The Rule of the Box

It’s funny how much little boxes can absorb your life. At this time of year, I enjoy looking at the brightly coloured gift boxes for Christmas and in a couple of weeks we pull out our personal boxes of Christmas decorations and put them up. (It helps keep our mood light through all the Christmas shows).

There are also boxes of magic. Boxes to carry magic props, boxes for the magic kits, and although you’ll never see them there are boxes for the assistants. These boxes make interviews very quick, because if you can’t get in the box – you can’t be the assistant. Before anyone panics I’m told once you’re used to them they can be quite comfy, in fact, Teller fell asleep in one of his and only made his cue on stage because the stage hand was a bit clumsy moving the box. There’s also a friend of ours who was interviewing an ex-circus lady, she was having trouble getting in the box and our friend thought that was it. But she asked if he could make her a cup of tea and she’d have a play with the box. When he came back down she was gone, he thought she had left too embarrassed to say goodbye. He went to put the box away and she scared the life out of him by jumping out of the box. They’ve worked together very successfully for many years now.

The animals have boxes of all types; huge ones called home, middle-sized ones for traveling in, and slightly smaller ones as their props. These props are specially designed so they can’t be too cramped (the animals get more moving space than the assistants).

Then there are boxes just for me during the paperwork. Some of these are fine; this box contains how much you earn, and this box is your voting choice. But some boxes are much harder; what industry are you in? What’s your gender? Can you make the same time every week? Often I have to choose the nearest best option or the ‘other’ box (although the gender options are getting much better).

The world of offices and 9 to 5’s (or battery humans as Ben says) seem to work well with boxes but once you step outside that small box with a desk, the paperwork gets much more inventive.

So it seems we all have boxes, choose yours with care and make it yours without a doubt.