Burningman

We were all pulsating to the same unheard rhythm—gyrating around the growing flames. "Throw it in!" Monica yelled above the hum of human bodies.

"Jim, throw it in!" yelled Brenden. I looked at them and started my move closer to the fire—through a crowd packed so tight that our sweat was all that allowed me to squeeze through the mesh of human flesh.

The crowd swirled around me, the intense heat of the fire made worse by the sweltering late summer desert heat. I closed my eyes and remembered how close I really came this time.

I could feel the energy of the moment in my bones—in my blood—spreading throughout my body.

Standing there in the desert dust, looking at life being lived in full color inside the tents on the playa, I thought about the tent I had become used to spending my days inside only a few months earlier at UCSF hospital with pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP) and when the nebulizer treatments of pentamidine failed to revive my lungs, they built a tent around my hospital bed for aerosolized treatments.

Here on the playa, beside the fire, I could taste the metallic taste of IV antibiotics on my tongue—I remembered how afraid I was to die.

With a guttural cry meant to be heard by the Gods, I screamed, "MY NAME IS JIM BURESCH AND I AM ALIVE!" People around me started to hoot and shout their approval of my declaration.

Looking at the bottle of AZT in my hand—a ball and chain like no other—I threw it in. After a moment the flames turned unearthly shades of green, blue, and yellow and shot higher, touching the Man's hand as it started to rise. The heat, the smoke, the ritual was simultaneously putting me into a trance and waking me up reborn.

Looking around I saw others throwing their offerings into the raging inferno—the woman next to me threw in a framed picture, another threw in a painting that caused the red flames to turn blue, green, and purple.

Still others threw in wads of paper.

I closed my eyes and started to feel the THUMP THUMP THUMP of my brothers and sisters. It sure beat the stuttering, lonely pings of the hospital's heart monitor. I pushed deeper into the rhythm, my skin slick, my lungs finally—violently—alive with smoke and salt.

My body and my mind were starving for air, water, and sex. I got all three when he instinctively handed me a bottle of warm water—it was delicious—so was he, as this stranger's eyes looked at me with a rawness that made my knees buckle.

Only for a moment—as he got on his knees and took me in his mouth in front of everyone and no one noticed. I could feel my eyes rolling backwards as my body went limp—until it wasn't.

We—me and my stranger—took off skipping along the playa. "You two look super cute!" another stranger said.

My senses were in overdrive—the lights, the music, the throngs of people, it was all alive. "So am I," I screamed in my head until the deep bass of Madonna's Drowned World/Substitute for Love remix took over my senses, commanding the air itself to do her song's will.

Feeling the music vibrate throughout my body, my eyes widened at the kaleidoscope of neon colors saturating the desert night sky filled with a million stars hanging over our heads—in one of the darkest corners on Earth. I turned to my stranger skipping alongside me, smiled, and yelled, "This is amazing dude! But I need to go find my camp—The Purple Psychedelic Freaks. It's the big purplish dome.”

Adding, “Do you see it anywhere?"

My stranger looked at me, grabbed my face in his hands, kissed my forehead, and ran off. As I watched his naked ass disappear down a dust playa street.

Looking to the heavens I said, "A god disguised as a stranger like Zeus himself.”

I saw our tent—remembering the near fight we got in over its shape. "It looks like a penis head," I said.

"No, it looks like what it is—a mushroom," Monica insisted.

"Jay, you see a mushroom, right? I know Victoria sees a mushroom. Why is it always about sex with you, Jim?"

"Monica, it does slightly resemble the head of my dick," Fox said, and Brenden quickly added, "Mine too."

Now, there they were, on the playa—one big happy family—sitting under a penis.

“Hey Mark, let the woman breathe.” I said.

“Leave him alone, this woman is just fine.” Victoria said as Mark cooed in her ear.

"No, no, no, come on guys, that's not how it is and you know it," I heard Monica saying as she leaned against a speaker talking to two guys, one wearing a sarong.

The other one wasn't wearing anything except body paint—one long red stripe running from his forehead, down his chest, and over the top of his penis, which made it look more like a Rosy Boa than a man's baby maker.

