Camper Bios - 2012
Sere
Robert Maddox ("Robert" will do for anglophones)
Age: 37
Where do you call home? Ooo toughie...
I'd have to say home is where I find family: either by
blood, law or choice. I'm rooted more in relationships
than locales.
Been to Burning Man before? No, I'm a
playa virgin
Why Burning Man? Back in 2005, I found
out about the Burning Man event through an acquaintance,
and after reading about it online, I decided to go
"someday". Well, soon after there was a heart attack
followed by a stroke then a divorce. Needless to say, I
corkscrewed a little sideways for awhile, but after a
bit, I found some equilibrium and decided that I'd go in
2010 as a "spaced odyssey". No plans how I was going to
afford it, get there, survive or get back, just a
definitive date rather than "someday".
For the next five or so years I talked it up with
whomever I figured would like to come with me, and in
the mean time found a new career in medical massage
therapy rather than the computer programming I'd done
before. Turns out I've some talent for it and things
started coalescing. 2010 found me a few years into
exploring alternative lifestyles, including polyamoury
and BDSM (Of course, I'd always secretly envied the
lunar families in Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh
Mistress" - I'd just never knew that was a real
relationship alternative!) and putting my much planned
for trip to the burn on hold to get married to my
delightful Fearecia. That's all right though - we'll
both be coming to the Festival this year, and It'll
probably be worth seven years of wishful thinking.
Volunteer on the Playa? Not yet.
Toughest thing: Loss of memory. You
know how ubiquitous computers have become? My laptop
recently had a hard drive crash and I lost lots of
"external memory" in the form of pictures, poems, music
and the like. About five years worth. It's interesting
to experience that sudden vacancy again - that
helplessness in the face of loss. Memories are the most
ephemeral form of "stuff" and it's tough to re-realize
that "stuff" just isn't that important. It's incredibly
freeing, to get rid of your "stuff" and start anew, but
the existential comfort that owning things, even if
they're just memories, can still have a deleterious
effect on our perception of limitless horizons.
Best thing: Realizing that every wall
and roadblock, when turned 90 degrees becomes a frame
for focusing on possible horizons. That and really bad
puns. Ooo: or a well told tall tale, I LOVE those!