Looking up into a draped parachute, filtering the midday sun, waving in the breeze is visually enchanting. It is also an oasis from the midday heat.
I am physically challenged in this desert environment. TM and Calliope both asked Tom if their lips looked as white as mine. No matter how much ointment I apply, within half an hour, my lips are once again chapped. My hair is like straw, sticking up to the right side and covered in playa dust. Scalp crud is increasing at an alarming rate. Playa dust looks like sand at first. But as the wind blows, you get a thorough covering of very fine, beige, silty powder. If it gets wet, it immediately clumps into clay. If it blows up into a dust storm, you cannot see two feet in front of you. Wind whips down the playa, picking up tracks of dust and making dust devils. My fingers are starting to crack, especially around my thumbs and right index finger. Dirt has gotten into every crack, so that I can’t seem to get clean, even if I wash and moisturize every hour. Drying fingers leave little bits of skin protruding and my fingers catch onto finer materials as I touch them. My fingertips are losing their sensitivity, due to their dry state. Going out into the wind, often means that the dust attacks my eyes, leaving them irritated and ready for bed. To protect my lungs from the small particles, I wear a bandana that covers my nose and mouth. I have kept my feet bound up in thick socks and hiking boots, so as to prevent heel cracks. This is one strategy that has met with total success. The midday heat has been unbearable, even for a Floridian. With windows closed, both the car and tent interiors are little suffocation chambers. If I open the windows, I get layers of playa dust inside. Under the parachute, the wind can still cover me with dust. When I am outside in the strong daytime sun, I stay totally covered to avoid sunburn. Although I am very excited about the upcoming art, costumes, performances, burning, friendships, and wild vehicles; all I want right now is to spend some time alone in comfort.
Tom: First day in the desert, we are definitely not in Florida anymore. The sun is really strong and it is very hot but the symptom that Florida has taught me to look for is absent, no drenching sweat. Here it is dry, dry, dry. How dry? Lips crack and peel, skin flakes, nose goes crunch when you squeeze it, elbows look like lizard parts, hands look like your mechanic's but with beige crud in the cracks instead of black, feet start to come apart as callouses crack, cracks extend like the veins in a leaf as your skin parts at the will of the dust, everywhere is dust, beige, powder fine, wind driven, the same dust that drove an empire to drop red coats and black trousers as a uniform and adopt a new uniform color, khaki, it is a word taken directly from Hindi, it means dust-colored, here we are all khaki, khaki hands, khaki feet, khaki snot, khaki teeth, khaki alkalai dust everywhere, khaki dust beige-outs blot out the sun, wind sculpts you, blasts you with waves of abrasive dust, eyes disappear shielded by goggles, a dust mask armors mouth and nose, hats cover heads and we all are anonymous, scary looking aliens in constantly shifting world of sun blasted wind driven dust.
John, a long time friend from Colorado College days, rendezvoused with us today. We tried to get both John and his spouse Kim, they are excellent company. We know this because Diane, Kim, John and I last had an adventure together in 1985 when we went on portaging trip through the Boundary Waters Wilderness. We tried to get both of them to the Burn but Kim has obligations as a physician besides not favoring mass gatherings, hence only John for this one.
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