The Tree House

The Dome Project and Recollections of Youth


If you have followed this blog for any length of time, you know about my adventures at the Burning Man Festival. Recollections of past burns can be found here and here and here. Attending Burning man is a hardship. You have to really want to go there to attend and you have to use your wits and persevere to reach the final goal of really 'burning'.

I realized this in 2009 when I attended for the second time. It wasn't a matter of just showing up and going, wow...geee-whiz, what a cool place. After my first journey there in 2007, I knew I had to DO something if I went back a second time. I had to push myself.



The Dome Factory In My Garage


The project I gave myself was pretty straight forward and logical. My first stay at Burning Man was in a tent, which proved to be a bit inadequate against the 40mph winds and dust storms. So the second time around I resolved to build myself a geodesic dome. This has been a dream of mine that I have had on the back burner for a number of years. I have hopes of building one someday to live in, and this was the first logical baby step. Build a small one and take it to Burning Man.

I researched the project and found plans on the Internet. It would be made out of cardboard and wood, constructed in my backyard, dissembled, hauled to Burning Man, erected, and when it was all over, we would tear it down and burn it. It took a lot more planning than I thought and was complex in ways unforeseen and easier in ways that I had not imagined.



Half Dome - The Dream Takes Shape


The hardest part was finding the sheets of cardboard. Cardboard boxes are easy to find, sheets of unfolded cardboard are not so easy. After doing a lot of research and collecting all the needed material, I started to work on the project a month before the Burn. A bit late per my schedule, but I was determined to make a go of it. After about 2 weeks, I had assembled the various panels that would make up the structure. Making them was easy and I figured out an assembly-line process to do it. Erecting the dome was another project entirely. Domes are extremely rigid when complete, but putting them together isn't that easy.

By the time my wife had helped me assemble the structure in our back yard, a few things became pretty clear. It was a lot bigger than I thought it would be. I mean, you can live in this thing rather comfortably. You could easily stand up in the center of it. It was 12 feet in diamter and 6 feet tall at the middle. I also realized that cardboard and wood, when assembled correctly, make a pretty darn solid structure. Properly secured to the ground you could ride out a Class 2 hurricane in this little building.



Full Dome - The Neighbors Were Starting To Wonder


After the initial erection, to make sure it would fit together, I disassembled it and started on some of the other detail work, like making a door for it, cutting up some discarded carpeting to create a soft floor for it and purchasing a portable generator. The generator took me way over budget, but was worth it. The generator was used to power the portable air conditioning unit for the dome and run some electric lights inside of it. It also was used to power up various devices like cameras, cell phones and iPods.

So when the big day finally came, we packed up everything and hauled it 2,000 miles to Burning Man where we managed to erect it without a hitch. By the end of the first day, I had a rigid structure that was carpeted and air conditioned, in the frickin middle of nowhere. I was the envy of most Burners within a mile radius. The dome had no windows, because I wanted to use it as a dark room to load film and sleep in.



"The Bio-Hazard Wine Dome Erected At Burning Man 2009


The first night I stayed in the dome a feeling came over me. A feeling that I had not had in years. Not since I was a small child, before all the cynicism and realty of adulthood sank in. This was my little house. I built it. This was the extension of the cave I made under the bed sheets on a cold winters night, the tree house I had when I was in grade school, the secret cave down by the river that only me and my friends knew about. It was my little space. I had made it. Outside in the night, the winds whirled around the dome but inside there was silence and solitude. It was a warm feeling. A feeling of success and security. It was something good. Something I had lost somewhere between paying taxes and the endless commutes to a cubicle in a glass tower. I was a child again, at the age of 52.



The 52 Year Old Child


Many of my friends can't understand why I would want to make the trek to Burning Man and endure all the hardships to get there. I suppose this is the answer. We have to push ourselves sometime, to rediscover the wonderment we have lost.

My-POV [Cat & Car]

Ilford_Delta-100_120mm_6-3-08_4
Originally uploaded by lotus_07

Tabitha (now deceased) sitting in front of our 1991 Lotus Espirt. Rainy afternoon in Phoenix, Arizona (a rarity).

My-POV is my ongoing experiment in medium and large format (non-digital) photography. Clicking the picture takes you to the reference page, clicking the "My-POV" title takes you to the full resolution image.

