-, her name was Alexis.
And the worst part is, I thought she was my best friend.
If you've been around this email list for a while, you know I spent the formative years of my childhood on a 280-acre ostrich ranch in Central Texas.
(If you’re new here, that should explain a lot.)
But before we began our foray into dumb, exotic birds, I lived in Colleyville, Texas.
In Colleyville, you didn’t own livestock.
You owned designer bags, boots, and designer trench coats made from livestock. You had people who owned livestock for you.
Colleyville was (and still is) a predominantly upper-class suburb of Texas where I believe they actually pipe in the distinct smell of generational wealth.
(Barrel-aged Chanel No. 5, if you’re curious.)
If you’ve ever watched Parks & Recreation —and I really hope you have so we can be friends— Colleyville is Eagleton.
I say all this because a) I still have no idea how we snuck past the tax bracket requirements to live there, and b) Alexis and her family were Classic Colleyville, through and through.
I was around 4 years old at the time of this story (which my kids ask me to tell them weekly). But it probably won’t surprise you to hear that, according to my brothers, I was a “precocious” 4. “More like 14, really” my brother texted me yesterday.
It was in this same era that I walked into my mom’s bedroom with a deep, frustrated sigh, and said, “Josh and Jason just aren’t obeying me today.”
(Josh and Jason are my much-older brothers. 8 and 11 years older than me, respectively.)
Alexis, only a little older than me, lived down the street in a very fancy, peach-colored Chanel-smelling house. She was an only child, and her peach-colored bedroom boasted a densely-populated, expensive toy collection that read, "Daddy's afraid of me. / possibly has a secret second family."
(She didn’t just own all the American Girl dolls; she owned all the American Girl dolls and everything they owned. And possibly 47% of American Girl, Inc.)
I mostly remember that she never wanted to come to my house to play.
I had to come to hers.
And that day, she’d specifically asked me to bring my favorite thing in the whole world:
My Fashion Star Filly.
-, I swear to you I didn’t know this until obsessively Googling while writing this, but my Filly’s manufacturer-given name? Was SERENA… which I went on to name my firstborn child.
Probably not a coincidence? 👀
Anyway. In the mid-80s, before there were My Little Ponies, there were Fashion Star Fillies. They were extremely glamorous and high-fashion — the supermodels of the toy horse market.
Alexis had almost all of the fillies lined up on her shelves like little Miss Colleyville trophies. (Such a flex.)
I had one: Serena.
Serena had bright, smiling eyes, a star on her cheek, glowing, incandescent skin, and flowing purple hair with a single pink streak. To me, she was perfect. My bedroom wasn’t lined with toys, so we did everything together.
That day, Alexis had invited me over to “play ponies,” so I gamely brought Serena over and tried to be polite when Alexis wouldn’t allow me to touch any of her Fillies (“They’re expensive!”), but immediately took Serena to play by herself. It was Alexis’ house and I was a guest; I needed to play nicely so I’d be invited back.
(Mom, if you’re reading this, see, I really did listen.)
But when Alexis informed me that I had to leave Serena there (?!) and that she was going to keep her since she she had almost all the other Fillies (?!?!), I didn’t know what to do.
Jeanie Carden’s Polite Guest Handbook had no subsection about tiny supervillains in Neiman Marcus sundresses.
So, an hour later, my brother Jason, 12 at the time, found me crying in the living room.
(To build an accurate mental picture, you need to know that my Jason hit puberty at like 8. At this point, I’m pretty sure he was already over 6-feet tall — he’s now almost 6’5”— and had a full beard.)
He took off his baseball glove and asked what had happened.
“Alexis… took… my pony… away…” I wept into my scratchy couch pillow.
I’ll never forget what happened next.
“Wait here,” Jason said ominously.
He marched over to Alexis’s giant peach house, waited for her to come to the door, and when she did, he leaned over, blocking out the sun, and slowly growled in his deep, 12-year-old man voice,:
“Give me my sister’s pony."
"And don’t ever…. ever take it from her again.”
-, I will NEVER forget the feeling of seeing Jason walk through our front door in slow motion, flowing purple pony hair streaming out behind him.
He was a beacon of justice in troubled times. Avenger of misbegotten playdates. Scourge of small, entitled mean girls. My own personal Robin Hood.
My hero.
Alexis was very, very nice to me from that point forward.
-, there’s a reason they just keep making Avengers movies.
We love a hero moment.
We want to see justice served. We live for the moment when the Alexis’ of the world hand over the Filly and get what’s coming to them. We want the good guys to win, wrongs to be righted, and lessons to be learned.
We want to see the gentle everyman turn into something much more — for Peter Parker to become Spiderman… but also to find out Zendaya was really into him either way.
In business and branding, mostly because of the book Storybrand, people talk a lot about heroes.
They say it’s important to remember, especially in your messaging, that your client is the hero of the story; you are the guide — the Alfred to their Batman.
Your goal is to make them the main character — to talk about how they’re going to get what THEY want, achieve THEIR vision, get the results THEY’ve dreamed about.
And I totally agree.
But, just between us (and as I've talked about before), I think Storybrand had it wrong.
Batman was a hero. Alfred was a hero.
And the civilians they saved were the heroes of their stories, too.
We want you to be the hero your clients need and the one they deserve.
Like Jason, we want you to be able to swoop in when they can barely find the words to tell you what they need and get them the most important thing in their world.
To answer the questions they haven’t even expressed, anticipate their next request, and help them avoid any potential pitfalls along the way.
And we want to make you the templates you need to do just that.
Like our editorial, gorgeous, client welcome guide / magazine, which you use to help expertly guide your clients through your process to their goals like Alfred on the bat-cave monitors.
I used it make a welcome guide for our Airbnb, and we get compliments from literally every guest.
With great power comes great responsibility.
And with great responsibility, you’re going to need even better templates.
If there's a template you need me to make this summer so you can step up your hero game, reply and let me know. I do work on request.
(Like the fact that you can now buy this speaking page and podcast page separately from Spicy Marg... You're welcome.)
Your favorite ex-Colleyvillian,
– Jen
P.S. If you enjoyed this story or just want to send a note back, click here to hit reply. I read every single response and writing this + emailing with you every Friday is the Fashion Star Filly of my to-do list.
P.P.S. Alexis, if you’re reading this, I’m not four anymore and I know exactly where you can stick your Fashion Star Fillies...
