•Role Model - Larry Kramer, Harvey Milk, every social worker, every LGBT person who has come out, and anyone else who has imagined a world better than their own and then put in the work to do what they’re able to make change happen

•Favorite Food  -  it’s a tie between pizza and Dairy Queen cake

•Holiday Destination - I’d love to go on another cruise after having so much fun with friends on the Inaugural  lesbian-based Sweet Cruise a couple of years back, but if we’re talking one location, I’d have to go with South Florida… it’s where I completed my Master’s degree and where some of my very favorite people live

•Preferred Charity or Cause - I can’t pick just one, so I’ll go in order of size… My favorite soon-to-be non-profit is Moments By Cole Photography, a great small organization run by a local businesswoman who has an incredible knack for capturing the perfect shot.  My favorite small organizations are a tie between Trans Kids Purple Rainbow and TYFA (Trans Youth Family Allies) as both do incredible work to further national acceptance for transgender kids.  My favorite smaller non-profit is Royal Family Productions; they have a two-sided organization; one side puts on incredible main stage shows (often tackling controversial topics such as the coming out process or suicide), and the other teaches theater to children on a pay-what-you-can scale.  Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS is my favorite large charity, the work they do on AIDS research and for Breast Cancer research is incredible. If I had a billion dollars, a good bit of it would go to them!

•If you could change one thing in the world, what would it be? - I’d change our focus.  I think we spend too much time griping about others and not enough time working on ourselves and that, as a nation, some folks are so busy spending money and time saying that the Bible is anti-same sex marriage (which is up for debate), yet there are starving children and homeless people in need of assistance and there doesn’t seem to be much discussion that everyone’s Bible is against that.

•If you were given $1 Million and you had only 24 hours to make the best out of them or lose it all; what would you do?  - If that means I couldn’t put it in the bank for the future… I’d pay off my student loans and buy a small home outright, I’d also buy gift cards for groceries and other things necessary to live… that way, rather than focusing on money to pay my bills in the future, I could spend more time taking the work I love that doesn’t pay well.  I’d pay some bills for those I love, I’d book an amazing cruise for my closest friends and myself, and then I’d go to a restaurant with a huge dessert case, ask for a fork, and take one bite out of everything I’ve ever wanted to taste.  (I’ve just always wanted to do that!)

•If Kryss Shane was a place, object or animal, what would she be and why?- hmmm… I think I’d be rainbow tie dye; bright, fun, a lot of history, a sign of being relaxed/laid back, and, though one-of-a-kind, a person can always make their own tie dye, just the way a person can always be their own kind of activist!   (Maybe that’s why I love tie dye so much and just never realized it until now?!)

•Something no one knows about you - I doubt there is such a thing considering that my closest friends have known me 15+ years, but something not super well known is my love of Jim Henson’s work… The Muppets, Sesame Street, Fraggle Rock… I’ve got a talking Kermit toy in my bedroom and Muppets band-aids in my first aid kit.  I just love the creativity and a world in which species doesn’t matter and there’s a song for everything!

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