Claire's Life

I was 10 years old and sitting at my desk in the 5th-grade classroom of St. Pius X Elementary School. Suddenly the PA system called for one of my classmates to go to the office because her mother was there to take her home. "What?" the classmate said. "I'm not supposed to go home early today." She headed to the office for an explanation, and didn't come back. A few minutes later, Sister Dorothy, a 74-year-old nun who led the school's religious education, came into the room unexpectedly. "Children, we've just heard there's an emergency in New York City and in Washington. We don't know any details, but we've been told to pray for them. Everyone stand up." She lit a candle while we stood, folded our hands, and bowed our heads in prayer. I saw a tear splash down the front of my plaid jumper: that's how I found out that I was crying. Our teacher sent us to Language Arts class across the hall, as planned. I was crying too hard

A few weeks ago, I got hit in the head at work and sustained a concussion. Yes, apparently, even office jobs aren't safe from accidents. Artist's Representation Reasons why that was bad: It was the day before my Jeopardy!  audition. I had online grad school classes, and screen time irritates concussions. This is my 3rd diagnosed concussion in less than 10 years: 1, I got dropped while swing dancing; 2, I flopped down on my bed and whacked my head against the wall; 3, something fell on my head at work.  If you ever swallow something poisonous and need to induce vomiting, try asking the HR department of a nonprofit about their worker's compensation policy. You'll be sick before you know it. The doctors keep telling me to stop getting hit in the head. I've been trying to tell them that's not something I can guarantee. Reasons why I can't guarantee I won't hit my head anymore: My left foot and my brain literally don't communicate, some

 Two weeks ago, I auditioned for Jeopardy ! I was pitted against 18 other hopeful contestants. We took a written quiz and played shortened rounds of the game, but our big chance to distinguish ourselves came during the personality interviews. The producers asked each of us 3 questions: Tell us about yourself. What do you do for fun? What would you do with the money if you won big on Jeopardy ? As the 9th person interviewed, I knew I needed to stand out. In answer to question 2, I said, “I read, I sing, and recently I’ve been researching which fictional character has the most dead girlfriends.” That got a huge laugh, and several follow-up questions from the producers. Which characters are in the running? How’d you pick them? Who’s winning? The lead producer called me “unique,” which she hadn’t said to anyone else. It was pretty much the second-greatest moment of my life. Since then, I’ve had to explain the dead-girlfriends-project to a number of people who asked how my audi