Jennifer Aniston: "It's My Time"

Jennifer Aniston may just be Hollywood's hottest celebrity.

Aniston is the subject of articles in numerous magazines -- GQ and Vogue, among them, not to mention pieces in seemingly countless tabloids.

She also stars with Owen Wilson in "Marley and Me," a touching romantic comedy based on John Grogan's best-seller, about a young couple who buys a very behavior-challenged dog, and where life leads them. The movie opens nationwide Christmas Day.

Oh -- and did we mention that Aniston poses all-but-nude -- wearing only a tie -- for GQ's cover?

Aniston, 39, told Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith Friday all the attention tends to become a blur, as her picture leaps out at her from newsstands everywhere.

"It's funny," she explained. "I mean, I honestly see it as a different person. It's just -- well, because the (tabloid) headlines are just outrageous, so you usually get a kick out of that. But you just kind of go -- you try to walk past it as fast as you possibly can, honestly."

As onlookers on the street gawked at Aniston through the studio window, Smith remarked about how difficult it must be to have fans notice her everywhere.

"It's amazing how you can sort of start to tune them out," Aniston replied."

Smith said he "gets the sense" it's simply her time, and Aniston agreed, observing, "It's my time. I feel just really -- I mean, I just feel like, you know, every woman that's ever said -- or man -- that's said it just gets better. I just agree. I just wish we could have -- it's the thing: You don't know as much as you know in your 20s as you do in your 30s as you do when you are..."

Smith took it further, paraphrasing a line in the Bernard Malamud novel, "The Natural," that says, 'We live two lives: one we learn with, and the other we live with.' "So, you may be in the 'live with' one," Smith suggested.

"I'm startin' to live. It's good!" Aniston responded.

Turning to "Marley and Me," Aniston said it "packs a punch," evoking a full range of emotions as it follows a newlywed couple over 15 years, beginning as a light film, then yanking at the heart.

She says it tells the couple's story "from that early stage of being married and excited and your careers and futures and dreams are right ahead of you, and then, just sort of -- life!"

But in it, "I get to get my hands a little dirty. And it was also ... so nice to sort of not be in a -- your normal romantic comedy, where it's about getting the guy or getting the girl. This sort of starts as a -- at the end when they walk off into the sunset, and you get to actually tell the story."

Aniston says she saw "Marley and Me" with an audience at its premiere in Los Angeles last week and heard "audible moans and snorts" from people getting choked up."

She and Wilson "had a great time (working together). It was easy from the minute we met. We just had that, you know, very similar sensibilities. We worked very similarly. We kind of -- he's just so good."