Do I Dare?

The first story is not so much about her daring as her ancestors' daring. She shares memories of traveling to New York every summer and visiting her large Italian-American family and what they have meant to her. Their daring later helps her to dare to live in Paris for a year. She was a middle school teacher in Gilroy, California, and begins her summer vacation studying Italian in Florence, Italy. Miraculously, she ends up in Paris and finds a teaching job, a roommate, and a year of unforgettable experiences.

When she returns from Paris, she dares to make lifelong commitments, marrying and having children. She tells the story of a canoe trip and how she learned about the corrosive influence of doubt.

The final stories detail Tezak's older sister's struggle with mental and physical illnesses and the challenge of allowing herself to accept her feelings about her sister, both the good and the bad, that she had for her sister.