It is so close to the departure for Burning Man and I am really nervous. I am sitting here in a sea of bills and behind on a car payment and feel like I cannot do anything about any of it. I was out walking Tom and started wondering if I was going to have to choose between rent and a car payment. I have been doing well financially, but somewhere along the way I managed to trip. I am still in free fall, imagine that.

Some people might be thinking, well ‘obviously you shouldn’t be going to Burning Man if you can’t afford it’? Newsflash, Burning Man was paid for in January before I was laid off and going there for 10 days will be cheaper than living in my apartment in Las Vegas… but let us not forget:

THIS IS A TRIP OF A LIFETIME.
If you don’t get it and don’t want to get it you never will… so bugger off.

And I stress over things at times more than I should. I lose sleep over dumb stuff. I kvetch my brains out but in the end things usually turn out okay. I am ready to get past this bump in the road.

…… I am a different person now in some ways. I look forward to my spirit walk through the desert. In 3+ weeks when I come back (if I come back) I look forward to making a new turn on my journey. It’s already planned out… cool, huh?

If I come back.

Spaghetti Dinner was more than a week ago and I am just making my notes. There were 50 burners plus and some people who have not participated with our immediate family before. I think this was awesome! I was pretty emotional on this meeting; I felt huge amounts of joy; felt tremendous burden and stress about this journey coming to a conclusion; I felt sad that every day can’t be like that evening.

The connections you make in life define you and it is here I found things that I never experienced it. So, Cameron, my churchification is complete. I am the LDS of Burning Man… ha ha ha…..

Sad news, too. The “No Burner Left Behind Event” as it was planned is officially cancelled. Too much behind the story to even hope to put on this journal; but even in paradise there was a bad apple or two.

Sigh….

It’s funny with all the bitching and kvetching about friends that – occasionally – there are some nice surprised. Mexican-John materialized this weekend after more than a month absence. Turns out he got involved with some douchebag (oops, I mean he was dating this guy) whom I met today. One word: douche. Have you figured out he is a douche yet…. ha ha ha

It was really good seeing him again. At least he is seeing that this guy is a solid mess and will be out of the dating picture soon – I hope.

We went to the movies to see District9 and I liked it a lot. Douchebag (aka Erich) came with John and he disappeared in the bathroom for a long ass time. Then apparently he could not figure out from his ticket what theater we were in, so I come out looking for him and see him in the lobby trying to call John to find him… sigh.

He came in… but I look over and DB is gone. Gone… gone. John says he left. After John said he paid for his ticket and everything… DB did not have his wallet or his car so I am wondering how he got out of there. Damn – some people.

Ugh. At least I got some pool time in today and met a couple of cute boys. They were very sweet and hope they hang out again. yey!

huggles

So, I have a lot of things to think about these days. There is a storm brewing which we will call chaos. Chaos breeds change and the first thing I do is look around and determine – what keeps me here in Las Vegas other than a shitty lease. I ask myself – where are my roots? Who is here that makes me happy to be with?

Well – obvious answer #1 is that I have my Burners. But Burners do not seem to be hampered by Geography because they always seem to be able to bridge the miles. Events that bring people together are sporadic and somewhat organized… unfortunately the people who have been managing those events are backing out this year and leaving it up to someone else to take the mantel.

Alas, when I look at the other relationships I have managed here… even they seem to be coming apart.

The guy I have considered my best-bud for 3 years has pulled away from my almost entirely; not even an explanation. I tried developing a friendship with another guy here, David, but he is not available either. Seems a lot of our cool hangout time seems to evolve around partying… and I guess that is not enough?

The women I have been friends with are also falling away. Deb is busy with her own life and even getting together has been nearly impossible. The only reason I see Olga so often is she lives right next to me. Roberta lives on the other side of town and we barely connect. Indi is a burner so she fits more in that scene.

True many of the things I do sorta exclude these friends. Burner events in the desert, guy only events at the pool, and sometimes I just want buddies.

My friends off in the distance are important to me too, and I still feel Jeff A and Kaidy though the live in L.A.. Strangers on Facebook are just as close sometimes and it is all quite annoying.

As I try and develop quality relationships with minimal baggage; I have opened myself quite a bit only to be hurt and disappointed way too often. Disappointed? That means I am setting up some expectations. Yes – I have expectations. I expect people to act like human being without hidden agendas and that seems to be impossible.

Whether it is a touchy-feely guy hanging on the fringe of the group who is ambivalent to boundaries (I suffer the occasional problem myself), or it is a guy making nice to use me to help him move or get groceries or whatever.

What prompted this entry is Mark again. He is a solid gold flake and I am sick of it again. We reacquainted with each other a few days ago and within a day or so he had me agreeing to ferry him to SFO in October to help him move??? Before that I was his ride to Burning Man – which he blamed me for ruining when I told him he had to find another way (that was the result of a previous argument).

As I look back with Mark I am now realizing he is a user. I developed feelings for this guy when we went to Utah together; things started going romantic and very much in a dating mode. Then one day he said he was not attracted to me. BOOM – slam the gate, turn the key, drop the key into the gutter and walk away from me. Ugh…

He said and did a lot of things over the following two weeks that just hurt my feelings. He was cruel in his words at me and when I just shut the door on that and walked away it was all I could do not to blow up. I just shut down and walked away. Now he seems to be putting me through the mess again without the romantic ideation.

Bad timing. I had – about the time of the Utah trip – felt like I was ready to open my heart to someone. Well… as noted in the previous entry – he took a crap on it, spit at it, pointed and laughed at it.

Heart closed.

In the process of coming to terms with a lot of things, I feel this huge shadow coming over me. As the world darkens I feel like there is a short row of brightly lit passages ahead. Which one shall I pass through?

