eden and for that we should be very grateful. Anyone who touches a computer on a daily basis should be made to grow a garden.