Hey all! Glad to join this tribe.

Below is my story at my first burn in 2007. I just wrote it today, and haven't really gone over my Burn experience this deeply since then. It's been very interesting to look back on. I share this with no expectations, but thanks for reading it if you choose to do so.

Blessings,
Ora

P.S. To explain the opening paragraph, I started writing it here and then realized I wanted to post it elsewhere.


A Personal: My Burning Man Experience

ChiSWMTFTSISOSP. This is my personals abbreviation for Burners. It's longer if not specific to Burners. The following began as a post to the Burning Singles Tribe on Tribe.net. It quickly evolved into something more, perhaps speaking for experiences we have all had or will have in our lives, within or outside of Burning Man.

I came as part of a theme camp, to build a Goddess Temple. It was a simple expectation, and the rest of my expectations I had mostly left behind... except the one about meeting that perfect person. You know the one.

It began with working my ass off from Saturday through Monday, adjusting to the constant blowing dust from incoming Burners. We put up two large domes with less than a skeleton crew, and my task gradually became one of deciphering geodesic dome layouts. On the first day, it was several men and myself putting up the first dome. The sometimes handsome faces covered by goggles and dust masks looked to me for directions as I translated Bucky Fuller's mind into reality.

On the second day, a mass of women arrived: all friends, all straight. The dome went up fairly quickly, and we began to setup the Sacred space.

In the first few days of the event proper, I made the typical virgin mistake of hanging around my camp for most of each day, saving only the night time to explore. Once in a while I would take a daytime jaunt into the deep playa to check out small projects and sometimes rides through town. I was in the flow of things and did little to assert individual desire.

Monday night I tracked down a friend from Tribe. We had a conversation wherein we both realized that I was still not ready to open up to Burning Man or the people there. It was a quiet and tenuous conversation and was gladly broken by the arrival of her girlfriend. From there the couple led me to a great psytrance('ish) party at Moon Tribe where I maintained a sizable distance from anyone. I danced and spun glow poi out in the open playa for a couple hours as the moon eclipsed. The greatest interaction I had that night was only in the collective mixture of concern, curiosity and then glee that fellow Burners expressed as the Man enigmatically burned early.

Tuesday night, our Temple was innundated with people lounging on the floor of the Temple space. The energy was dirty and disrespective, increasing my misanthropy, and I knew that we'd have to do energetic cleaning in the morning. So I decided to get away from it all. I spent that night escaping people to see the art.

Monkeys eating snakes, high city views, flames, lasers, electronic string instruments, an arrowhead gift, a business card, costumes, roving party vehicles, law enforcement with thermal scanners, flames, lasers... It was all neat, but the playa itself and the pagentry doesn't surprise me. It's the way life *should* be. It's home, and I was ready for that long before I missed my first chance to go in 2006.

That night I looked over the playa from the oil derrick (Crude Awakening), and saw thousands of amazing beautiful people. Doesn't one of them want to love me? Of course the answer is probably yes, but finding them, opening them up, and opening up to them can all be difficult, three things which may often be disproportionate.

I mostly maintained a distance from people that night, spending only a half hour in conversation with a Columbia professor who played the interactive art & electronic string instrument with me for an equal amount of time. The following night involved even less interaction as I hid in the Temple all night, watching people commune with the Divine. The spiritual connection they craved I had in lonely abundance, but an abundance of interpersonal connection I craved was often what brought these wartorn hearts to the Temple.

Thursday afternoon I went to a seminar on transgenderism and found myself giving a short 5-10 minute workshop to less experienced elders on the sacred aspects of transgenderism and sacred gender identity. Throughout the week I found that even transpeople on the playa knew little about the sacred aspect of being trans.

Now please excuse me while I digress to share an important piece of awareness about being trans, particularly being pre-operational (or just pre-op) transsexual. In an earlier conversation on Tuesday with a veteran Burner and camp organizer, it was revealed to me that while people are generally free from marginalization based on their sexual orientation on the playa, transpeople, or people with a variant gender identity are more tepidly embraced, especially non-crossdressing transpeople. Crossdressing is of course seen throughout the playa and largely accepted, but what of people who actually identify as a gender incongruous with their physical sex?

I felt throughout the week that I, unlike so many of my friends who were conquering their fear of nudity, could not walk topless or naked in public on the playa, because my gender would be wholly misidentified. While everyone deals with a myriad of issues when conquering the fear of nudity, it seems to me that pre-op transsexuals (and I should add intersexed individuals) face a uniquely intense and difficult experience.

