Profile from Elle Magazine

If you could come back as a dress, which one would it be?
I’d pick one of those classic little black numbers from Givenchy.

What is your favorite color?

Purple, violet, amethyst…you get the picture.

What is your favorite junk food?

Kettle chips.

What are you most vain about?

Nothing. I’m not vain even where I should be.

What are you most shy about?

Everything. How’s everything for an answer?

If you could have somebody else’s body, whose would it be?

Do you mean I would exist in said body or that the body would be mine to play with as I please?

If you could have somebody else’s breasts, whose would they be?

Uck.

Who are your fantasy dinner party guests?

There are so many. But assuming I am the hostess of a dinner party for twelve, I would select Coco Chanel, Charlemagne, Eleanor Roosevelt, Richard Feynman (physicist), Mary Robinson (former president of Ireland), Kurt Vonnegut, Sally Ride, John Young (also an accomplished astronaut), Zsuszanna Budapest (womens’ rights activist), His Holliness the Dalai Lama, Gloria Steinem, and Carl Sagan.

Where is your favorite place to have a drink?

I love this little authentic coffeehouse on Penn campus.

Whose wallet would you like to steal?

I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.

Whose diary would you most like to read?

Hilary Rodham Clinton’s.

What’s your least favorite food?

Anything tomato can get kicked right to the curb.

If you were an inventor, what would you invent?

I’d invent something that would do all of my dressing and grooming for me. I feel like I’m on automatic pilot anyway.

What is your favorite car?

I like the car that gets me where I’m going safely.

When and where are you happiest?

I’m happiest in those wonderful moments at night when I’m relaxing in a scented bath with the day behind me and the comfort of sleep awaiting me.

What or who is your worst enemy?

I am my own worst enemy along with my evil sidekick Doubt.

What piece of art would you most like to own?

“Mary Magdalene” by Gustav Adolf Mossa.

Where is your favorite vacation spot?

Quebec City, Canada

What is your most treasured possession?

I have the fang of a rattlesnake my shaman mentor gave to me as a rite of passage.
Who is your favorite fictional character?

Holden Caufield.

If you weren’t a writer, what would you be?
A mortician, an aerialist, a lawyer…who knows?

What current trend would you like to see disappear?

I want to see anything extolling extreme thinness as some kind of virtue disappear.

Always…?

Always remember things can always get worse.

Never…?

Never doubt that things can get better.