"Escape from Burning Man"

The way I pictured my 40th birthday was not like this—standing in a desert, blinded by sun, mouth full of dust, skin cracking, feeling all alone, stranded, having just walked in on the guy I was supposed to have a romantic weekend with, having just walked in on him with not one, but two girls, and not one, but two guys, entwined on some filthy fuzzy white carpet under a camouflage tarp, naked and sweating as one.

And to think all he did was look up and say, “Oh, Jeanine. You’re here early. Everyone, this is Jeanine.”

And to think those kids actually rolled over, opened their eyes and said, “Hi, Jeanine. Welcome home,” like a bunch of fools.

I hate how they call it home.

The outside of their site was walled in with a Ryder truck with large letters painted on it that said Cuddle Puddle Camp. A couple of guys on a motorized couch wearing nothing but green body paint and blue feather boas almost ran me over as I walked out. Then a whole brigade of people on bicycles flew by chasing a dragon made of scrap metal.

For as far as my eyes could see it was just naked white people and dung-colored mountains.

I was in hell.

This is the way I once pictured my 40th birthday.

I thought I’d be married, to some great rich guy who loved jazz and recited poetry. And I’d have a few kids who loved us and wore matching tennis outfits. We would have a party with our friends in the Hamptons, successful doctors, lawyers and accountants, who were simultaneously creative and compassionate types. I would be celebrating not only my fourth decade on the planet but also some recent promotion or award for being the most innovative and powerful executive of something or other in New York.

But you see, that ain’t how it went down.

I’m not married, not seeing anyone except my two cats who I feed twice a day. I just recently lost my job. (“We are overhauling the culture of our sales team,” my boss told me, which was code for “we want to hire younger, skinnier women to sell pharmaceutical products to doctors.”)

And since most of my friends are hitched with kids and they all had plans for Labor Day weekend by the time I decided, last minute, to have a get-together in my Brooklyn studio, all 500 square feet of it, I found myself facing the prospect of spending my supposedly most pinnacle, most epic, birthday alone.

Yes, my mother offered to have something at her place in Jersey, with her friends, but that just sounded even more depressing, what with the images of the aunties gathered around a table of Costco deli meats and Cheetos, smiling sadly at me, trying to avoid the elephants in the room: my single status, my joblessness, my existence.

It was my baby sister, Dena, who, bless her, a few weekends before, had taken me to a club because, as she said, “you gotta shake that ass now and then otherwise it’s going to start collecting dust like a piece of furniture.”

I hadn’t danced in years and I also hadn’t drank in a bit, which is what I did that night, in excess. I guess the music and tequila lit a fire in me because I ended up dancing, bumping and grinding something fierce with this pretty young thing from California, Ronin, who grabbed what the good lord gave me, and then some, out on the back deck behind the club under some blue lights, and I have to say, for a second, I saw heaven.

I knew all along it wasn’t a great idea to come here but Dena told me it was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and better than sitting in Ma’s place listening to Auntie Betty tell us that story about her botched colonoscopy for the tenth time.

“Burning Man!” Dena said when I told her, like she was saying the name of some exotic island. “It’s supposed to be so wild and fun. Plus it’s only for one night and then he said he’s going to take you to Vegas.”

***
“I told you in my email that I was into poly-am,” Ronin said to me as I huffed out of his tent of human pretzels. “And you seemed okay with that.”

This is the problem with younger guys. They speak another language.

I thought poly-am was some new emo band. He then tried to explain to me that it’s short for polyamorous, which apparently means you like to fuck anything and everything under the sun all at once and everyone around you is supposed to be okay with it.

Well, I, for one, am a mono-am woman and this is where I drew the line.

He was trying to catch up to me as I walked faster and faster away from his site.

“You said you wanted to shake things up for your birthday!” he called out. “Well here’s your chance.”

I was looking for the kids I carpooled with from the airport but they were long gone.

“Talk to me, Jeanine,” Ronin said. “What’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong?” I shouted. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong. You’ve been wooing me by phone and email all these weeks, saying how you want to see me, and I haul my ass across the country and drive three hours in a Yugo with a bunch of hairy, smelly kids out to the middle of god knows where just to find you rolling around with your hand in a bunch of cookie jars, and you ask me what’s wrong!”

A few girls with parasols in tutus and silver boots walked by and whispered, “Oooh, playa drama.”

“Shut up!” I hissed.

He put his arm around me.

“So, what I hear you saying, Jeanine, is that you’re disappointed. What I hear you saying is that you don’t want to share me. But there is enough of me to go around. And the same goes for you. Don’t live with thoughts of scarcity. The universe is abundant. Everyone is here for you. There is so much love here for you. You just have to open up and receive it.”

“I’m gonna open up my fist and see if you receive it.” I shoved him off.

“Where are you going?”

“Home. I’m out of here.”

I thought he might keep following me, but instead he said, “The Universe is telling me to let you find your way, Jeanine. But, you can come back anytime. Right here at the corner of Bliss and Redemption. It’s just you and the playa now. Good luck on your journey toward survival. And remember, leave no trace.”

And to think I was going to sleep with that fool.

What a joke. And what a joke this bullshit about survival. Survival is walking through parts of Brooklyn and not getting shot, survival is some people living on a dollar a day. Not this place of yuppy tribal posers.

At first I assumed here in the land of peace, love and understanding that some fool would give me a ride back to Vegas, or at least to somewhere with a god dammed hotel and a shower. But I was wrong. No one wanted to leave!