"Where's Brenden?" I asked no one and everyone.

"He's here somewhere," Monica yelled without looking away from the men in her lair.

"I wouldn't either," I said out loud, taking one more look at that giant boa—as the man caught me staring at it and gave a wry smile.

I went outside to the back of the tent where the cars were parked.

"There you are!" I yelled as I ran up to Brenden and gave him a big bear hug. "Where's Jay?" I asked.

"He's here, he's in the back of the trailer," Brenden said.

I looked at Brenden quizzically. "He's tripping, man," Brenden added.

I walked over to the U-Haul truck where we kept our food stored, opened the door, and there was Jay talking to a banana.

"Aren't you very yellow," he said to the banana, before asking, "Are you a happy banana?"

In a voice four octaves higher than his own, the banana replied, "Eat me, fucker!" And he did—Jay took a big hunk out of the unpeeled banana.

"Dude, what the hell?" I asked.

"Jim!" Jay said, bouncing off the floor of the truck and springing to the ground like a jack-in-the-box.

Jay ran up to me and said, "Stick your tongue out."

I looked at Jay and thought, why stop now, as I put my tongue out.

Jay took a piece of paper stamped with the Dead's Dancing Bears and placed it on my tongue. Instinctively my tongue started to retreat until Jay grabbed its tip.

"Not so fast, Mister Jim," he said, putting drops of liquid on top of the blotter. "Liquid acid, buuudy"—the last word sounding more like Pauly Shore than Jay.

"Jay, you missed your calling, dude. Hollywood would have loved your characters," I said. Jay looked at me stone-faced with no idea what I was talking about.

We sat around the campfire under the penis head—Jay, Monica, Brenden, Victoria, Mark, and Fox—listening to music from the different camps flood the night sky.

“Jim, buuudy, let’s go walk around!” Jay exclaimed.

Feeling more than hearing the deep bass house music blaring from all around, I could feel myself leaving my body. The double hit of acid had started kicking in.

"Let's go!" I yelled as we started walking around the playa.

As we started our stroll Jay said, "I didn't notice how much larger it's gotten since we got here."

"Look," I said, pointing towards the western horizon. "That red streak is brake lights from cars waiting to get in."

“Fuck me man, that’s miles of lights,” Jay observed.

Adding, “We got here just in time to get that spot on the third row. Imagine waiting to get in and then having to camp so far away."

The night was hot, dry, and full of dust—carrying the fumes from gas-powered generators the way smog carries diesel from rush hour into my nostrils.

That haze, interlaced with acid, made the reds cosmic—the greens neon—the blues electrifying, and whites blinding. The lights moved through the darkness, whirling and swirling, creating trails in a hypnotic dance.

"This is so beautiful," Jay said.

"You're seeing it too?" I replied.

"Buuudy, I hope you're seeing what I'm seeing," he said.

I looked over at Jay and saw him crying. Not tearing-up-at-the-end-of-a-movie crying, or the kind we do when we get bad news. It was the type of crying you'd expect from a little baby, staring at something for the first time in pure bewilderment.

"Dude, you're beautiful," I said.

He looked at me stone-faced with no idea what I was talking about. It just makes me love you more, I thought.

We spent the next several hours walking around the playa until our water bottles were bone dry, like the dust in our mouths.

"I see that neon sign from the camp behind us," Jay said. "This way." He took a hard left toward the neon sign when we heard Monica excitedly say, "Watch out, you freaks!"

"Jay, watch out, man," Brenden said.

"Where did you guys come from?" I asked.

"You're kidding me, right?" Monica asked.

Jay and I looked at each other, confused, as we turned toward Monica, Mark, and Victoria.

"Holy shit, you freaks are whipped. You've been walking in place for hours," she said.

The whole group—our family—burst into a rumpus room full of laughter and delight.

The next day we started breaking down our camp, leaving it as we found it, and heading back to reality—for most of us that meant Wells Fargo Bank's corporate IT department.

A few weeks later, Monica called. "Hey Jim, there's a Burning Man event in SOMA this weekend. I'm getting us all together. You in?"

"Of course!" I said.

Saturday night I caught a cab to SOMA, to the address Monica had given me.