First Friday Flashbacks

Fading To Black.....

We often times forget about the experiences that really define our lives, until the universe tapes us on the shoulder and forces us to remember

First Published on December 1, 2005
[A special note, the images are tombstones from the Arizona Memorial Cemetary here in Phoenix Arizona. I used to go there a lot for inspiration and reflection.]





Arizona Memorial


I got sick last week during the Thanksgiving holidays. Don't remember much of it. Actually, Sue got sick first and then after 36 hours the bug made the leap to a new host. The price I pay for loving her, but hey, it is worth it.

This was a good bug. Not that it was a mild illness, it was anything but that. This germ really kicked my ass. Haven't had my mind, body and soul worked over like this since I got a 104 degree fever in high school. When I have no arguments about going to Urgent Care and waiting for 2 hours to fill out paperwork just to get some antibiotics, you know I have thrown in the towel.



Arizona Memorial


While there was not a lot of pain involved with this illness, there was a lot of coughing, running nose and some extreme muscle weakness which made just getting out of bed to make it to the TV almost a triathlon event. So the predominant thing that that I did for 72 hours was sleep for about 60 of them. And brother, let me tell you, that is all I wanted to do.

With this sort of extreme exhaustion and fever, the things that go through your mind are not really under your control. I recall trying to lie down and think about things, but my thoughts eventually ended up on some really weird subjects as I lapsed in and out of consciousness for 10 hours at a stretch.

My overly analytical brain had enough power left to speculate that this is what the start of the 'final journey' must be like. That slow descent into the afterlife as the present life slowly drains from your body. There isn't a lot of fear or pain here. It is pretty much the most relaxing thing you can do. I recall struggling to crawl between the sheets just so I would not have to tax my brain to keep my balance anymore and the relief I felt after getting all cozy and just letting gravity do all the work once I was laying there.



Arizona Memorial


All the thoughts that kept running through my mind were some sort of bizarre "life passes before your eyes" movie with no particular order or reason and with a Fellini-like twist of surrealism. Inside the womb of the bed, I was relaxed, tired, and had this strange catalog of video memories that seemed to be stuck in the 'random view' mode. These were not visions of material wealth or great accomplishment, they were recollections of emotions and what had caused them. It was that whole sort of life's lesson movie that Frank Capra tried to teach us in 'It's A Wonderful Life'. All that stuff about virtue and value and the things you leave behind that can't fit in your coffin / urn because they are intangible.

In a way it was almost enjoyable (except for the hacking and the sweating, not to mention the inability to eat anything). These scenes from marriage, childhood and work would float through my mind and then I would cock an eye open and look at the alarm clock by the bed. It read 2:37pm, and I thought I should get up and get something to drink. After 'thinking' about getting up for about 12 minutes, I dozed back into the movie theater of life for another 25 minute screening. I was finding it enjoyable to be able to be totally exhausted and totally content in that bed and let my deeply stored subconscious just play away.



Arizona Memorial


I was thankful that this was a holiday week since I was not missing much work and could just let this virus run its course.

It has been over a week since that fun filled and fever induced experience, and I am still not quite over this thing. The concrete that formed in my sinus is still being chipped away at with medication and deep breaths still make me cough, but I am getting back to normal slowly. I guess sometimes, Mother Nature has more than one way of forcing you to slow down and re-examine things.

My-POV (A.C. Coupe)

A.C. Coupe - 1979

A rare car (never seen one since) on display at an auto show at my old alma mater, Oregon State University, circa 1979. This is a Type 88 Polaroid Print that shows why Polaroid is worth saving. Exceptional color

My-POV is my ongoing experiment in medium and large format (non-digital) photography. Clicking the picture takes you to the reference page, clicking the "My-POV" title takes you to the full resolution image.

Paying For My Sins

Burdened with Guilt?

This seems to be the season for the intellectual post. After seeing fellow blogger The Verdant Dude pick apart the artist and his art via Roman Polanski, I thought I would dust off a blog that I have had in waiting for a few weeks.

Last week I was standing at the bus stop in the early evening twilight when I spied the sign pictured above. It is for Arizona's version of the United Way campaign where they ask state employees to contribute part of their paychecks to help the needy by pooling all their money together to help the less fortunate.

