burning man

Ha – as it turns out Xeni Jardin was among the Burning Man virgins last year, a group which I was also part of. Not that there was any chance of us meeting had I even known who she was (nor do I still), but it’s interesting to know that all these people show up. Supposedly Gwenyth Paltrow was there that year too, but I digress.

The first night I was there, having shown up and not been able to even remotely locate our camp, I was supposed to volunteer at the café around 11 PM. So I biked around all over the place, and there were these beautiful sights everywhere, people having a wonderful time. Etcetera. At the base of the ziggurat that held the Man, there was this labyrinth lit up with neon (you can sort of see an image of it around the Man in Xeni’s ticket in the link above). Well, they say that labyrinths are meant for meditation, you see, so after watching a show by Reverend Billy and The Church of Stop Shopping (pic), I walked inside the labyrinth for a while. There were people all around me doing the same thing. It was dark, and around me all things were new and mysterious. Then suddenly I started crying; I made sure no one around me noticed, I kept walking along the path here and there. I wasn’t sad; I was unsure what I was doing or why I was crying. I still don’t really know. But I walked and walked and cried.

After that I went to do a shift at the café. It was way late and I met a lot of people. The day after I met this girl named Zoe that I hung out with until the end of the festival. She was really great to spend time with.

A lot later, I found out from my girlfriend that our friend Karen Simpson, also from Montreal, who was at Burning Man too, was worried because she thought I was wandering around alone a lot. And I guess I did, a bit, but I was with people, too. Everything was just right. It was awesome there. I loved it.