Virgin Burns 3

[The continued adventures of a first-time Burner at Burning Man 2007, 3rd of 3 posts]

The Premature Immolation

The one thing any newbie knows about Burning Man is what the climax of the event will be.  All week long the Man, made of wood and dressed in green neon tubing, sits atop a structure in the center of Black Rock City, awaiting the climactic ritual when virtually all the camp's inhabitants gather to cheer his burning.

Monday night, our first night on the Playa, Tater, Lisa and I go out to see the total lunar eclipse, an astonishing show presented gratis, in the spirit of the Man, by the cosmos.  Our bright white full moon is gradually devoured by the Earth's shadow until it's merely a dark orange button hanging in the sky.  Given the mind-boggling array of luminous Burner folk trolling the Playa below, it's a sci-fi vista; I've been drop-kicked onto another planet.

We're back in our campgrounds before the moon begins to reappear, toward 3 a.m., and I'm puttering around the truck, still unloading bags, when I hear a woman run into a nearby tent, exhorting her boyfriend to get up.  "The Man's on fire!"  I assume it's a prank, but then I hear someone else saying the same thing, so I walk over to the circus grounds to see what's what.  Weirdly enough, the Man who was glowing green only minutes ago is now a fiery orange.  I return to the dome to report this to my veteran companions, telling them that it seems the Man is burning.  Tater and Lisa roll their eyes and assure me this is impossible.  Billy the virgin is just so gullible!

But more people are running out of the campgrounds.  I take another look from the edge of the Esplanade and see it for myself: the Man's indeed aflame, smoke billowing from his head.  I run back to tell Lisa and Tater and at first they still refuse to believe me, until I'm standing outside the dome, yelling, "The - Man - is - burning!  Get out of there now!"  We rush out onto the Playa, where fire engines have already encircled the Man.  Water sprays the towering figure.  Tater and Lisa are agog ("This has never happened before!").  We join the expanding circle of on-lookers being held back by rangers, and watch the fire finally put down as Burners cheer.  The Man has upstaged the moon.

Later, we learn this has been a deliberate act of arson committed by a veteran burner from San Francisco named Paul Addis, apparently mounting a Dada-ist protest against the ostensible rigidity of this one-time wholly anarchistic event.  Arrested, he's being held in the nearest town lock-up, and by the next day "FREE PAUL!" grafitti is ubiquitous around the Playa.  I'm now a privileged member of a historical elite: this is the first premature burning in the event's 24 years.  For days afterwards, I get to tell people, "I'm no virgin.  I've already seen the Man burn."

Benificent Infernos

I fear the actual Burn on Saturday night will be anti-climactic.   The ceremony seems over-elaborate, with its ritual fire dancers performing in a large ring at the reconstructed man's base followed by a panoply of firework pyrotechnics.  But at last a torch is lit to the Green Man's feet and the man is burning for real.

What is Burning Man?  The mind can't really comprehend it when you're in the midst of it, the sheer size and intensity of the event confounds understanding.  But you stare at the Man burning and the experience obliterates rationality, all you know is the profound rightness of what you can't tear your eyes away from.   It has to be a man, and the man has to be burning.

I realize it's our Man -- he is us -- he's everybody's man to be whatever anyone wants him to be.  And he's also mine, personally, I'm remembering my visit to the Man last night, strolling around the massive wooden pyre underneath him, listening to the taped sounds of jungle noises and suddenly hearing, amidst the calls of rainforest birds, a pre-recorded whisper: "Hey, it's Burning Man.  Does this make me look fat?"  The Man made me laugh, and now he's ablaze, his arms up in the air, looking weirdly jubilant in his demise.

At the moment when the Man is fully lit, there's a massive orange fireball, a huge mushroom cloud of exploding propane gas, the Man gone nuclear -- and the city goes bonkers.  I hear the by-now familiar refrain from Tater and Lisa ("They've never done that before!") but I'm speechless, wide-eyed in the cheering, the crackling -- the raw primal pull of fire.

Later that night the Oil Rig blows, with another hydrogen bomb-like effect.  But these are penultimate burns.  The next and final evening, Sunday, we go to the Temple of Forgiveness, an exquisitely carved wooden structure resembling a tiny Oriental ivory chess piece magnified a hundred-fold, to hear the Reverend Billy (of the Church of Stop Shopping) give a sermon, bless us and perform a lesbian marriage.  At one point he refers to "our fellow burner, Jesus Christ."  It gets a laugh from the crowd but seems absolutely apt.   

The Temple is filled with grafitti and momentos left by people forgiving those close and those departed from their lives, the living and the dead, in messages written on the walls that'll go up in flames for week's true finale.

This night's burn is quieter, less show business.  It's a meditative fire.  You can feel the force of thousands of souls contemplating all the forgiveness that's ascending heavenward in the spiraling smoke, dust devils dancing in its wake.  Like so many of my fellow burners, I've left a message in the Temple.  I'm a part of the Burn, and now it will always be a part of me.

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

The Playa gives you myriad gifts, so many of them paradoxical dualities.  Burning Man lets you let go with wild abandon even as it propels you into intensive introspection; it gifts you with anonymity, yet forces you to confront who you really are.

We're on the road home, hours from Black Rock City, paused in the little town of Lee Vining for lunch, when we spot an SUV that's as covered in dust and mud as our truck is.  The Burner driver is a talkative registered nurse from Colorado.  We're happily dishing about our respective past week's adventures when I realize I have to run an errand and excuse myself, saying I need to get bandaids at the store.  "Bandaids?" the woman asks.  She opens her trunk and fetches a box from a well-organized bin.  "How many do you need --two, three?"

The Burn continues.  Spirits willing, it'll never really end.

Comments

[Molly]

Wow. That's one of the most eloquent documents of the Burn that I've read so far this year. For those of us who were there, it's really a joy to read this. Put me right back on the Playa, where I had a ripping good time (and one very similar to yours, I might add).

That Astor Place on the Playa was one of my faves. But I have to admit that the propane mushroom could annoyed me. Why were they burning fossil fuels to blow up that effigy of an oil rig? Sometimes people just confound me.

Anyway, great post.

[Christina]

Virgin Burns 4: The First Shower After Returning Home

An epic tale of playa dust, an empty water heater and a $500 plumbing bill.

So how long was your first shower after you left the playa? I suspect mine would be as long as the hot water held out.

[Erika Schickel]

Fantastic post, Billy, solidifying my resolution to go join the fun on the Playa next year. Loved the porta potty story and the "Snack Food Glory Hole." Why doesn't somebody write a Burning Man rom-com? Boy meets girl on Playa. He drives a mutant car. She shampoos him. Passions ignite causing the burning man to immolate early...

[mernitman]

Molly: You are kind and sweet and politically correct.

Christina: My first detox water-fest was actually a jacuzzi in the motel we stopped in on the way home - followed by a shower that prob'ly lasted hours...

Thank you, Erika -- Y'know, you might be onto something here...

[Just Another Hollywood Guy]

Try as I might (and watching it over and over again and over again...), I couldn't see Billy Mernit (or even a lookalike) when watching (and viewing the TiVo'd version more than a few times) the segment on The Burning Man on today's CBS Sunday Morning show...

And they teased me with, "...and this will be something special." Special? How could it be special without talking to the Mernitman?

[mernitman]

Just Another: Wait, how could you have missed me? I was that guy wearing the thing behind that woman with the boa by the whatchamacallit with the fire...

But you're right -- I can't BELIEVE they didn't interview me.
And they call themselves reporters?!