As I stood waiting for the bus in order to save money on gas, which is a luxury I can't afford these days, it sort of dawned on me that "I" was one of the less fortunate! Where was my slice of the pie?

First of all, I am not against charity. Just like I am not against religion. However, whenever middle men start to step in to take their 'cut' of the good deeds of others, I start to get a tad bit annoyed. Organized charity, just like organized religion tends to lead to the dark side. Remember, there is money to be made in other peoples suffering. Something that plaintiff attorneys in this country are well acquainted with.

So I stand there waiting for the bus, thinking that I have been asked to donate to this cause, when I am in danger of losing my job to budget cuts because this state is 4 billion dollars in the red due to miss-management. Something just does not seem right here.

Add to this, the fact that in the past I have actually been on committees that helped distribute some of this charity. When we went to see one of the 'less fortunate’s' home, we found a color TV, an X-Box video game, a Chevy in the driveway, Fruit Loops and Captain Crunch in the kitchen and a single mother with 6 children, all from different fathers. Less fortunate suddenly seemed to be more like bad decision making. How did this less fortunate person qualify for this charity? She applied for it, just like a job interview.

As I continued to stare at the sign in the gathering darkness of the bus stop, it sort of dawned on me that this was all about guilt and not wanting to get our hands dirty. Many folks 'feel' for the less fortunate, but they don't want to actually get their hands dirty and 'do' something about it.

They could make sandwiches and hand them out to the homeless in the park on Sunday. They could offer rides to a limping transient trying to get to the homeless shelter. They could offer to pay for an all day bus pass for a homeless person. But they don't. Instead they will donate $50 to some bureaucratic charity to do it for them.

Isn't this like paying someone else to sit in traffic court for you if you get a speeding ticket. Isn't this like 19th Century England, were the aristocracy could 'pay' for someone else to sit in prison for them when they were convicted of a crime. It just defers social responsibility with money.

Here in Phoenix, Arizona, they air about 500 Accident/Injury Lawyer advertisements a day on television. All these commercials assure the viewer that the attorney is working to protect their legal rights in the event of an accident. Bullshit, they are offering to be professional insurance claim collectors and want 33% of your pain and suffering. If they really cared that much, they might be doing pro-bono criminal law to put the drunk driver that hit you behind bars. Yeah, that is going to happen!

So the bus finally arrived and took me home, where I made my nightly martini and sat on the front porch, just happy I have a nice home, wife and job. But the notion lingered that we are just not a responsible society anymore. We pay others to do thing that we should be doing ourselves. Somewhere back down the line, we placed way too much emphasis on the use of money to solve all our problems.

Is it just me? Or am I being way to cynical here?

Burning The Temple - Part 4

A Fictional Recollection in Four Parts

The Man burned brightly, and he burned for almost an hour. A huge bonfire that light up the desert and the thousands of followers that had come to witness it. Scout watched from the front rows, the heat from the Man was so intense that he had to shield his eyes from the flames. The same heat bathed Bliss' face as she stood among the thousands.

The partying went on well into the wee hours of the morning as some revelers went all out on their last night in paradise. Others slowly started to disassemble their camps to leave for what they called the 'default world' the next morning. Scout wandered the Playa well into the evening hours, thinking and contemplating. He had so little time to do any of this in the world he had come from.

Sunday dawned with many of the adjacent camp sites empty as a long line of Burners made their way out of Black Rock City. Wandering the Playa the previous night, Scout had decided to stay until Sunday night. He wanted to take it all in and see what the last gasp of the event would be like. He had nothing to run back to. He was in no hurry and there was still one last thing he had to find out.

The Temple was the last structure to be burned. All throughout the day, there were raging bonfires along the avenues as Burners set fire to the remains of their camps. Columns of smoke rose into the air throughout the day as wood and fabric were consumed in the giant steel cauldrons that were placed around the Playa. As dusk approached, Scout walked to the Temple, in order to arrive before it was finally closed to prepare it for consumption. As he approached the entrance, he saw a woman adorned in furry knee high boots, bright orange bikini bottoms, a low cut t-shirt and multi-colored dreadlocks that flowed down her back. Across the top of her bare chest was written the word 'Bliss' in bright orange finger paint.

