One week from tonight is SeaCompression and I have yet to write a thing about this year's Burn. I don't quite know why; 's probably a combination of things. I came home to a job that started days after I returned. It was my second Burn, so I wasn't seeing with beginner eyes. And it was a difficult year, plain and simple.

It was hard to leave the playa feeling so jumbled, yet I was never more grateful for a bed and shower than the night we pulled in to Lakeview. The ride home was so very ugly; the bed and shower were the only positive aspects until we reached Pdx. In some ways I'm still reeling from that drive, but that's not a topic for this space. That one stays locked up nice and tight.

I just feel like this year was wasted, y'know? All the prep, all the excitement, all the work and effort and cost, and it was a let-down.

To begin with, the first two days were HELL in a bucket. We set the chute up in a major dust storm on Saturday. It took much longer than expected because the design changed - we raised it by 10 feet and put 8 foot poles around the edges to lift it off the playa floor. We had no electric and very limited water for the first 24 hours we were there, as the coordinators of those things... well, bygones, eh?

Sunday was just as bad, though the portapotties arrived on time, and the water (24 hours late) arrived shortly thereafter. Mid day we were hit with MASSIVE dust storms again, which eventually started pulling out the side poles. We attempted to tie the chute down to the Penske van, but it was clear something needed to be done differently. After about 8 hours of holding the damn thing down by hand - at one point we had around 20 people holding on to the chute to keep it from pulling more poles out - and much discussion about options, it was (wisely) decided that we should lower the chute. So Sunday night, after dinner, we took the whole thing down, and set it ALLL back up. It was tiring, but necessary. And wise, ultimately, because we had several more big, multi-hour storms later in the week.

Of course, all this meant that many of us didn't even SEE beyond our camp boundaries until LATE sunday night, and by that time, most of us were too tired to do much beyond wandering out to the esplanade to see what was taking shape.

Bold and BLove and I were among the MOST overworked that Sunday night, but we did drag our sorry asses ALLLLLL the way across the playa to the Big Round Cubatron, which is STILL my favorite installation piece. I could sit in front of that thing for hours if the desert floor weren't so damn cold at night. It's really THAT wonderful.

Monday was much nicer - no major storms, moderate temps - so we got the rest of the place set up and organized. Bold and BLove and I decided to take a ride over to visit the DFTs to see Jonathan and Dad and Buttery. I got less than a block when my seat fucked up and my chain slipped. I lost it. Right in the middle of Arctic and 6:30 and I'm crying like a toddler. I was just so done. Yes, it was only Monday. Bless BLove's heart, he went and got his tools and he fixed my bike up for me. Unfortunately it was already SOOO dusty that there were little drifts and my skinny tired piece of shit couldn't manage them well. I realized that within a couple of days, I'd have to give up riding. Still, we made it out and about, saw the DFTs, then rode out into open playa for a bit. After a while, Bold and I split off from BLove and hit Center Camp just to check it out.

The rest of Monday was pretty mellow. The remainder of our camp arrived and got settled in, we had dinner, and took off into the night. Bold and I ran around with Tombro, who showed us how to REALLY work the backroads bars. My only real complaint about it was that my contacts were gummy and icky. It took another day or two and I switched over to my dailies; the eyedrops weren't helping and I got sick of having halos at night.

We came home, hung out with folks, and settled in to watch the eclipse. Once it was full, I toddled off to bed, saying "Ok, the moon has done its creepy thing. I'm going to sleep." I don't know how long I was out, but I awoke to Bold unzipping the tent and telling me I had to get up cause the man was on fire.

"On fire?"

"Yeah, he's burning!"

"Oh shit."

I hauled my cold and extremely tired ass outta bed and we tromped through the Virgins' camp and saw that he was, indeed, ablaze. Such a bizarre thing. I wanted to cheer it on, and yet, I couldn't because it was arson. More importantly, there was the very real potential that this little "stunt" could awaken the wrong interest in BMan, putting us on the radar of people who wouldn't think twice about shutting the event down.

So yeah, that set the tone for the week. Things were tense for me. The energy in camp was weird; there were some interpersonal dynamics that left folks feeling excluded and although we had no more infrastructure problems, the stability of the chute and our tents was always on our minds.

On top of all this, I got whomped with a bladder infection. I won't recount the clusterfuck that THAT turned out to be, but suffice it to say, it took me outta the game for a couple of days. In the midst of that, Bold decided to play a lil kickball with rebar and broke his toe. End result? I couldn't ride cause it hurt, he couldn't walk much cause it hurt. Sucked to be us.

