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The hardened cynic in me says there's a politician born every minute, so it took a moment before the e-mail — Jessica Wolfe To Run For Congress — rang a bell.

Wait for it . . .

That Jessica Wolfe?

Clang!

"It's me," she says happily.

We'd spoken nearly 10 years ago. She was The Tribune's Athlete of the Year — a do-it-all sports star at La Cueva High who just happened to have a "4-point something" grade-point average, a full-ride scholarship to a prestigious private school, and was the Bears' prom queen to boot.

Beat that for a prep résumé.

But Wolfe may have something else to talk about at the 10-year reunion this summer. And regardless of whether she gets a sniff for the Democratic nomination in the 1st Congressional District race, she might be living proof that politics don't always have to be backroom deals and back-alley brawling.

With no previous political experience, save for a stint as a special assistant for Cabinet affairs to Gov. Bill Richardson, Wolfe insists her candidacy will be for real.

It'll have to be: the same day Wolfe announced her run, former Albuquerque City Councilor Martin Heinrich announced he'd raised more than $465,000 for his run. Others, including former state Health Secretary Michelle Lujan Grisham and local lawyer Robert Pidcock, also are in with both feet. More may follow.

And that, sadly, is where the cynicism usually hits for me. Lots of people want to run; only a handful even have a prayer of winning. And the truth is, the people who make primary ballots are more often picked by party apparatchiks than they are by voters.

But even today, candidates still dream. And in some cases, they're 28 years old, and ask themselves: Why not me?

Which is pretty much where Wolfe is. If nothing else, she's nonplused about the succession of Mt. Everest she must scale to be a threat in June's Democratic primary.

But then, that's what I remember most about her from an interview — one in thousands — a decade ago.

At that time, everyone at her school knew her; she was campus star. But she had a completely unaffected, almost irreverent, way of looking at the world — and an unmistakable drive in wanting to conquer it.

So, it's 10 years later, she has pretty much zero name recognition outside of the La Cueva class of 1998, but . . . what the hell? Go for it.

"I would have hated to miss this opportunity," she says now, "more than worrying about the negative consequences. Besides, I've put everyone in witness protection who might say something bad about me."

There will be plenty of time for that, of course. But here's what's known about Wolfe, post-prom: Unlike most of the other candidates in the 1st District, she actually was born and grew up in Albuquerque. She got a degree from Vanderbilt University. She donated a kidney to her mom. She's mostly worked in the health care industry and as a policy manager for Boston Scientific, a company that produces medical devices.

Hers sounds like a lobbyist's job.

"They'll call me a lobbyist," Wolfe acknowledges, "but I'm not a registered lobbyist."

Is all this the classic congressional launching pad? 'Course not. If nothing else, Wolfe's Democrat-From-the-Very-Republican-Far-Northeast-Heights pedigree will raise eyebrows.

"Every now and then," she says with a laugh, "a flower springs through the iceberg."

It's still a cold world in politics. But fortunately, it's still warm enough that a young woman can dream.