[MD] The Return of the Burning Man

[John Carl]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ww-_hsVxPa0&feature=related

Separation doesn't mean the same with me and Lu that it does with other
people.  So I probably should use a different term.  We're not fighting or
angry.  We just realize a need to shift roles a bit.  Our kids are grown and
stable, and Lu's in a different place working in town, the main support of
the family.  That's a big difference.  I stay out on the ridge because this
is where my skills are needed, and its easier when nobody's around to fix
things, think and write.  I like it.  She didn't at first.  She never wanted
anything out of life but being a pampered housewife and tho' her high school
career counselor was shocked and tried to convince her otherwise, she never
wanted anything else.  And then she went off and married me.  Hah!  Go
figure.

But she's really adapting well.  The kids she teaches art  really love her.
 And they're all crazy for the drama class my middle child sarah is teaching
too.  Which is a big consideration.  Lu doesn't like forging through life on
her own.  She was born English and moved a lot.  English always want to know
the social rules, and when you move a lot, they're always changing.  But her
daughters are 21, 18 and 16 and all together they make a formidable and
survivable team.  They've been more economically productive doing baby
sitting than I have with carpentry!   The other teachers really love her and
the principle of the school is that the principal is in charge and she
absolutely adores her.  And she's shifting into something different, and its
hard, but she's doing well and I'm proud of her.

And the fact that we just visit on weekends makes the weekends more intense.
 There can be different rhythms of differing relationships and their not
always easy to explain to outsiders but for some reason it's important to
try.


Here is what I found at Burning Man - a circle.  A small circle, in cosmic
terms.  A literal circle drawn in the dust, by the hands of men and dwarfed
by the circles of the earth and the moon and the orbits of the cosmos, But a
circle full of human ideas and art.  Ideas and art that whispered "you don't
have to do it this way, or that way.  You don't have to be constrained by
social patterns."  Then DQ University and Masanobu Fukuoka and the idea that
living on the planet is being done all wrong, just blended with the circles
in my mind which I wish to continue, amplify upon and expand.  And I have to
draw apart to do so.


The time I went to Burning Man, my wife had a whole different perspective.
 She  suffered a whole series of troublesome tragedy, unaided and all alone.
 I'll leave it to her to give her perspective someday.  She says she'd
gonna.

And that week was  followed  by my truck breaking down, my uninsured, brand
new motorcycle wreck and subsequent loss of work and so much crap in one go,
that if you took it apart from the whole rest of the deal, and weighed it in
the balances - I'd be found desperately wanting, no doubt about it at all in
MY mind.  But she persevered.  We both persevere.  I'm willin'.

Lu actually has had grave doubts at times.  She did give me an ultimatum,
when I was heading to Burning Man that I'd better actually follow through on
this, or she'd lose faith, probably for good.  She'd grown tired of me
always talking about ideas I never implemented  so that was an extra drive
to get there and get it done, despite hell and high water, in an effort to
demonstrate something about new ways of living on the planet.

A return to Burning Man now seems probably like the last idea in the world,
to request of my long-suffering wife.  But this time it is different.  This
time it isn't going to a far off place in the desert.  It's getting a
different attitude, where I am now.  Coming out of babylon, in this place.
 And the advantage is I don't have to strike camp.  I can just leave it up
and use the structures I create.

And by "this place" I don't mean "wherever I happen to be".  I mean THIS
place.  This place I dwell, this home on the ridge, this spot on the great
California surfboard.  This is important because I believe the purpose of
consciousness is to articulate environment.  to understand and "speak for
the trees".  To be a voice for a place and to demonstrate with right
actions, the best way of dwelling in that place, for yourself and for the
place.  It's a win/win, if done right.   I want to do it right and I sort of
have to ignore everybody else, to do that successfully.

"The single man cares for the things of God, how he can please the Lord, but
the married man cares for the things of the world, how he can please he
wife."

That was that misogynist Paul, speaking, but I'd bet  Buddha would agree.
 I'd guess every man who ever lived would nod along with that formulation.
 The trouble is, what to do about it?  Fight it, or go with the flow?  I'd
say my conclusion is go with the flow, but don't get swept away.  Surf,
rather than float.  Use some damn judgement, fer goodness sake.


The orchard, below the house, holds a school bus and old vehicles waiting to
be mechaniced.    A 73 VW camper that Bill used to own that needs the carbs
rebuilt and my grandpa's 73 chevy one-ton, dually, camper special that is
NON SMOG !! Yay.  That needs new ignition wiring, and a bunch of stuff that
needs organizing and one computer with internet connection, an RV and me.  I
won't be far.  some separations are meant as movement away but closer to the
heart.  Lu's in town and we'll probably try and rent out the house ASAP.

And when the cold rains loom, I'll drive the RV down to Sacramento again,
live during the week and go to truck driving school.  Once my job is
established  Lu can stay home again for a while.  It's good to take turns in
marriage.  It really is.


Here's a special song for a special someone on their birthday.  This was the
first piece of music I ever bought in my life, Linda Ronstadt's Heart Like a
Wheel (.. but my love, for you is like a sinking ship, and my heart is on
that  ship out in mid ocean...  such poignancy!)

Now that  I think about it I wouldn't be surprised if this song is a big
part of why I wanna be a truck drive! Along with a restless urge to keep
movin', to see what's over the horizon.  To travel.  In my mind, if nothing
else.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJHcD0kHTGk&feature=related