"Miss Bliss, I presume?", Scout inquired.

"Boy Scout.", replied Bliss with a smile, "...you made it."

The two walked up the incline into the interior of the Temple. They spoke at ease about their experiences of the past week, and their impressions of the art and the burning of the Man. They maneuvered their way through the crowds that were looking at the inscriptions on the Temple walls one last time.

Bliss turned to Boy Scout and asked, "So, do you think you know who you are now?"

"I am not sure", replied Scout, "...but I am starting to figure it out."

"Yeah, Burning Man will do that to you."

Bliss leaned against the railing and looked out at the 6 o'clock Avenue toward the site of where the Man had stood. Scout leaned forward next to her and surveyed the world that they had known together for the past seven days.

"Glad you could make it.", she said with a smile.

Bliss glanced over at Scout and saw him scribbling something on the railing. He stuffed the pen back into his pocket and smiled at Bliss.

"I'll be back.", he replied..

Bliss and Boy Scout left the Temple at 6pm and walked together back toward where the Man had stood. Half way there, they turned to see flames rising up from the Temple, as all of the thoughts, prayers and hopes that were inscribed within it were consumed.


Burning The Temple - Part 1
Burning The Temple - Part 2
Burning The Temple - Part 3
Burning The Temple - Part 4

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Writers Note: The imagery and some of the events represented in this work of fiction were taken from my recent trip to the Burning Man Festival in 2009. To see more of my photographs from the event check out my Flickr Collection. To view my video documenting our trip to Burning Man, check out my You Tube channel. You can also check out the Burning Man Video Guide on my You Tube Channel as well. If you want to learn more, visit the Burning Man Website.

Burning The Temple - Part 3

A Fictional Recollection In Four Parts

Before Bliss and Bright ever reached Costco Soulmate Camp, Scout was filling out the questionnaire. In a place like Burning man anything could happen, so he thought I would give fate a little push. "How old do you feel?", the questionnaire asked. "Old enough to know better", he responded. "How many secrets do you have?" was the next question. "I don't really know who I am.", was his response.

Sometime on the afternoon of the 3rd day, the questionnaires were fed into a reader and the results were processed. A few minute later, an old dot matrix printer started churning out a long list of names. Next to Miss Bliss was the name Boy Scout.

Bright returned to Steel Forge camp that afternoon and searched for Miss Bliss. "Bliss, Bliss, I got our matches, they were posted at Costco Soulmate. Mine is named Gorgeous George at 4:30 and Extinction, yours is some guy named Boy Scout at 8:00 and DNA. Lets go find them!"

Gorgeous George wasn't hard too find. He was at Muscle Camp and first and foremost was in love with himself. It appeared that he had enough love to share and since Bright wasn't the deepest of souls, they hit it off pretty well. After about 45 minutes and a few mixed drinks, it was evident to Bliss that Bright was in no hurry to move on from her new boy-toy. Bliss excused herself and continued around the radial avenues of Black Rock City in the descending twilight. 8:00 and DNA was only about a half mile away. She could swing by on the way back to camp and still arrive in time for the rave party that evening. She was curious to see what sort of Boy Scout the universe had conjured up for her.

Bliss found the neat and precise dome structure at 8:00 and DNA but there appeared to be no one home when she rapped on what she thought was the door. Looking around the camp she found a box lid and a magic marker and left a message. "Boy Scout - Are you my soulmate? Meet me at the Temple entrance, 7pm Sunday - Miss Bliss"

Boy Scout saw ghostly figures as they materialized out of the storm, walked past him and were once again consumed by the earth. The dust storm had overtaken him from behind and engulfed him without warning as he walked the Playa. As the first timers guide had instructed him, he knelt down, put a handkerchief over his nose and mouth (ala Jesse James robbing a train), put his goggles over his eyes and waited for it to pass. The visibility was down to less than 15 feet as he knelt in the desert. As he waited, his compatriots moved about him in a strange silence, seemingly unaffected by the blowing dust, as though they had lived within it all their lives.