We did manage to get out and see a lot of the installation art. And there were some really beautiful times - getting caught in the massive dust storm at the Temple of Forgiveness, riding out the rainstorm in the booth and being rewarded with a double rainbow, giving out snap peas on Friday, having a Margarita at Monticello on Thursday Afternoon, wine, cheese, and prosciutto on Burn night, riding on Leo's bee, Temple Burn.... Cherished moments, made all the sweeter because they were so few and far between. And I made some marvelous connections - I strengthened old friendships, revelled in new ones, and enjoyed the catharsis of baring my soul to a complete Stranger.

All in all, I walked away from it all feeling very ambivalent. I know this is colored by Bold's experience, which was even less positive than mine. I wanted so much for him to love it unconditionally as I do, but this was a really hard year for everyone, doubly so for virgins. With the extra burden of me being down for the count and the constant wind which made sleeping difficult for him... well, it seems like he never really got his legs underneath him. By the end of the week he was so fried he told me he didn't think he could do it again. That's changed in the ensuing months, but he's still wary, I think.

Oh well. What will be, will be. Next year is a long ways off, and we've got a lot less time to burn (heh) thinking about it. So much is up in the air, what with jobs, money, the kiddo... I can't imagine not going back - the playa's in my blood now - but how it will manifest, I don't know.

Time will tell....

Re-Entry

Oh-Seven is history. I think that's a good thing, but time will tell. This year was markedly different from last year: many more downs than ups, challenges that weren't present in oh-six, campmates that, through non-action, created discord.

The tenor of this year's recap will be much less exuberant, but done with no less emotion. The playa giveth, and the playa taketh away. We love her no less for it.

Gearin' up for Oh-Seven

I was skimming the posts I've written and wow! It sure does seem like the Playa was a long, long time ago. Even the pictures seem like they're from a different age. So weird. I still find it hard to believe I was there, and oddly, the pictures don't help as much as I wish they did. To get the REAL flashback, I hafta sneak into my garage and open up my gear bins and breaaaaathe deep. THAT'S what I'm talkin' about. Heehee.

I'm starting to get excited about this year's burn. I can't wait to be back out there - chapped lips, dusty hands, 4pm heat and all. The funny thing is that it's really not about the place. Rather it's about a week of just being. It's an incredible gift. But there's something about the otherworldliness of the Playa - the isolation, the barrenness, the climatic extreme of it - that elevates that gift and turns it into something extraordinary. Granted, I haven't been to Critical Massive or Recompression or Xara or any of the other gear-up event, so I can't say for sure, but I have trouble believing that it's as easy to leave your baggage at the gate at those events. They're too close to home and too easy in comparison.

But to trek to the Playa, so far from any urban center (major OR minor), to pack everything you need to survive, to move - in my case at least - from a temperate marine climate lush with evergreens through irrigated plateaus, arroyo, and finally to arid ancient lakebed is really a journey. Among other things, I discovered that my emotional health was inversely related to the aridness of the land! Who knew?

This year will present some interesting challenges. Foremost is the fact that it's my second year. I have expectations now, which will be very difficult to leave aside. Yet, all my reference points will be different: different campmates, different location, different tent, different burn. Last year I went in with blind faith; that will be harder to do this year. Still, to drive through those gates with the expectation of having anything other than AN experience is to set myself up for disappointment. I'll have to chew on this one a while.

The other challenge is that my man Bold will be there with me. I'm extremely excited about sharing the Burn with him - CRAzY excited. But I hear stories of how hard the playa can be on relationships. I'm not super worried about that because although I believe those stories wholeheartedly - I've seen the effects myself on the relationships of friends - Bold and I have a strong, loving, forgiving relationship. We've weathered a lot together and we try to remain in charity with each other. Plus we're on the same page about so much and where we're not, we talk things out. Still, it's easy to get grouchy out there and when you factor in the intensity of the build-up and prep beforehand, well, irritability and flash anger and crankiness are probably inevitable.

The real challenge will be the man himself (Bold, not the MAN). He's fully into going, he's happily involved in the camp, he's active and psyched. I'm making the choice to trust that. I say this cause I remember last year, standing out there, looking at my camp and those around us, and thinking "I canNOT picture him out here." The playa demands that you drop your cynicism, drop your defenses, drop your excuses, and just BE. I had real trouble seeing him able to let go of his need for situational control enough to do that. I'm less worried about that now - he's changed a lot since moving out here - but there are many, seemingly innocuous things he's still unwilling/unable to take risks on. I guess I need to remember that I'm not responsible for his experience out there - he'll get out of it what he puts into it. I need to remember that his experience will be valid regardless of what he walks away with. I need to remember not to burden him with the experience *I* want him to have.

Ah... such an interesting few months ahead of us. I can't wait to see how this unfolds.