the adventures of boxhead
Morale was low for a couple weeks, and then I remembered you can just put a cardboard box with eyeholes on your head and walk around downtown.
It was a Friday night. People loved me.
My very first encounter was a pretty drunk person who was... ecstatically confused? He kept asking why I was wearing a box, and we kept saying "It's friday night!!!", which really didn't clear it up. He walked away with a spring in his step and the biggest, most incredulous grin.
The moment most people saw me, their faces absolutely lit up. Then they'd immediately turn to their friends, family, even nearby strangers, to see how other people would react. I loved seeing how everyone responded to something so unexpected, so socially untrodden. I brought a lot of joy to a lot of faces.
I was in so many photos, and at least one travel video on a proper video camera (I waved and said "Hello from [town]!!", which made them incredibly happy). One man said "I'm voting for you!", so, ?, :)! At one point I bumped into someone (...I had next to zero peripheral vision), and when she turned around and saw me, it was a solid eight seconds before she could stop laughing long enough to say hi.
The name "boxhead" quickly started showing up. So many groups of people independently thought of it. Everyone around me was watching joyfully. I was riding on a wave of people behind me saying "WAIT WHAT WAS-- WHAT?" and "I DIDN'T EVEN NOTICE...!". With the weird acoustics and limited visuals of the box, everything felt unreal in the best possible way.
A decent few people walked past while awkwardly trying not to stare, which is hilarious, because I am wearing a box on my head. I think you can stare at someone with a box on their head.
The best part was, if I waved or nodded at someone, they'd get so happy they'd sometimes literally jump up and down.
There were a couple assholes, of course. Two people decided to smack the box as hard as they could. And one guy grabbed my arm. Hard. My friend / bodyguard moved them all quickly away, but it was... unpleasant, and put me on high enough alert that I got pretty overwhelmed by the end of the evening. Also a group of lads (derogatory) kept calling out jokes about 'they/them box' which like, okay.
We decided to sit in a park for a little while. I laid down in the short grass, crunching raspberry sweets and looking through my eyeholes at the clouds drifting past. I love existing in a little box, which smells slightly of cardboard and keeps out most of the light. I don't have to act like a human person, I can just be.
It's wild how no one does this.
