SPEAKER: Welcome to the Towson University College of Fine Arts and Communications What's Your Story podcast. In today's story, we hear from Tavia LaFollette, Professor in the Department of Theater Arts. She recalls the time when she realized the power of stories to cross boundaries. 

TAVIA LAFOLETTE: I grew up in New York City in the '70s and '80s. It was an era of pet rocks, polyester, bell bottoms, skateboards, and rainbow shoelaces. I claim New York City, but I was really born in Argentina and lived for a while in the Northeastern corner of Connecticut, dubbed the quiet corner, along the Appalachian Trail. 

I came from these places because my parents were film makers and they would drag us from one shoot to the next. My brother Oliver and I became the city kids in a country school. And I'm sure we had quite a reputation before we even got to the school, because it was a small town and we moved into this set of the crazy inventor. 

My parents were doing a movie for Exxon, called the Great Energy Answer Hunt. Oliver, my brother, was five years older than me. I believed anything he said. He was stronger, faster, smarter and a boy. So I was kind of a boy too, a tomboy. I was the other, the crazy New Yorker, who lived in a weird house, talked funny, and dressed like a boy. 

We were constantly moving things back and forth between New York and Connecticut. On one of these trips, my brother came back from New York with a pet tribble. Do you know what a tribble is? This was before Star Wars. So Star Trek was a really big thing. Trouble With Tribbles is an episode where these fuzzy creatures take over the entire ship. 

My brother came back from New York with a tribble. He said, Tavia look, it's a tribble. Little man in outer space catch them in giant nets and you don't have to feed them anything because they live off of your love. Oh, I thought and immediately went to school, the new kid, the crazy New Yorker who dressed like a boy, and went up in front of my whole class at show and tell and said, look it's a tribble. Little men in outer space catch them in giant nets and you don't have to feed them anything because they live off of your love. 

My teacher must have thought, oh, no, these wacky New Yorkers. But all the kids, they believed me and why wouldn't they? So they all wanted to touch the tribble and I got invited to birthday parties and sleep overs and I was no longer the other. I think about this as I cross borders myself as an adult into other worlds and communities. I like to share stories because it works as a method to cross over from one other to another.