Rattling & Giggling: Souvenir of Burning Man 2026 Part One
I am with a group of friends. We are in a desolate landscape floating a few inches above the earth. We are fixed on a destination but a strong headwind is slowing our progress. We slog on and on and on. Dust swirls around us. Out of the whiteness a large rotating mandala emerges, mesmerizing us. We pause in awe. Is this a dream? No, it is Burning Man in the year 2026. Judy and I have traveled here to the Nevada desert to camp out for a week with ecstatic dance camp Rhythm Wave. Here is a small part of what happened, captured for your pleasure as a meager written souvenir of an indescribably rich event.
Reno
Judy and I have found a quiet moment in our hotel in Reno Nevada this morning. We are on our way to Burning Man. And today is the day we drive out the 150 miles to the playa. We have been preparing for this trip for months. My luggage is full to the brim with solar panels and power tool batteries that I plan to use to help my campmates recharge their lights and mobile phones and other appliances. And Judy and I have filled all the gaps in our suitcases with underwear and costumes and socks and blinky lights. Yesterday we drove our rental car over to Walmart and filled it with with big jugs of water and sports drinks and coconut water and granola bars and beer. I am reading the book "This is Burning Man" by Brian Doherty, who chronicles the first several decades of the event, which began when a group of friends burned a man effigy on a San Francisco beach in 1986. Now it is 40 years later and Burning Man has grown into an international event attracting over 50,000 people.
Build
We've spent a couple of days immersed in "build" at camp Rhythm Wave: running electrical cords to light up big tents; setting up insulating panels in a shipping container to create a temporary cooler; placing a shade structure over our tents; and setting up my little solar panels. We also help our campmates assemble a 50-foot by 50-foot sprung bamboo dance floor that is our offering to the wider Burning Man community: we will be hosting daily ecstatic dance events on this our sacred floor.
The playa is coming alive as other camps also finish their builds. So Judy and I venture down the road to see what others have to offer. Artwork is everywhere on the miles-long Esplanade, the street that encircles the central playa. We come across a coffee shop festooned with intricate laser-cut placards celebrating real and imaginary sacred places: Yggdrsl, Taj Mahal, Pyramid Lake, but also the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey and the TARDIS, Dr. Who's time machine disguised as a phone booth. We encounter a beautifully detailed carousel with painted wooden horses. As we admire the horses a grizzled old man beckons us into the "Cereal Thriller" bar, enticing us to try "those sugary cereals your mom wouldn't let you have when you were a kid". Rows of tantalizing colorful cereal boxes line a tall shelf behind the bar. I indulge in a bowl of Fruit Loops and chocolate milk. On the way back to camp we stop at the porta potties and even there we encounter wit and mystery. A graffito states that it's "You vs. you, not you vs. them".
The Dance
It is Monday morning and Burning Man is officially underway. Dusty RVs have been arriving all night long in a steady stream. It is time for our first ecstatic dance event. It begins simply enough. People gather. The music begins. Many of the DJs at Rhythm Wave subscribe to a style of ecstatic dance called 5Rythms, created by dance therapist Gabrielle Roth. (The five rhythms are Flowing, Staccato, Chaos, Lyrical, and Stillness, and are performed in that sequence.) People begin swaying back and forth to the flowing music, moving their arms, drawing in their dance energy. The music picks up pace. A "dirty bass" kicks in, thrumming and throbbing. A crescendo, and then the "drop". The crowd goes wild, trembling and flailing. Arms and legs and other body parts stab into the air. A particularly energetic man draws my attention. He has been rolling around on the floor, and now he is on his back, pumping his pelvis into the air. I go up to him and put my hand on his chest and say "You're a wild man! I love it! You're an inspiration!" He looks startled and says "Thank you."
The music eases into a more reflective mood. People put their palms on their chests and gaze into the distance wistfully. A few people in the center of the dance floor glom together into a little group hug. Others join in. The circle grows. I spread my arms and a magnetic force sticks me to the side of the circle. I begin humming to the music. Others join in. I am overcome by a feeling of great compassion but also of loss. I feel a sob rising up in me and it erupts from my mouth over and over convulsively. "Why am I crying?" I ask myself. "I don't know!" I tell myself.
The music transitions to a more upbeat mode. The group hug breaks apart. The dance continues. Mostly I dance with Judy. We are so familiar with each other that there is none of the awkwardness of dancing with a new partner. We feel free to get as crazy with each other, or as intimate with each other, or as silly with each other as the moment prescribes. We move in sync, then in opposition, then lightly spanking each other all over our bodies. The dance is bliss.
