Vulnerability, Authenticity and Your Business; the Secret Life of a Burning Man Port-o-John.

The rules on how to “be” are exhausting in their malleability. At Burning Man, there are only the 10 Principles, and they are universal. They are not etched on stone tablets but are equally timeless and exquisite in their simplicity.

Thwack, creak, slam.

Not the readily accepted sound of a bass drop, but the familiar rejection of a Port-o-John door too filthy for my waste.

Consumption and waste, the rhythm of human experience.

Your playa name is Blue.

You stand sentinel, waiting. Soft blue lights signals within the dark night, quiet falls as feet drag on playa — rest two-wheeled steed, and hold my fur. My fingers find my necklace with centerpiece luminescent. Light my way, save me from other’s — shit.

Leave no trace.

But we must.

Because we exist.

You are my hero, Port-o-John, stoic as valiant relief, you need no cape. I am the Lois to your Superman, costume discarded and rawness revealed.

Standing hefty, deft, in blue plastic — right there when I need you.

Radical Self-Acceptance.

You take me as I am.

The ritual of partitioning waste from the rest of our environment — as if there were ever such a thing as away in the act of throwing. I consume therefore I waste.

I threw away a refrigerator once. A refrigerator. He said, We don’t take those here ma’am. You will have to bring that to the main landfill just outside of town, east on I-80 get off at Lockwood. You’ve gone too far if you find Mustang Ranch. We arrived; refrigerator secured in the back of the truck, and directed upwards to the household appliance dumping spot.

It looked like Tatooine. Vast sand-scape hills disguising our waste as undulation. An awkwardly large metal dumpster as the lone interruption signaled our dumping. So we leave it here? Next to the stove? Metal testaments to what was once convenient: How many layers of refrigerators, stoves and de-commissioned washing machines contributed to the sand that supported our tires?

We drove away, swallowing vomit.

How much vomit have you held, Blue?

You silently consort with all manner of human etiquette, playing dumb politely around personal trashcans and retaining our human secrets. Intimacy. You hold messages, a candy wrapper stuffed down discreet, a condom foil guiltily folded, a scrapped telephone number ill acquired despite the warnings. Tissues. Q-tips. Corn.

The unique gifts of an individual told through what has been, and the opening of space to what will be.

My Radical Self-Expression.

I love you as my recipient, Blue.

And you are my dark side, as well as my light.

The Port-o-John as villain, fickle trickster with traps abound.

You are full of shit. You stink. You lure me in with a false promise of anti-bacterial gel on the other side. In the heat of the day, you enclose me in the sulfurous runoff of the River Styx. Villainous. You are full when I seek empty, long when I need short. And yet we are still drawn to your evil unavoidable. Until cleansed.

And relief.

A blissful morning when you open your door to me, and my lungs fill with the smell of a brand new deodorant cake disintegrating in the basin. Slam, gentle slide of lock — Occupied.

Thwack, creak, slap.

Like the crash of a wave.

My reflection in the cerulean blue light of the pristine disinfectant water — reminder of — another playa, oceanside, hidden below a narrow trail, accessible only at low tide. A discovery made because my dog had to take —

a shit.

Near a white spine of rocks extending from cliff to sand to tide pool, green moss latticed over stone. A minor symbiotic buttress. Strolling shoeless leaving temporary footprints.

De-commodified.

Broad wings throw shadows and my eyes follow and find you landed — heady, long red neck with dangling ruddy skin — a wake of vultures devouring the carcass of a seal. They catch my eyes, and we nod in the knowing.

Consumption and waste, the rhythm of human experience.

We circle.

Waiting.

Treasure or trash?

What we tuck away indicates something about our consumption — what’s the consistency of that waste, what weight? Where is the excess that allows it?

Where is our excess? And when do we acknowledge it?

Blue, you stand as monument to the sycophantic landfills, to the maelstrom of plastic bags churning in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. You silently speak of the consequences of misdirection, of failing to consume humanely.

Blue.

Gaia?

The emptiness waiting, ready to hold all of you without judgment or duress. How did you err? There is no such thing, to you there is only internal adventure. The canted blue door, timeless, whistling a bit in the high desert wind: yes, bring me your shit. What no one else will take, you will. Does that make you home? The place where all that we are is deemed acceptable? Or at least forgiven? Welcome — bang the gong! Your inclusion is Radical, you are the community in which we all participate as equal — unmasked.

Is that the womb?

The place where all beauty and rancid cyclicality are probable, sustained? That fragile light filtering in to eyes half shut in either blank delirium or self-evacuation, differing levels of presence coincident with consciousness. With circumstance. All blue, all reminding you. All precious depth and buoyant attempt.

This, the Gift you bring.

Unconditional.

And what is the value of your return?

We accept your gift.

With fragranced Gratitude.

Or risk of default world entitlement? Do I notice you out there, or take you for granted without consideration? Senseless waste, ignored. Consume. Waste. Consume Waste. We shit where we walk — remnants of what we consume behind unused just so we can step in it later. You join with others, banded together in Communal Effort and silent invitation to join the conversation.

Blue.

You teach me.

In metaphor and ritual.

Your scroll is thin — and white — somewhat obscured yet omnipresent in Western society — as American as humble pie and toxic detergent. Yes, this will hold us together. Yes, life is sanitary in this manner. Yes, I will stuff your paper in my pockets for the foreseen occasion of dearth.

Oh, scarcity! The empty roll with last dangling shred, disintegrating. Worse: the roll present and full, unfurling, but gal-dang it’s wet.

The brittle fibers of human society, all manner of cultural construction, fraying deep in our nether regions.

Deep in blue.

One ply, or two?

My civic duty — my responsibility — is to whom? Not to you, Blue. To you that keeps the artifacts. Awareness and civility. Pay attention to the seen and the unseen.

I stood, at then end of your line, waiting for another who was still held in your grasp. And I watched the parade. The anxious rush when time is short — how often do we forgo the important and attend to the urgent? But you are a gauntlet thrown to what we fill and measure. You are both urgent and important. Read between the scrawled lines inside your door. I wink as I leave you, and hold the door to another. I let them know that they are in good hands with a knowing glance — and a smile.

I feel my immediacy.

You live the principle.

Immediacy.

You break down the barriers between self, other and world.

A portal john to a natural world that defies my control.

You ask me to let go.

And when I do — the experience is ineffable.

If only you played music.

But you do.

Thwack, creak, slam.

Consumption and waste, the rhythm of human experience

This essay was written in collaboration with the wickedly creative Hannah Allen. Much Gratitude.