I have been struggling with work since February when I was laid off from my job. I have no ill feelings about being laid off, I was not an important cog in the machine there. It was a sales driven environment and I was a web designer that did his job; I deigned and launched the TalentHook.com web site. It still looks great and is still working.

It’s all good.

So, given the experiences I have had and the skills that have driven me mostly over the last 2 years I ask myself: do I maintain this career path and follow through with design? …or do I pursuit cooking. I could so return to banquet cooking or more personal chef work.

Both fill me with great passion and there really is no reason I can’t do both. I do wonder if my time in Vegas is at an end? My roots here are not deep and friends I counted on outside the burner community have faded away. Yet, even many of my burners have not embraced me that much; but they are family; it’s a different feeling.

Been thinking a lot about Hollywood again and am thinking a lot about Austin [TX]. Oh where to go and what to do… sigh. Which door do I take Monty Hall? Which door do I take?

So, I woke up this morning looking around myself and feeling like such a fraud. It’s funny to make a statement like that, but one of the things I have been struggling with is the identity of who I am.

I have passions and I love doing a full and complete job, but I can wear more than one hat at a time? <--- yes it is a question mark without it actually being a question. I started a journey about a year ago and began living a life outside of the box I thought I knew and began exploring things about myself. It caused some relationships to fall away and brought some closer. I have some new friends and different expectations from the people I meet day to day. Within that, there is a lot of pain you see in how other people are defining their identities and the shallow, plastic, even papermache construction of those personas. Funny how quickly those same people want so badly to tear down my world because it is really freed from certain false supports. But… I’m good enough to challenge myself. I know how and when I delude myself, but I have dreams still. I’m a middle aged kid inside and still maintain some adult discretion’s and disciplines… I am. I am… … (he sits down and looks out across the open landscape. In one moment it is a beautiful desert with metallic coppers and steel – while it morphs into rich blues and flowing greens of an enchanting forest – it’s endless)
He dreams of coming back from the desert after a long journey changed. To find profound moment when the tears of fear and anxiety wash away the broken shell to reveal reborn… he flies away to a new landscape and a new adventure.

First Friday in Las Vegas Art District was today with a nice Burning Man focus. It was cool to have the art cars there as well as the costumes, poi, spinners, hoopers and tunes. I played a mix from DJ Spyder from AZBurners TOAST and our very own DJ Damian. The music was perfect.

What I did notice is that First Friday was totally weak about letting people know the Burners were out there. Not that they needed to or cared, because on this night they had a huge flow of people. It was one of the nicest (weather wise) First Friday’s I had been to.

I emailed Cindy at Whirleygig Inc (who runs First Friday) asking her if she had a twitter (like me x3) so I can follow them and their adventures with Whirelygig… blah blah blah no reply. I wondered also why Burning Man was not mentioned in anything they sent out. Kinda sucked.

There are a lot more pictures being posted. But there will be a hell of a lot more in Spetember.

Anyway, I emailed my community about a vigil for some fallen burners including Elias Sorkin and Holli Hollowell and 2 locally connected burners. Elias is said to have been murdered in Santa Cruz, California and they had not found his body. Holli was injured in a motor cycle accident in India back in March and literally came out of her coma last week. 2 local burners and freinds of Melissa were hurt in a motor cycle accident and are slowly recovering; but they will never be the same.

Between Holli and Elias I found myself emotionally attached to these people, though I did not know them. Maybe I sound like an idiot? I wondered about going into this vigil and one of my people explained he is an athiest and blah … yet I have some spiritually connected people… so I tried to bridge it to the middle.

I set up a table with a brief explaination with a pic of Elias and one of Holli and told people a little about them. I had a box with a slot in the top for people to put well wishes, prayers, thoughts, messages, what ever they needed to express.

The box will go to Burning Man with me and will be put into the fire at the base of the man on Sep 6th.

Now, I think that is some universal points?

Hm. More tomorrow. A few things are bugging me. But they might be gone after some rest. Or maybe this is better for my diary (other blog). sigh….

I asked my community to bring a white candle for the health and wellness of people in our community. I’ll be naming people like Elias Sorokin, Holli Hollowell, and a couple other local members who have been faced with tragedy. Members of our global community as well as locals… just for peace.

The video features Elias from his friends and was posted on the Burncast… peace.

There is a sea of atheists out there who may not be comfortable with the whole thing, but there are a lot of us that are very spiritual. One atheist shocked me by telling me that. I mean I see a spiritual presence in Burning Man…. but it is a perception.

I omitted a page about my journey this year and realized today that is was important. So I updated and re added it to the site. I also added my burner logo into the banner. See my Burn. Linked in the menu to the right ->

When I remodeled my site I removed one of my resources… a page a started for my journey from 2008 to 2009. Burning Man was the path I took. In recent months I have been accused of letting Burning Man take over… well there is a lot going on. I enjoy this community and have found a lot of meaning in it; besides the small amount of drawback. However, I have control over the influences around me and I make my own choices.

Radical Self Reliance is Dogma in the Burner World and it forces a person to not seek crutches … but really there is a mutual understanding that you have to be responsible for your own actions. On the other hand, there is a great sense of oneness in the the community at times when it is needed.

I find people judging this sub-culture without knowing a single thing about, but there are a sea of mundanes out there dreaming of going – yet not knowing a thing about it. The “churchification” (Cam’s word) of Burning Man can be a black hole, because it can demand a lot from you. I do what I do because the principles of this group are in my heart now.

These people – though dysfunctional – are more functional that most of the people I have met in the default world. I have heard new people introduced to this scene say on more occasions than I can count: “Can you imagine if everyone in the world treated each other like a burner treats another burner, we would have peace.”

I can dream it.