Returning to the workshop on Thursday afternoon, it was quickly interrupted by the giant duststorm that kicked up. Suddenly, I was wisked away from my poigniant realizations -- with my trusty compass guiding me through 3' visibility -- to the Temple to make sure everything was okay there. I wanted to be a playa angel and help people in the deep playa find their way back, but I decided to check on the Temple's status. Structures everywhere were failing and blowing away. The Temple was fine, except for random refugees unknowingly lifting the Goddess's skirt to escape the storm.

Like the duststorm that afternoon, Thursday night hit me the hardest emotionally. I wanted some One. Friends everywhere were connecting, even if only romantically or spiritually for a day or two. I rode throughout the entire city, some 5-10 miles of streets, connecting with very few people. A depressive funk (genetic in my family) started to take its really nasty hold.

There didn't seem to be any music I liked. I was looking for "full-on" psytrance at 8-10pm at night, something I didn't bother to realize was a relative unlikelihood. Most camps didn't appear to me as inviting, as if exclusive to their tight knit group. Or at least, I told myself: "How would they receive a person as strange as me? Yes it's Burning Man, but I fall under a different kind of strange than probably 97% of the people there." Then comes the age old pity party question: "How can a person like me ever be loved?" These dangerous thoughts, 20 year old patterns that use my gender identity as a crutch, pervaded my mind as I traversed most of the city untouched by the superfluous positive energy it had to offer...

Finally, I broke down crying while riding my bike, tears flowing down the esplanade. Still I continued to escape from people. This time, I rode full bore into the deep playa, legs weary but pumping the pedals hard. I laid at the trash fence, looking up at the stars and the moonless sky. It was still early enough that the moon hadn't come out yet, and here I was bawling my eyes out in the lonliness I was creating. I questioned myself if anyone would stop and approach me. For well over a half hour of tears, people, art cars and law enforcement (LEOs) just drove by, glancing on occasion. The LEOs stopped long enough to watch me move, to make sure I wasn't a dead body by a parked bike.

The ground and the air that night were very cold, and I had only one layer over my tank top. So I returned to my tent where I cried myself to sleep. Friday morning I woke up, looking for a friend to talk to about all this. Luckily I had a talk with a soul sister who was camping next to me. Her instructions were simple: "Get out onto the playa and just be happy with yourself." I unknowingly did that the first couple days. Now, I had to renew it.

I rode out into the city. I found an upright piano and no one around, so I played. I rode some more. I stopped by a camp with a sign claiming they had "elders." Hoping for a sacred camp to connect with, I instead got a 15 minute deep lecture by a complete non-peer, who needed to talk himself more than I needed to hear what he had to say. He thought he helpd me, but I think I helped him more by listening. I smiled to myself as I moved on.

Then I stood at a plaza behind Center Camp, at 6 and "something'ish." I heard a deep organ sound from massive speakers and recognized it immediately. As Lisa Gerrard began to sing "The Host of Seraphim," I stood directly in front of the speakers, eyes closed in meditation. A few people joined me, recognizing this was a "moment." What followed was a couple minutes of pure peace and stillness...

I opened my eyes for a second and saw in front of me, with arms outstretched like an eagle circling the plaza, a man with a cowboy hat, dust mask and white fur trim on his backpack. "Yes!" I thought. I watched him intently for a few moments as I noticed he began to spiral out of the plaza. Just after I lost sight of him and as the music ended, I jumped on my bike and blasted after him, as if my life depended on this chase. Could it be? Is it that simple?

I caught up with him and dismounted my bike. I didn't know what to say, so I made it simple, "Hi! I saw you back there in the plaza and thought I should say hi." A wonderful little chat ensued. Yet within minutes I found out that we were not compatible as lovers, another case of girl meets gay boy. Riding a positive high from the meditation, I resolved to be friends nonetheless and to follow him to the dance he wanted to get to, something called "The Deep End." As usual, I feigned virgin Burner ignorance despite having seen copious amounts of video and Tribe posts about it online.

In the jungle of bikes, I locked it well and placed my backpack in a strategic location. I took a giant swig of water in preparation. And then... I danced my ass off. He gave me a hand up to the stage where I worked my dance magick on a floor filled with people unaccustomed to whatever it was I was doing. EVentually people followed suit and realized it was time to kick up the energy. 4 years ago, I'd never danced in my life. This was a good feeling, life of the party, even if only for a few minutes.

