Three Boxes

Growing up, whenever I was testing out a new pen or pencil, I’d often doodle three boxes. Specifically, three rectangles. Side by side. Just like the logo on this site. In fact, that image is a vector version of the “canonical” drawing of the boxes I have from my childhood.

I never knew what the boxes were or why I drew them.

One day in high school I realized they represented a game I used to play with my grandmother when I was a very young boy.

My grandparents ran a business that involved shipping, and they often had these very specific tall, skinny, rectangular cardboard boxes around their warehouse. They even had some of the boxes at home, in the garage… used for who knows what.

I’d enlist my grandmother to play a game with me. I’d drag three of those big empty boxes out, lay them down in their driveway, put out a folding chair for her to sit in, and hand her a broom. I’d instruct her to close her eyes while I hid in one of the boxes, and she’d tap on the box she thought I was in. Like the classic shell game. If she found me, I’d jump out of the box and laugh with her. I can still remember how fun it was to hide and watch the inside of the roof of the box cave in a little when she’d tap it and find me.

Those three boxes have been a personal logo and sort of trademark almost my entire life.

I miss you, Guy.