Back in the Virginia suburbs around 1990, my mom showed up for her first parent/teacher conference with my preschool teacher. She was expecting to hear about how great I was at taking naps, how I was pretty consistently hungry and how I sang allllll the time. After confirming those suspicions, my teacher told her a story.

During a lull in recess, itching to make something happen, I called a group of my fellow human-goldfish together… we were gonna put on a play!

I sat them down and told them Aesop’s classic fable of the fox and the crow – in line with prehistoric parenting standards, and most early Disney movies, my dad had a habit of teaching me life lessons through animal stories. Vanity-schmanity. Crows are rad. Anyway! After repeating the tale to the herd, complete with voices and cartoonish faces, I doled out parts and proceeded to direct the damn thing. Turns out, monkey bars are a stellar stand-in for treetops and wood fiber mulch can basically serve as anything you’d hold in your hand or mouth – at least for a four year old. After a few rounds of rehearsals, the rest of the kids gathered to watch. Yeah, I fed lines to the stars but we had their attention!

The whole thing not only delighted my teacher and classmates, but stuck with my mom so much that she frequently references the story 30 years on as a thin-slice of who I am and what I love to do.

I’m Pebbles Russell and I love to tell stories and play with my voice!