I would say the discovery of the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos Islands. That really turned science upside down. Until that time, there were a lot of things we didn’t know about the ocean. We didn’t know why it was salty. We didn’t know why it had the chemistry that it had.

I don’t know whether I feel pride. I think pride is hubris. I think it is an emotion that if you bask in it, it’s like hate; it will destroy you. So I don’t make those kinds of assessments. I like what I do. I am repeatedly struck by how I have missed part of the story, always.

Yes, it's one of the things that I'm most proud of is the Iberian lynx was extinct. It was declared under extinction and with a new project funded by the European Union, Portugal and Spain started the process of recovering the Iberian lynx. And it took maybe 15 years to recover with the lynx being incubated first in a facility. And then finally there was a day where we have to feel sufficiently comfortable to release the first lynx and then to have the normal reproductive path in the environment. And it worked. Can you imagine? Even a species can be recovered. So, if there is a will, there is the way.

If it’s one thing, obviously it had to have been being selected to make the first manned space flight for the United States. That was competition at its best, not because of the fame or the recognition that went with it, but because of the fact that America’s best test pilots went through this selection process, down to seven guys, and of those seven, I was the first one to go. That always will be the most satisfying thing for me.

Oh, yes, absolutely. I have two children, and often I think about them and how when I’m gone, they will be here listening to an old CD of mine, thinking, “At least I can I can hear her voice.” I think this is very charming. It’s very nice. And then, of course, I also think about the other generations of opera singers coming behind me… It’s so important that they can have a real testimony of how it was in our ears. I think that what stands the test of time is really the memory of people hearing us singing somewhere.