By the time the dust storm had subsided, the sun had started to set and Scout began to make his way back to his dome. It was time to crack open a new box of wine and some tuna fish. His pace had slowed and he was in no hurry. Time sort of stood still here and was dictated more by nature and those around him than by any clock. Arriving back at his dome, he found Bliss' note. "Miss Bliss?", he thought...."How appropriate", he said to himself with a smile.

The next several days were filled with wandering and discovery. The loud thumping techno music that permeated every aspect of Burning Man eventually became a background noise that no longer interrupted Scout's sleep. He found that he could easily exist on a diet of boxed wine, potato chips and macaroni and cheese without any problem. Scout often found himself wandering the far reaches of the playa were various bars and lounges were set up in the middle of nowhere. The drinks were free and the attitudes were beyond care-free. Here in this surreal place, where no one and no drink should be, were lounge chairs and like minded souls and nothing else. Slowly, he thought to himself, he was starting to figure out who he was.

Saturday evening arrived and as the sun set on the second to last day of Burning Man, all the camps slowly emptied as the residents of Black Rock City gathered at the center of the Playa. As they formed a huge circle around the statute of the Man, the last rays of daylight dwindled and a thousand stars slowly appeared over their heads. Soon the fire dancers appeared and encircled the man with burning hoops and batons. The spectacle of 10 acres of moving and undulating fire was impressive and continued for over a half an hour. Then, just as quickly as they had appeared, they dispersed into the crowd and everyone fell silent as their gaze turned to the giant figure that had been the center of their lives for the past week.

Within minutes, hundreds of fireworks shot into the night sky, signaling the impending death of the Man. As the red, green and blue glare of the rockets bathed the Man in mulit-colored light, he slowly raised his mechanical arms over his head. As his arms reached their full height, the crowd let out a thunderous cheer as the final rockets launced with a thunderous salvo. When it did, the base of the Man erupted in a ball of flame which consumed the structure and the Man that stood atop it. As the wood slowly caught fire and the Man began to burn, the heat given off from the inferno was intense, even for those standing 100 yards away.

....to be continued

Burning The Temple - Part 1
Burning The Temple - Part 2
Burning The Temple - Part 3
Burning The Temple - Part 4

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Writers Note: The imagery and some of the events represented in this work of fiction were taken from my recent trip to the Burning Man Festival in 2009. To see more of my photographs from the event check out my Flickr Collection. To view my video documenting our trip to Burning Man, check out my You Tube channel. You can also check out the Burning Man Video Guide on my You Tube Channel as well. If you want to learn more, visit the Burning Man Website.

Burning The Temple - Part 2

A Fictional Recollection In Four Parts

The next morning Miss Bliss sipped on her coffee from the communal kitchen as she chatted with her camp-mates before dawning her goggles and handkerchief and wandering out onto the Playa. She wore her furry knee high platform boots, some bikini bottoms and a chain mail vest that was mostly see-thru. This was all standard Burning Man attire and she hardly stood out in the early morning crowd. She walked down the 6 o'clock Avenue and came to the Man. The huge stick figure towered over the center of the playa and was surrounded by an elaborate structure that symbolized the theme of this year’s event; Evolution. She continued outward toward the far reaches of the playa taking in all of the art that had been installed on the vast dust covered plain. A half mile from the Man she came to the Temple, recently finished and opened to the masses. This year’s Temple design was a giant lotus flower. She mounted the spiral staircase and went inside.

Even though it was early in the day, the Temple walls were already being covered in writing. All burners eventually visited the Temple to pay homage and remember the special moments that had affected them over the past 12 months. Eulogies for those departed, lost friends remembered, devotionals for those still living. They were written on walls, ceilings and stair wells. There were mementos shoved into the cracks and seams. Photographs, lockets, concert ticket stubs, guitars; would eventually adorn every inch of the structure. Bliss took her time and read them for hours. Sharing in their grief and wondering how they all coped. Eventually, she took a stray felt tipped pen and scribbled on the upper railing, “Nob, Now that you are gone, I don’t really know who you were – Bliss”.

Scout looked down a long corridor of arched wire rods. They were 12 foot high at their apex and snaked for a hundred yards across the desert, making a sort of open air hallway. This was all like some sort of dream. He had been wandering the playa for hours, taking in all the installations and people. The scope and size of the event were not something that his mind was prepared for. He realized he was getting pretty tired and thirsty. He looked for a place to rest and made his way to the Temple to sit in the shade of the giant flower-like structure. Like Bliss, his eyes also started to wander over the thousands of scribbles that were being written even as he sipped on his canteen.

