Sunday, 1 July 2001

1998

We made it to the playa under some duress, but we had to go as our friends asked us to join them. Funny how we'll drive 750 miles to visit with folks that live just across town. We brought an enormous amount of stuff - a whole camp of our very own, toys, candy, food and water for several armies. We wore our idealism on our smiling faces, and after the 100th horrifyingly discouraging encounter with thankless idiots on too many drugs, puking in the gutters of what now were practically paved streets with names and lights and everything, we had to take action to not end up bitter at the whole event.

We had a great time, saw our friends, strolled around, set up camp, played with stuff, met new people, gave away a lot of stuff, and knew our abridged version was as good as it was going to get.

We left after 21 hours. Here are the highlights:

Burning Man 1998

A Travelogue

Thursday

12 noon At Work

The weather reports for Gerlach, NV, call for severe thunderstorms for the next several days. There’s nothing like storms on the playa! This is one of the reasons to go to Burning Man. Hooray! Perusing the e-playa and find background on the multitudinous theme camps. Decide this whole thing is entirely out of hand, excessively contrived, probably pissing off the locals again (why I didn’t go last year). But Brendan and I have never been to Burning Man together, and decide that we’ve gotta do it. We’re going to go open-minded and open-hearted, and have a great time together. And see our all of our friends and loved ones...

First time sans larger group - this should be liberating. I’m just worried about the security factor - and boy does that suck. Alora.

3pm Leaving SF

Traffic is about what you’d expect if an entire city is taking a 4-day weekend.

4:30pm Loomis

Shopping at the Loomis Raley’s is an intensely pleasant experience - everyone is friendly, folks make eye contact and smile. They have a child care center in the store, on top of an amazing looking deli and Wells Fargo ATMS.We go on a little exploratory adventure through what we have to admit is a very cute little town.

Gas is $1.11/gallon.

6pm Donner Summit

The electrical storms promised by the weather forecasts are delivered. Hand of God lightening, intense double rainbows which become brighter as the sun sets.

8:30pm Getting gas betw. Sparks & Gerlach

Dudefest ‘98. First signs that this is turning into LollapaSpringBreak.

9:00pm in Open Range country

Cop pulls off road in opposite lane, lights flashing. Obviously a warning to Slow Down Now. We did - just narrowly avoiding hitting a scampering steer. He was like an 800lb. puppy, lost on the hwy.

9:15 Gerlach

We are faced with the enormity of this years’ Black Rock City. Fuck it’s big. We marvel at the number of flatbed and rental trucks. It’s a lot like driving into Las Vegas, complete with lights. It’s so bright you can’t see the stars.

9:20pm Burning Man

Totally amused and heartened by the “Slow The Fuck Down” signs posted along the road to Camp. Anything over 7mph stirs up a thick cloud of dust, and there can be a lot of ignorant drivers out here.

9:30 S.10th/Outer: Home Base.

There’s a tree-lined village of Renn Faire tents opposite our hoped-for (and vacant!) spot. Bond with our immediate neighbor, a very cool 60ish loner guy named Roger. He's got a truck, a lean-to, a lantern and a book. And a wonderful, neighborly, disposition. He rocks.

Set up camp in the dark - no mean feat.

Discover shelter apparatus is just about worth the $20 we paid for it.

10:00pm Baltic Ave.

Going for a walk, looking for Piss Clear and Fandango. We run into Anton, Daniel & Vera, and Nigel and Rebecca, from Tower Camp. Hooray for old friends! No luck finding our destinations, but they serve as a fine excuse for a walk.

Cool percussionists and fire dancers at center stage. Drano Village is just about the coolest thing ever, next to the flaming bull car. We get to N12th and Baltic and head home. Gaggles of kids on drugs, doing the group hug thing, the blank stare thing, the glowstick thing.

Lots and lots of nouveau goth (hack), capes and whiteface and all...

