I'm Bagging Burning Man

So today I was digging through my bag full of MiniDiscs, trying to see if the original Moray interview was on another disc (somehow, I deleted a killer interview and live recordings of two songs on my way to San Diego) and I came across a MiniDisc from the earliest days. Uncertain what was on it, I popped it into the deck and stcuk the headphones in my ears...

And I heard the sounds of the Playa. Unmistakably the Plaza...I was somewhere out in the middle of the Playa, talking to myself, this was Burning Man 2000, and in the background you could hear the whole damn carnival that is Burning Man taking place behind, while I stood around in the distance, two miles out from the Man, trying to make sense of what I'd seen so far, that first year I went.

This would have been my fifth year - I ostensibly started this blog to talk about Burning Man, after I was there last year and I realized that there was still so much to be said about all that I had seen and experienced there. Then, this blogging thing seemed kinda silly without a topic to focus on, but now, I just like writing about whatever-the-fuck strikes my fancy - which is maybe the best thing about Burning Man there is.

This year, I was really lukewarm about going, mostly because I haven't been terribly profitable this year - although that wasn't really the issue. I applied for - and received - the low-income ticket for the drop-bottom price of $145. In the course of writing my essay for that, I realized since I was letting it all ride on whether or not I got the low-cost ticket, that maybe it didn't matter if I got to go or not. In the essay, I had the opportunity to think about all that Burning Man had done for me already (maybe I'll back-post it at some point) and to realize that if I went to Burning Man in 2000 because I thought the world sucked ass and I was completely uninspired, then the fact that I now feel so darn inspired by all my projects - DropCaster, this blog, my photo hobby, the second book I'm writing, various stories I'm writing for various magazines - may have something to do with what I was able to experience there all those years.

I won't say I'm never going again - fuck no. But this year, I'm going to actively Not Go, which as a Big Bonus includes getting to house-sit my friend's Josh & Sadie's house in Chimayo. Because they're going. So is most everyone else I know at this point. But I'm going to just stick around and clear out all the old projects - and give someone else their turn at discovering the wonder and the magic of the One True Home of the Trans-Generational CounterCulturalists.

- gregoryp(tm)