Christine Stoddard

Though I was raised in an interdenominational household, my upbringing could at best be described as vaguely Christian.

Before I became a haunted house performer, I thought having my face touched was one of the creepiest things imaginable. But it wasn't the eerie set music or the beheaded baby dolls that changed my definition of scary. It was what went on in the green room.

Some people think that the size and budget of your wedding reflect how much love you and your partner have for each other: The bigger the wedding, the bigger the love. On the other hand, my father likes to joke, “The bigger the wedding, the bigger the divorce.”

Black—the whispered word in educated, politically correct, upper middle class society.