[MD] The Return of the Burning Man

[MarshaV]

John,

Even within its beauty this seems sad, i don't know what to say, 
but I wish I could make you laugh.   


Marsha
 



On Sep 5, 2010, at 9:16 PM, John Carl wrote:

> 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
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