It takes a lot of energy, probably why others were dancing less before, pacing themselves. Winded but high on life, I replaced myself on stage with a pretty vixen from below. The telling look on her face of surprise and elation brought a smile to my face as well. I waved goodbye to the white fur man who had brought me there for a little fun.

I made my way out to the playa. I figured out the art of the giant swing, requiring patience and perfect form to get high without pushing. When I got off, a 6" action figure with a Cheech Marin accent driving a remote control monster truck came up to me offering tortilla chips and what I must say was excellent guacamole. Shortly after, a large dust devil engulfed the swingsets and those around them. We were pelted with fine rocks and sand from every direction for 5-10 seconds, and it continued on its path. Racing on bike with a fellow stranger, we tried to catch the whirlwind.

From there I hung out at the 9 O'clock plaza by a giant birthday cake and spun my fluorescent sock poi. I danced until I ran out of water and my lips were dry, sending me home for more. Back at my village, I caught a seminar on sacred geometry, interrupted by the double rainbow for a short period. It was turning out to be a beautiful day.

For supper, the village was serenaded by an incredible violinist while waiting in line for one of our amazing meals. That night, I spent 2 hours on the back of a tetrahedral art car with full-on psytrance while spinning my long poi off the back. Most of the people who hopped on for rides were only kids, college aged. Ravers, hippies and yahoos were words that came to mind, and I became present to a lack of the sacred anywhere outside of my own camp. It was a myopic view to be sure, and it sent me to sleep that night again non-plussed. I reminded myself later on just how full that day had been.

Saturday morning, I used the camp's showers. I was naked and getting dressed. The man after me was just now undressing and getting naked. Suddenly, we found ourselves in a long, powerful and deep conversation. We were mutually transfixed, and the word soulmate had crossed my mind. Sexuality came up and in the most gentlemanly manner he offered a "sexual experience" with him. It was astounding to find this thrown on my lap so perfectly and suddenly with the sexuality and gender lines already fully discussed and understood. It was amazing! But as Morpheus says in the Matrix, "Fate it seems is not without a sense of irony."

He had kids my age. I do not fall so easily for such taboos, and age would not be a primary concern for a singular sexual experience, a blantant -- but responsible -- "romp through the woods," as it were. And yet I found myself turning him down on his offer on account of age difference. Upon greater reflection months later, I begin to wonder if it was just an excuse for a last ditch effort at sabotaging my desires and dreams, something I have battled since elementary school.

There I was, having made it that far, from depressive lonliness on Thursday night to an outright offer on Saturday morning. I reflected on this by spending the next few hours in the Temple. Ultimately this turned out to be a distraction I had used many times that week to retreat from my growing pains.

The fountain water in the Temple was brown from playa dust. It had been a long week. I went to a final seminar on extraterrestrial culture. I watched fire conclave, uncertain if I ever wanted to be in it. Standing alone in a sea of people, I watched the Man burn. It did not have the joyous feelings that others retell in their experiences, nor did I have bad feelings. I was simply present.

I exited the crowds early and dashed for a front row seat at the oil derrick burn. I sat next to a beautiful soul, my same age, who gifted me foot lotion. He and I talked softly and gently, with healthy doses of peaceful silence as punctuation. He was not interested in romance or sex, but he was a beautiful soul to connect with. We were ships passing in the night, sharing their light. The heat of the mushroom cloud warmed our smiling faces. It was a moment to remember. All by "Ourself."

Experiences like these make me realize that the people of Burning Man, including interactions with myself, were far more significant than the events or artworks themselves.

Like three year olds with cardboard boxes we want to appreciate the vessels these gifts of people come in: the human body and all it creates. Yes, Burning Man can be seen as humanist from a physical perspective. But like adults we equally want to appreciate the spiritual value of the hearts, minds, and souls that lie within these gifts of people. Burning Man can also be seen as humanist from the emotional, mental and spiritual perspectives.

The art of Burning Man can be thought of as a catalyst to bring us together. The deep underlying reason why we continue to come to this event is to appreciate and play with the Art of People. Personally, I wish to go deeper into this Art. I wish to know it better physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. I want to know people better. I want to know You better. I want to know Us better.