Pleasant Journey

A carnival inventor demonstrates an electrical helmet-and-chair apparatus that stimulates the brain to conjure a traveler's subjective experience of home. A cautious buyer becomes immersed in a succession of intensely vivid domestic and pastoral scenes—city streets, highways, meadows, and a familiar house—feeling physical sensations and emotional certainty despite only seconds of real time passing. He returns to the booth, purchases the machine, and receives a warning that repeated use may lead users to prefer the created homes. The narrative explores technology as escape, yearning for belonging, and the commercial trade in illusion.