I went up to every campsite I passed and people walking or riding by. I even offered money. “No way, sister, can’t miss the Burn!” is what they all said, looking at me like I had just suggested missing out on the return of the second coming of Christ.

Soon I had other problems. I was burning up, thirsty as hell, top of my head and my eyes frying under the sun. My feet blistered. My tongue felt like a sandbox. I couldn’t even buy water; you couldn’t buy a god dammed thing in this place.

“No currency. Currency is evil,” one girl with flabby tits and a live snake around her neck said. “Plus you’re supposed to come prepared for survival, with your own water. But I’ll barter with you.”

I wanted to punch her in the face and stomp on her snake, but instead I gave her my I Love NY keychain for a bottle of warm water.

Time after time, people turned me down for a ride. Even after I finally made it to the information tent, I was told I had to wait until the morning.

“We discourage traffic on the big day. You’ll have to stay the night.”

But there was no way I was going back to Ronin’s tent. I had to find a way out.

I passed the Yoni Temple, a giant paper mache vagina, and the Penis Slide and watched people wait in long lines to go in and out of one and up and down the other.

At midnight, I was going to be forty and I needed to be anywhere but here.

Walking around in a daze, I started to get harassed by a bunch of people sitting high up on lifeguard chairs. Next to them was a line of bikes marked, Borrow Us.

One guy, with a bullhorn, shouted at me: “No spectators! Tee shirt and jean shorts is not a costume!”

“Fuck you!” I screamed, and gave them the finger.

They turned around and mooned me with their hairy asses.

I kept going until it dawned on me that I could see the highway in the distance and if I could only bike across the desert to the road I could hitchhike to Vegas or the nearest town.

The mooners were happy to see me again and to give me a bike.

But of course there was a catch. I had to put on a costume.

I agreed, reluctantly, and rode off into the slowly setting sun wearing a bra made of fake pink fur, matching panties, gold boots and a paper birthday hat feeling like an idiot but thrilled to be that much closer to getting out.

The desert is much bigger than it looks. And the bike was much shittier than it looked. So by the time I rode to the edge, the two tires were totally flat and I was exhausted.

There was no one in sight, nothing except a small wooden door hinged on a post with a sign on it that read: You have reached the edge of existence. Exit at your own risk.

I opened the door, stepped through, and closed it behind me.

The sun was melting hot orange and magenta all over the desert. For a second I felt a great sense of relief. I had made it. But more than that I felt untethered, as if I had truly left the entire world, reality, my life, behind.

The feeling didn’t last long. I saw the tiny headlights on the road, still far away, and started running as fast as I could toward them, screaming these primal screams like a crazy woman.

Maybe that’s why I didn’t hear it charging up from behind me.

This beast, this giant pink rabbit with a maniacal grin the size of a billboard barreling toward me.

At first I just thought it was just another stupid art car out for a cruise but then it became very clear it was making a beeline, for me. I started running, now in the direction back toward the Man. I wasn’t taking any chances. You had all sorts of fucked up people on all sorts of stuff out here and I knew full well this could be some bunch of fools driving around totally high seeing if they could scare the shit out of some lone tripper out past the edge of motherfuckin’ existence.

Then, the rabbits came out.

About a dozen of them, dressed in full rabbit suits, jumping out of the van, sprinting after me. My left knee, my bad one, gave out. They caught me and covered my head in a pink mesh bag. I started punching and kicking them and even caught one in the jaw, but all they did was laugh and sing, “We’re the love the brigade! Here to love you!”

They carried me into the van, and took off the bag. The walls inside were covered with pink fur and silver glitter.

I reached for the door.

“Y’all better let me the fuck out of here or I will sue your asses for assault, abduction, battery and anything else I can think of!”

But they just sat next to me, smiling like idiots, trying to tell me that someone ordered a “love abduction” on me because I needed to be pampered and loved. They were offering me whatever I wanted, free massages, champagne, a gourmet meal; they even had a shower in the back if I wanted to wash off.

“I just want to get out of here! I want to leave Burning Man!”

But that’s one thing apparently the Love Brigade would not offer. So I sat there while they drove around, realizing they weren’t about to let me out unless they got to do something wonderfully loving for me.

Finally I told them that I was sorry for being such an agro bitch, and that yes, I wanted a group massage, but not inside the van because it was too hot. The roof was much cooler and that way we could watch the sunset together and chant to the playa goddess and thank her for her abundance.

The bunnies clapped and hugged me. I then told them I wanted to shower first, but that they should wait for me above where I would make my grand entrance in the buff.

“It’ll be like I’m being reborn to all of you,” I said, and the fools ate it up just like I knew they would.

While I listened to them get settled on the roof, I made my move, got in the driver’s seat, started the engine and began roaring back toward the road.

They banged their fists and shouted, “what the hell are you doing?” “slow down!” “fucking bitch!” Eventually I stopped and told them to get off, now or never.

A line of rabbits chased after me until they got too tired.

“Eat my dust, bunnies!” I shouted.

Then it was just me, Jeanine Stintson, at the wheel of this crazy mother fucking rabbit machine barreling toward highway 34.

I pulled off my birthday hat and threw it in the back, tossed my hair and saw myself in the mirror. I looked good in pink.

The sun and my smile melted into one. I was on my way.

(photo by photographer, Declan McCullagh)