”This is it, buddy," said the cab driver.

I looked out the window. Harrison and Sixth Streets. I paid the cabbie and jumped out scanning the crowd for my Burningman family.

"Jim!" Monica yelled from somewhere deep in the crowded street. I saw her waving both hands like she was lost on a deserted island and I was flying over.

And even though I was surrounded by skyscrapers, seeing all these Burningman freaks took me back to Mother Nature, back to the playa—only for a moment, but long enough to feel it. Long enough to feel alive in the flames again.

Entering the giant-sized industrial space painted black with neon graffiti on every surface that felt more performative than authentic—still—the hypnotic music pulled me into the mesh of human flesh.

As I got lost in the crowd and the sensory overload I completely forgot I was back home, in the City. After a while I went looking for the other freaks but there were too many people.

Unable to find them, I started breaking out in an unearned sweat, my heart racing, a feeling of impending doom rising.

“What’s happening to me?” I said.

“Oh my god, I can’t breathe,” I said, pulling my shirt off as I pushed through the throngs of people towards the door. Once outside, the cool night sea air filled my lungs, my pulse quieted down and I sat there just breathing.

“What the fuck?" was all I could think.

I headed home and told Alain about the weird experience.

Monday Morning

On Monday, Monica came to my cubicle, landed in a chair and said, “What happened to you Jim, we looked for you everywhere.”

“I was dancing when a really weird sensation happened, it felt like I was having a heart attack, I said.

“At 28, doubtful Jim,” Monica said.

Just then, Jay popped into my cube. We were reminiscing as our chatting grew louder—finishing each other’s sentences. My boss’s office was next to my cube, and Sheri came out and around to my cube.

“I can hear you three in my office. Sounds like you had a really good time on your vacation.” Sheri Nash said.

“Oh my god, Sheri, it was amazing. We were part of a temporary community of art, love, and music,” Monica said.

“Sounds like Woodstock to me,” Sherri said, cutting Monica’s words short.

“It really does sound like you all had a great time, but let’s get back to work,” Sheri said, turning to leave. The three of us looked at one another with wide-open eyes that barely held back our laughter.

As the summer sunshine gave way to the cloudy, rainy days of winter, Burningman became a memory as we started to make new ones.

Then came springtime and sun bathing in Delores Park with it—after months of grayness. At times, it seemed the whole city had found a spot on the western slopes of the park overlooking downtown with its amazing views of the Van Ness corridor, the Civic Center with the City Hall dome rising above, and above it all rose the Transamerica pyramid.

When the summertime fog returned, it had renewed an energy in me to protect what I had grown to love—The Castro neighborhood.

“ Someone, grab it!” Alain commanded from the kitchen.

The wind picked up a long strip of brightly dyed pink fabric—making it dance toward the big bay windows.

“I’ve got it!” James yelled as he dove out of my bedroom, across the hall, and grabbed at the fabric like a drag queen diving for a loose dollar bill.

After Alain finished sewing the strips of fabric together,we all unfurled the giant inverted pink triangle overlooking Market Street during the 1999 Castro Street Fair: “KEEP THE CASTRO QUEER.” As we looked down on the crowd of hundreds gathered below us, I wondered if it would always be this good with James, Ryan, and Alain.

The San Francisco Chronicle did a story about it. Stores made T-shirts and greeting cards out of the image. As we gave our community something to hold on to, my world was falling apart.

“Jim, I’ve already paid for the flight, the event passes, and the hotel.” James said—anger hiding his hurt. It was nice to lose all control to him when I seemed to be in control over everything else in my life, but my family was my family.

“I understand that, and you know I want to live that experience with you, but I can’t go to International Mr. Leather in Chicago instead of Burningman.” I replied.

A few days later, over dinner at Café Flore, we were listening to Edith Piaf singing Non, je ne regrette rien when James sat down, his glass of wine, and said to me, “You’re just too high-maintenance, Jim. I just don’t see how we can build a life together.”

“This is still about International Mister Leather? Sorry, James. I prefer the community on the playa over a weekend of you parading me around!” I retorted.

“Jim, calm down,” James shot.