While wandering the upper level of the temple, Scout came across Bliss' note and paused. He wondered who he really was sometimes. All the things that he had pursued throughout his life seemed hollow. The house in the 'burbs' and the shinny new car along with the 2.5 kids and the dog seemed like cruel jokes to him. They were all false images set up by capitalists and corporate leaders to push Proctor and Gamble, GMC and Maytag. He was questioning everything and those questions had lead him here instead of the beaches of Acapulco. Who was he and what did he really want? He wasn't sure anymore. He wanted something like this. Something like Burning Man, but he knew that this couldn't last. This was just a waking dream that would end eventually.

Bright pleaded with Bliss. "Come on Bliss, this will be fun, life is all about taking chances." Bright was short for Star Bright. She was Bliss' partner in crime in most things Burning Man. Bliss could not recall how many times they had passed out on the playa together or gotten each other out of tight spots on the past. Bright was trying to convince Bliss to accompany her to the Costco Soulmate Camp. It involved filling out a questionnaire and submitting it for data analysis to see which other Burner would be your soulmate. Bliss reluctantly agreed. Life moves on and so must she. She needed to focus on the future and not dwell on her past.

....to be continued

Burning The Temple - Part 1
Burning The Temple - Part 2
Burning The Temple - Part 3
Burning The Temple - Part 4

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Writers Note: The imagery and some of the events represented in this work of fiction were taken from my recent trip to the Burning Man Festival in 2009. To see more of my photographs from the event check out my Flickr Collection. To view my video documenting our trip to Burning Man, check out my You Tube channel. You can also check out the Burning Man Video Guide on my You Tube Channel as well. If you want to learn more, visit the Burning Man Website.

Burning The Temple - Part 1

A Fictional Recollection In Four Parts

The dry lake bed glowed and swirled under the dust from hundreds of vehicles, countless feet and bicycle tires. Boy Scout had been waiting for about an hour as the long line of cars slowly crept toward the main gate to Burning Man. It was hot and the sun was starting to set. As the light faded, the glow from propane powered Playa art installations started to illuminate the fog bank of dust. Scout starred off into the distance at the surreal nature of it all. He had never been to Burning Man before, and despite his research into the festival, nothing could really prepare him for the size and the magnitude of the legion that he now found himself a part of.

The tap from the horn of the converted school bus behind him, prompted Scout to move forward in line. He still didn’t know what to expect once he got in, but in a way, that is what he wanted. He sensed a need to find the unknown and the unexpected. His life up to this point had been a series of disappointments. Bad jobs, failed relationships and a growing frustration about where his life was headed had led him here. He needed a vacation far away, not only in distance, but in mindset. He needed a new perspective.

Miss Bliss slumped on the dust covered sofa that had been set up around the propane fire pit at her camp. She had been working since the first day of the burn to erect some of her camp's art on the Playa. She had done all this before and she always came back. Neither the heat, or the dust, or hard labor could keep her away from the community that she loved so dearly. She popped the top on a beer and leaned back to look at the 40 foot high steel sculpture of the nude woman that adorned the front of ‘The Steel Forge’ camp.

She hadn't helped in the forging of the statue, but she was one of many that had a hand in its creation. Her day job was in the warehouse, moving large strips of steel and iron with an overhead crane and doing inventory. She was not an artisan like some of the welders, but she was learning. The metal figure loomed over their camp and was stunning in its beauty.

As she sipped the beer and allowed herself to relax, her mind wandered back to ‘Nob’. Nob couldn’t make it to Burning Man this year. Nob was dead, killed in a car accident 3 months earlier. He had been her lover at three previous burns, or so she had thought. He had been witty, good looking, hard working and full of energy. She also learned after his death, that he had a 5 year old son and a girlfriend in Sausalito. She wondered how many other secrets the world had hidden from her. As the wind started to rise and the dust started to swirl, she took one more gulp of beer and then covered her nose and mouth with her bandanna. Hard work kept her mind focused, so she returned to the semi-trailer to continue unloading the camp stores and setting up the kitchen.