One precious vestige of what I’ve come to expect from Bman in the form of a random, tweaker conversation on the (approach of the new) millenium, psychic evolution, and psylocibin. Lots of Terrence McKenna references.

Friday

3:00am

Windstorm making shelter flap about. We get up and take it down so as not to annoy the neighbors.

6am

Awakened by the light and heat. The local (down the street, blaring for all it’ s worth ) radio station is playing African Head Charge. How nice! Last night it was XTC and the B52's, with some 70s top 40 for good measure. Um, ecclectic is good within limits...

Breakfast on PB & J, Tiger’s Milk and guarana. Create masterpiece shelter. The Leathermanish tool Dad sent for my birthday totally proves itself.

7:30am

We're annoyed by the preponderence of naked people, especially when such is the chosen mode of "expressing oneself.” Come now - all it tells me is your body shape, which is usually uninteresting and rarely novel. So many blank canvases... Way too many male genitals entwined with bicycle seats - ouch.

8am

Going for a walk, we’re invited to play on the Big Swings. Hooray for nice people! Only 2/5 people return Good Morning greetings, but those make up for the Losers. The radio station is playing Hong Kong Phooey, and this makes a neighbor run out and dance in the intersection. Someone has found their secret bliss. Woo-hoo!

We head out to Fandango, miles away, with our colored mylar parasols. Run into Layne, looking fabulous, on the way. He directs us to Fandango and Piss Clear.

There’s so much crap around the Man, which is so close to camp. The Tower is really close, too. Crowd control is in full effect.

Where are the Cacaphony Society camps? Where is OhMyGawd (ok, we saw him on the way home, and a smattering of other Art Cars in BRC)? And the BugVan? All the veterans have vanished.

9:00am at the BFT

Little sign of the Fandango crew. Slim and Galen and friend are the only creatures stirring, except for Weave, who doesn’t say hi. It’s hot under the BFT. We give our address for those seeking us, and/or quiet, and depart.

Grab PissClears on the way home, and take photos with Layne.

Find the Peace Chain camp - hooray! Forgot to bring barter items on the walk - boo.

9:30am S.17th

At the far end of camp we find the Forest of the Day Before. Nice. Rubiks Cube is cool. Lots of CD sculptures. Many "Alien" themed camps - no imagination, just following directions. Since when has Bman had a theme? Spiral Oasis didn’t bring a full moon weather ballon - phooey. Nice blowy thing, tho; serves as a great homing beacon. Great music - trancearific. And besides, there will be a real full moon Sunday.

A camp of older folks (sorry, besides their coolness that’s the distinguishing characteristic we picked out), cooking breakfast and being cheery. The alpha male calls out “nice art!” the finest compliment I’ve received in a long time. Thank you for thinking beyond "tats!" This stuff in my skin is my current mode of Art.

Our neighbors 2 doors down turn out to be the Butterfly Bike, motorized sofas, and Bunny Car guys. True self expression thru vehicles. Right On.

I wonder about all the guys I see in motorized wheelchairs - have they seen Crash one too many times?

10am back at home base

It’s about 100F. Hooray for H2O, spray bottles, and aromatic oils! We lounge, and groove on our immediate neighbors: Jonathan (a most gregarious, generous, genuine guy), Frankie, Andra, and Friend (very nice kids!). Jonathan offers real live tent stakes to help with our shelter. Later he gives us a shower with his garden mister. It’s his first time here, and he also followed a strong instinctual urge to come at the last minute. He’s having the time he deserves, a great one.

The annoying little shits who invaded our camp last night turn out to have a link to Roger. Hm! We invite them into our shade, but they are too cool for that. They roast for several hours, at which point one’s Mom shows up in an RV towing a car. After grabbing the car (which is to be sold here) they head off to “where the action is.” Okey Doke. Sayonara.
Spiral Oasis is playing Roni Size - ahh...

