There you have it. And because I'll probably never be one of those reclusive authors who writes one best-seller after another from her cabin on Lake Winnepesake, I'm also a bunch of other things. 

...like a mom

To a girl named Sophia, although we have been known to call her Soaf, Sophie, or in formal situations, The Soafmaster General. She was born September 23, 2004--also the birthdays of Bruce Springsteen, Miles Davis, Ray Charles and my cousin Shawn. While she is sleeping I like to put my face to hers and smell her breath. 

And a greeting card magnate 

Speak! Greetings was going to be a forthcoming line of greeting cards celebrating the life and wisdom of the late, great, incredibly soft dog, Bobo Reale. But like many of my great ideas, I only got as far as ordering the domain name and designing a logo.  But--but!--you can still order the existing line of Bobo greeting cards; proceeds go to the Denver Dumb Friends League.

...and a merchandise maven, too! 

Reading The Vagina Monologues in 1996 inspired me to write a family of slogans Madison Avenue will never--ever--use, even though they are unspeakably excellent. (Eve Ensler herself loved them and auctioned them off to rave reviews at her first-ever VDay benefit in New York City.) The good news is that you can support them anyway, and in turn, celebrate women and the people who love them. Check out or buy some original Jody Reale wares and join the revolution.

As advertised, I'm a woman 

As much as I resented the clothing choices I faced as a young girl, I never made good on the promises of gender reassignment that I made during my fifth birthday party. I never liked wearing dresses, and still find them a might impractical, but the good, fancy underwear we get to wear makes up for the fickle finger that is women's fashion. Just as an aside, I'm pretty sure the devil wears Dockers, not Prada.

So I stuck with the girl thing, which leaves me free to consume as many self-help materials as I like without having to explain myself. And, I admit, I am guilty of being just a bit of a shoe whore. 

When the '80s came, I decided to hardly bother with clothing at all. Such a philosophy garnered me a 10 nanosecond spot in the Def Leppard video "Pour Some Sugar on Me." I'm the one with the big hair that was looking for blond in all the wrong places by way of a product known as Sun-In. Please pass the Jean-Nate After Bath Splash. 

In the early- to mid-'90s, before "business casual" reared its khaki head, I wore pantyhose and a suit every day to my corporate America job. I survived the urge to cozy up in bed with a can of spray paint and a paper bag by participating in community theatre and pagan rituals at night. 

1997-2003 marked the all-important Vagina Years, the period of time that brought you such treasures as the aforementioned merchandise and my award-winning essay, "Ask Me About My Vagina!" which I was certain would jettison me to the heights of literary stardom. Then I met an agent, who told me she thought that vaginas were yesterday's news, not that she ever thought she'd say that. 

Since then, for reasons that may or may not have anything at all to do with what someone else may or may not have said, I've been transitioning into a new era of womanhood--or personhood--that I have yet to give a snappy title. Themes in the running include, "My dogma bit your co-pilot's honor student," "I eat carbs and I vote!" and, in a moment of vagina nostalgia mixed with political activism, "It's 2007. Do you know where your Bush is?" (Now that the Bush Administration is a bygone era, the fruit just doesn't hang as low as it used to.)

My vagina is, for now, just super. Thanks for asking.

Boy, am I married 

To an alien named Alex from a planet called Upstate New York. As someone who had never been east of the Dakotas until 1995, I found him strangely exotic, very Republican, and slightly Jewish. Somehow we've found a way to get along. He likes to eat sandwiches over the sink while wearing boxers and black dress socks. I love him. 

When he was young, Alex went to summer camp and hasn't shut up about it since. And every time we go somewhere, we meet someone from his old neighborhood. (Don't you people from New York ever stay there?) What we do best is teach each other things, sometimes in the most annoying ways possible. Thank goodness I met him; he and the dog I adopted before I met him really need each other. 

But wait! There's more...

I'm a fencing prodigy, a knee reconstruction survivor and I make a good meatloaf, but that's not all. I also play guitar, but I happen to have the worst-ever taste in music, which I make up for with my scorching rendition of Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" whenever I have the chance to sing karaoke. I am a dog person. I can paint a Renaissance Fair-quality butterfly on your child's face. I refuse to watch or read the news. I am a registered independent, but will take credit for coining the phrase, "Don't blame me, I voted for Pedro." I've never been interested in politics, but I was once a mayor at MomsTown. And now that I'm thinking about it, there's more.