“I am calm, James,” I said, wiping the corners of my mouth with my napkin as I politely got up and walked out of the restaurant.

“NO!, You didn’t!” Monica said on the other end of the phone.

“Well, he was trying to make me choose between what he loves and what I love,” I said.

“You’re so sweet. We love you too,” Monica said.

When we weren’t chatting on the phone after work, we were chatting at work, making plans for Burningman 2.0.

“I’m going to dye my hair platinum blonde,” I informed Monica on a smoke break.

“You totally should!” She exclaimed.

Jim Fox, who was standing next to me, said, “My girlfriend is a hair stylist. I can get her to do it for you.”

“That’s so cool of you,” Monica said.

“What’s so cool?” Jay asked as he walked up to us.

“Jim is going to go full bleach blonde for Burningman,” Monica said.

“Will Brian and Sheri be okay with that?” Jay asked, cutting the fun.

“Oh shit, he’s right,” Monica said, adding, “They can fire you if you change your appearance from when they hired you. Technically.”

“Well, they can’t fire me. I’m a contractor,” I said.

“You know what I mean,” she replied.

Jim Fox said, “Not if we both do it.”

I turned to him with a look of interest. Fox said, “We both work for IDEX. They don’t care what we look like. Have you seen some of those guys working on the branches?”

“No,” Monica said flatly.

Fox said, “Some of them are covered in militia tattoos. Others look right out of the movie Deliverance. No offense, Jim.”

“None taken,” I replied, thinking about some of the rougher rednecks I’d known growing up in West Virginia, adding, “I can see what you mean.”

Jay said, “Jim, just go and ask Brian. If he says it’s fine, Sheri won’t care.”

“Good thinking, Jay,” Monica shot.

Later that afternoon, I casually talked to Brian Gilpin, a VP at Wells Fargo, and asked him if he would care if Jim and I temporarily went blonde.

“If it’s temporary, no problem,” Brian said.

I went over to Jim Fox’s cubicle and told him it was a go, and we made plans for our blonde ambitions.

Monica had become part of the Burningman organizing team, which meant we all were now part of the family. We spent our weekends planning and getting ready for Burningman when we were out attending fundraisers for our community.

As the summer days grew longer in the city, Monica planned a kickoff party the weekend before we were set to leave for Black Rock Desert. Fox and I planned our blonde conversion for the day of the party. He and his girlfriend showed up to the condo Alain and I had immediately off of Haight Street and a few blocks east of Monica and Jay’s apartment.

Jim and I were both nervous. We were tall, beefy, manly men with little outward femininity in us. “I’ll go first,” Jim said.

A few hours later, we looked like brothers—Aryan or otherwise, and it was full on creepy at times.

“Jim, you’re blonde, man,” Jim said.

“Jim, you’re blonde, man,” Jim said.

We both broke out laughing.

Burningman 2.0

After hours of driving north out of Reno, I saw the sign for Gerlach, and my heartbeat raced when my mind went back to the flames and the secret they shared with me.

Driving beyond the town limits, I pressed the gas pedal to the floor with the windows rolled down and tuned up the CD player with Creed blasting on the speakers, challenging the wind for dominance.

I felt my life in San Francisco disappear. The worries that caused sleepless nights for the Bank’s feared day of Y2K vanished. The lingering pain of James’ breakup—gone. It all faded as the freedom of Burningman took over my thoughts—the hot desert air rushing through me and my car.

Hours later Jay and I were walking about the playa watching everyone starting to assemble their temporary homes. “Let’s get a tattoo” Jay blurted out.

“What do you mean?” I asked

There’s a guy doing tattoos with his car battery as the juice and he’s bartering for doing the work.”

“There he is,” Jay said, pointing his finger towards a camp on the outskirts of the planned city on the playa. It was a white van and a pop-up tent on either side of a makeshift tattoo parlor.

“Hey guys, what’s up?” I said, approaching the creepy white van. A middle-aged man covered from his hairless scalp down to his feet with tattoos got out. I saw a lot of women's names on his skin, a few skulls, a lot of what looked like tribal symbols but I learned the hard way— just because the artist says that’s what the Chinese character means doesn’t make it true.