11:00am

We swear it’s been all freaking day. Hours have passed in the past 20 min. It’s 104F in the shade, but we’re digging it. Very little traffic besides the occaisional arrival, driving too fast.

Very, very pleased by the pristing condition of our local Port-o-San, until it is padlocked. Urgh! As it happens, the row-o-potties down the road is well kempt. Hooray for the Porto-San maintenence guys! Hooray for groovy neighbors!

Jonathan enjoys how “here, people can be who they really are.” That, plus related tidbits in PissClear, makes me feel dismay at what I imagine to be the daily lives of people who only express themselves here. These are the naked spectators. Adrian says Bman Is classist - I have seen it as Haight St. On the Playa. The naked folks shop for style in the boutiques manned by trustfunders gone street. I notice fewer and fewer really honest-to goodness groovy folks that have come out to share in the wonder of creativity and etc. human agency. There are a few; but perhaps most have, decided to stay home.

This is our Burning Man experience - nice, creative and/or openhearted, mature neighbors (most of S. 9Th through S.11th), garnished with hordes of silly kids showing off to one another, lots of “partay!” screams, boring naked folks, and annoying addicts.

This year's epiphanies: follow your bliss. Really. Don't hang out just because you're expected to; go home when you're done.

12:00 noon

Lunching upon cans of black beans and corn - perfect playa food. We discuss going home - should we spontaneously decide when it is time, or plan to leave at some point? We plan for spontaneity, sit back, and enjoy the windstorm. I’m very proud of our little shelter for weathering it so bravely.

3:00pm

Having discussed the silliness of hanging out waiting til dark to do and see things we don’t really care about all that much, we go for a perhaps final walk to the Man to photograph just how freakin’ big this convention has gotten to be. 1/2 way there I feel woozy - oops, no hat - and sunburnt - yeah, I’m pinkish.

We turn back for parasols and sunscreen, only to find one final pile of reified inklings to leave - our shelter has collapsed in the 5 min. we spent away, after a vicious windstorm. The stakes and lines are still functional, but the poles themselves have bent in half. Wow. That’s pretty much the hint that it’s time to go. Seeing actual rain in the offing, and, we pull down and pack up in about 7 minutes.

I give the barter toys and 5 gal. of water to the old guy, our parking cardboard to Jonathan’s camp. We make it out in the nick of time, stopped by an immense sandstorm near the gate. Visibility=0 for several minutes. We’re almost run over by a van. What an idiot. We eat camp food and guarana on the way home, no stopping at Burger King, for an expeditious trip.

6pm State Line

Customs guy smiles and waves us through. The foothills are lovely; sluices and tiny railways line the highway. Trees everywhere. The sun starts to set as we pass Colfax, and is lovely. There are more storms ahead of us.

9:15pm

It’s sprinkling but warm on the way home to S.F. We indulge ourselves in showers and a soak in the bath. Real food. Beauregard. Bedding. The Garden. Ahh...

Saturday

Forecast as of 3:30 am PDT on September 6, 1998

"Flash Flood Watch This Afternoon and Evening Until 1000 Pm... Now : flash flood watch until 1000 pm PDT... showers and thunderstorms had begun to develop...mainly over the higherterrain...at 1245 pm over parts of northern Washoe County and also over Lassen and Plumas counties. Heavy rain and lightning will become more likely after 200 pm and through the evening hours. A flash flood watch means that flash flooding of washes...small streams...rivers...and other drainages is possible in the watch area. People in the watch areashould keep an eye on the weather. Be prepared to escape rising water by climbing directly to higher ground if heavy rains occur or if a warning is issued. Do not CAMP near streams or other areas subject to possible flooding. Do not attempt to cross fast flowing or rising water...Many flash flood deaths occur when motorists try crossing flooded roadways. Never try to outrace a flood either on foot or in your vehicle."

Happily it was not as dramatic as all that - it was more! more!! more!!! of a good time for those who stayed for the Burn.