Occasionally I engage with another dancer. Perhaps first I put a hand on their shoulder or a touching of palms and checking their reaction before continuing. A young man responds favorably and joins with me. His movements tell me that he is practised in the art of contact improv. We mirror each others' movements for a bit while gazing into each others' eyes. Then we begin to swirl around each other, pulsing and swaying. I give his left hip a little push and he spins off, only to return and give my right shoulder a tug. I respond in kind by spinning off and returning. The music intensifies and we begin crouching and shaking our fists at each other. We engage in a mock battle, shouting at each other in rhythm, "Hoo! Hoo! Hoo! Hoo!" Then we laugh out loud together, and we each put our palms together on our chests in the international sign of "Thank you," and disengage.
Playa Adventure
On Tuesday after dinner a group of ten or so of us Rhythm Wavers gather to bike out to see our campmate Z's sculpture. His sculpture is placed at 11:30 and perimeter, in "deep playa", so all the way across the playa to the very apex of the pentagonal trash fence that borders Black Rock City. We all mount our crappy one-speed bikes and switch on our blinky lights and lower our goggles into place on our faces. We pedal into the wind, rattling and giggling.
We point ourselves down sixth street stratght toward the Man, a towering wooden figure set atop a tree-like structure, and destined to be burned down this coming Saturday. We bike on past the Man toward the Temple, a more somber wooden structure destined to be burned down this coming Sunday. We bike past the Temple into deep playa. The road grows rougher. Our tires catch in deep ruts full of loose powder and occasionally one or another of us comes to a standstill and falls over. Sarah's chain falls off and she puts it back on only to have the chain break off completely a hundred yards later. Z, who is the only one of us who has an ebike, gentlemanly offers to give Sarah a ride on his banana seat.
We continue. The ruts become so difficult that we walk our bikes the last quarter mile. The winds increase to white out conditions; we can't see more than ten yards in front of us. Finally Z's sculpture appears majectically in front of us. It is the figure of Atlas, down on one knee, arms outstretched to bear the weight of the world. Perhaps the most salient feature of the sculpture is the large penis hanging down between Atlas' legs. We tell Z that we appreciate that his sculpture is anatomically correct. He explains that he has sized the figure by taking measurements of his own body and then adding 25% to make the sculpture slightly larger than life. Burners appreciate risqué humor. Z explains that people's first reaction to the sculpture is to walk up to it and to lift Atlas' loin cloth, and to exlaim about the size of his penis.
We gather the group and move on to the next sculpture along the perimeter. We encounter a weird landscape with insectoid aliens glowing in the dark. Farther along we find a little shrine where an animated pig encourages us to "Bless This Meat." Next up we find a full living room laid out in the desert. We settle onto the couches and comfy chairs there and read passages from the various books placed strategically there.
Farther along we come to a large plywood cutout of an art car complete with plywood cutouts of spectator burners standing around. Several grizzled artists encourage us to write jokes on the wall. As we stand there chatting I remind Z of the conversation we had together when I first met him eight years ago. He had told me how he had worked for an indoor marijuana farm and how the fire marshal had stopped by and pointed out all the fire code violations. Z said he remembered that conversation. Then, shortly after he said this, a fire truck rolls up and four uniformed firemen jump out to enjoy the artwork with us. "You know Z that this is playa magic at work," I say. "You said the words 'fire marshal' and a fire truck pulls up." He laughs out loud.
As we move on, the wind picks up again and we decide that we need to find shelter. Veteran campmate Poptart takes the lead and we follow him into the white void. We are all starting to get worried that we will lose our way or that someone will get separated and have to find their way home alone. We ring our bike bells so that we can find each other in the thick darkness. And then we see it: rising out of the swirling dust we see a glowing castle up ahead. We head there for shelter, struggling against the dustly headwind. But when we reach the castle we find that it is just an open structure made out of lighted poles. We struggle on and find temporary shelter at some porta potties.
The dust dies down again and we head toward a large glowing hulk in the distance. It is the Titanic, life-size, broken in two by its collision with a metaphorical iceberg and "sinking" into the desert sand. The two old-timers with us, Poptart and Ramble, are not impressed. "Several years ago there was a sinking pirate ship that was much better than this," they opine, "with lots of detailed artwork to explore."
We reach a denser part of the event teeming with lighted bikes and lighted artwork. It becomes difficult to keep together as a group. Oncoming bikes zoom in and around us, and it feels like a video game dodging to the left and right. We long to be home. Finally we see some familiar landmarks: the big blue dome of our neighbors the Playa Choir, then the fluttering maroon and gold flags of our own camp, and lastly our own little tent beckons us in and into sleep.
Part Two coming shortly!
Comments