The late [and generally gentle, except for that last night Bryan was here] rainy season kept on

greening things up up the creek while Friday we went down across the valley to where our friend Nina has decided to contain her scene in three shipping containers,

two for the studio and one for home…an anchor for her peripatetic artistic practice with electricity

to allow the first refrigerator she’s had in years…beautifully sited, mountains all around, off grid

with water in Gardner just a few miles distant compared to having to drive it down from Albuquerque to her previous location in Datil, NM. Meanwhile out west in Black Rock City these weeks it’s strictly BYO everything and seemingly flourishing…

The next day we were back in Gardner for the Farmer’s Market, arriving early to partake of

summer’s bounty before heading down the street to La Clinica for healing work with Desireé before

she took off to meet her partner in Reno for a driving trip to the coast and points north once he was done with his BM…in that present moment the Afterburn remained a futurity although in spite of

my continuing and somewhat demented obsession with the event I checked out way before the

predictably anticlimactic Man Burn, checking in again Sunday morning to determine, yes, The Playa Abides…as will, for the next day or so, Black Rock City

while we here began a New Month

on Labor Day with a walk well beyond the rest rocks

to see the unseasonably fast-flowing [un]Dry Creek as

the BM Exodus* through Gerlach commenced…

continuing into and throughout Temple Burn Night, initially never more than four hours

“from gate to gravel”, their quaint [or alliterative?] way of designating CR 34’s two lane blacktop, paved well before any burnies “discovered” the desert back in 1994 or so.  Whatever…and where is and how long does it take to get to “gate” from BRC?  We’ll never know. I do know that the rest of the year a half hour will get a person from Gerlach to at least the Dip whether by desert at Threemile or High Road’s washboards…

*Leaving behind an as yet unidentified** male in a pool of blood…no evidence, no suspects and with thousands departing the playa, a seemingly perfect crime.

**Until a few days out…finding the perpetrator, however, may prove a bit more difficult.