Let's see:
- Maria definitely loves her country and is well-prepared to defend it. Back in the cold war days of the early 1980's, she thought that she'd grow up to work for the CIA. She used to say to me "Hit me as hard as you can. I need to learn to withstand pain in case I'm captured and tortured by the enemy." I was more than happy to oblige. Her pain threshold is (was?) pretty high.
- She's a fierce competitor and never gives up. As an example, she loved to play tennis (she was on the varsity team at good old EFA) and I was her most frequent opponent in the off-season. If I remember correctly, she never beat me. But, that didn't stop her from trying. On further thought, isn't this actually a clear example of Einstein's definition of insanity?
- She's not scared of anything. In her early days in DC, she supplemented her income by delivering Domino's pizzas on her bike throughout northwest DC out of the Domino's located off of Dupont Circle. Even though she's all of 5'1" (on a good day), she had no fear about going anywhere to deliver hot pizzas to her customers. She would ride that bike into some pretty interesting neighborhoods (this was back in the days before gentrification of places like the U Street corridor). She even had a bike or two stolen, all in the name of capitalism.
- She's very good at paperwork, which I think is important for any government official. I think this stems from her early days playing "insurance" in the old garage behind the house on 5 Brown Square. Of course, we didn't know what insurance was, but we knew it had something do with filling out forms. She was good at that. Actually, now that I think about it, I think I was the one who was good at filling out forms. Maria was good at handing them to me and telling me to get busy.