“Whas’up my dudes?” The tattoo artist said.

“How much for a tattoo?” Jay asked.

“I’ll take some shrooms or blotter,” he replied.

“Perfect!” I said excitedly, remembering the bag of magic mushrooms I'd traded my homegrown weed for.

He started tattooing the image of Burning Man onto the back of my neck under the relentless summer sun. I passed out cold.

I had taken too many drugs and not enough water. After they doused me in sacred water, I woke up and was ready to keep the party going.

“You okay, Jim?” Jay asked.

“Never better,” I answered and asked, “How does it look?”

“Never better, buuudy” he replied.

As we were walking back to the now erect tent that looked like a penis’ head, I said, “what kind of tattoo did you get?”

“Oh… after seeing you face down in the sand from the car battery powered tattoo machine-a-thingy I can wait until I get back to the City,” Jay answered with that stone cold midwestern face.

“I’m really hoping this Burningman is a spiritual awakening for me. I plan on taking a Lizard King walkabout into the desert, naked with only water.” I told Jay.

“What kind of spiritual awakening are you looking for?” He asked.

“The Jim Morrison kind,” I said.

Jay just looked at me with that same Midwestern stare that said, 'this Queen isn't going to win a Miss Mensa contest'

“Look, Monica!” I yelled Approaching the big penis-headed tent, I turned around for her to see my backside.

“Yeah, your ass is as flat as ever,” she said to me, laughing.

“What, you don’t see it?” I quizzed her.

“Relax, Jethro, I see it. It’s lovely,” she replied.

“Lovely!” I yelled, “Who has some mirrors I need to see it?”

Victoria came over to me with two makeup mirrors and showed me my tattoo of the man on top of his altar on fire and his hands raised. “I love it!” I said.

The sun was setting fast, but that blast of air that swept across the playa floor was absent that night. “I’m going to take a nap in my car,” I said to the group and went out behind the tent, turned on my car and its A/C, and fell asleep with exhaustion.

“"Is he dead?" I heard Monica asking.

"I don't know, but he's been in there with the car running for a long time," Brenden said.

I opened my eyes and saw Monica, Jay, Brenden, Victoria, Mark, and a few strangers surrounding my car — staring at me.

"Jim!" Monica yelled and smiled a smile so large that I knew it was chemically enhanced.

"What time is it?" I asked, climbing out.

"Just after 5 am," Brenden said.

The sun would be up soon.

The planned city grew quiet just as dawn rose above the mountains to the east—I left everything behind except for a walking stick and a gallon of water.

Walking out into the desert naked with no chance for modesty regardless of dangers excited me.

Not because I wanted to be an exhibitionist but it was about surrendering—leaving my fate up to something unknown—I kept walking into the wilderness, expecting something but not sure of what to expect.

On that walkabout, I had a long discussion with the man I found alone in the desert. He wasn’t the Lizard King I thought I was looking for—it was me, and I knew the life I was living wasn’t making me happy.

When I was down to half a gallon of water, I stopped and masturbated under the scorching sun, and as I climaxed, I screamed with all the vigor of the moment, “I am the Lizard King, I can do anything!”

Walking out of the desert, sure of change but unsure of the change to come.

It was late morning when I got back to camp, and I saw Fox had arrived and brought me a present to boot, my hubby.

“Alain!” I screamed with excitement, ran to hug him.

“You taste like salt,” he said, and we kissed more.

Later that night, Monica came back to camp panicking and confused.

“She’s on her way to the hospital. They flew a helicopter in, and they’ve taken her to a hospital in Reno,” Monica said.

Alain asked, “Who’s been taken by helicopter, Monica?”

“Victoria,” she said, knocking the wind out of all of us.

“Someone needs to be with Mark,” she continued.

“What’s wrong, what happened?” I asked.

“They’re not sure, the medical tent doesn’t think it’s just dehydration. It looks serious.” Monica said.

“Jim and I will go,” Alain said. We immediately packed up our belongings and began the drive south to Reno, passing miles of cars still waiting to get in.

As I watched the planned city’s lights dim into darkness the further we drove, I knew, deep in my bones, that I would never return to the playa, but the playa would forever be in me.