It all seemed like total chaos, but there was electricity in the air. Scout continued to unload his SUV in a camp site on one of the outer rings of Black Rock City. Activity swirled all around him as old friends in neighboring camps greeted one another. New vehicles inched down the avenues that encircled the Playa to set up their camps. He struggled to erect the small geodesic dome that he had created in his garage back home. The on-line guides had warned him about flimsy tents and sand storms, so he hoped this solution would work. A dome had long been his dream of alternate housing to break the norm of the ticki-tack dwellings he had come to despise. As he worked in the growing darkness, the sounds from the center of the Playa grew louder and he could sense the fever pitch of the party atmosphere out on the expansive dry lake bed. He yearned to finish his structure and go exploring.

....to be continued

Burning The Temple - Part 1
Burning The Temple - Part 2
Burning The Temple - Part 3
Burning The Temple - Part 4

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Writers Note: The imagery and some of the events represented in this work of fiction were taken from my recent trip to the Burning Man Festival in 2009. To see more of my photographs from the event check out my Flickr Collection. To view my video documenting our trip to Burning Man, check out my You Tube channel. You can also check out the Burning Man Video Guide on my You Tube Channel as well. If you want to learn more, visit the Burning Man Website.

I've Changed

Plumage Display In The Burbs


We went to a going away party last weekend. Some friends of my wife have a son that is going into the Navy, so we all gathered to wish him good luck at the start of his journey into manhood. It was a nice little get together but it showed me something that I had totally forgotten about.

This barbecue was on the west side of town. We refer this these sections of the Phoenix metro area as the 'Sea of Sameness', because it is all track housing put up in large sub-divisions. The houses all look the same and are a bit run down. Most of them were built in the 1970s and they are showing their age. The neighborhood was pretty solid middle class, but like the rest of the nation, it has seen better days.

I used to live in this area. Before I met my wife and moved downtown into an historic neighborhood I was just another Sponge Bob in the Sea of Sameness. Living here entails long commutes to work, and shopping at a strip mall that either had a Safeway or an Albertsons. There isn't a lot of variation in the sea of sameness. Most residents buy what they are told they want, and own more vehicles than they need. They all have pools that they don't keep up, and the father's tend to have more toys then there children.

Going to the barbecue was a trip back down memory lane, and made me realize just how much I wasn't like these people anymore. First of all, they all smoked. I mean they smoked a lot. Where I live and work these days, smoking is a big no-no. You are pretty shunned if you do it. That was not the case at this little gathering. I counted no less than 10 packs of cigarette laying around and I saw at least $45 of the little cough'in nails go up in smoke. I can point my finger at these folks, because I used to smoke, and I quite. I pretty much lived on Marlboro Lights and Pitchers of Miller Beer while I was in college, but I have moved past that now. Most of these folks obviously hadn't.

The other thing I noticed were the wives. They were fat. I mean muffin top, hanging over their too-tight jeans fat. With hair died different colors and nose piercings, they weren't the sort of woman that I would find the least bit attractive. Fashion was not on their minds nor was spending any time in a hair salon trying to tame the muskrats on their heads. The lovely little model displaying her white thong on the blog graphic was the high point of fashion at this little gathering.

The final thing I noticed was the absolute addiction to technology that these people had. Every single one of them texted at least once while we were there during a 4 hour period of time. Many texted CONTINUOUSLY. Often times texting someone that was only 10 feet away, as though they were whispering in someones ear while they were conversing with someone else. Now, I have a Twitter account and a Facebook page along with a pretty sizable presence on the web, but this was a bit over the top. I might send 20 texts a month. These people were sending 20 a day, minimum. Technology has its benefits and its detractions. Put down the phone people and take a walk. Geezzz.

So in the end, I have changed. I was on track to become a member of this pack of lemmings, but something altered my course about 8 years ago and now I am in a totally different place. I am not sure what it was. Probably a growing frustration with the lifestyle that I found in the Sea of Sameness. Possibly a desire to find something more than the closed minds that my neighbors perpetuated. Definitely the fact that I found a good woman that knows how to dress without showing her underwear to the neighbors. I think I have changed for the better.