Lucky Motherfuckers

That’s my camp.

Bahahahaha.

Oh.

I love it.

And I love that I am on this thread which updates me as to all the other “lucky motherfuckers” that I am camping with.

I received another missive from the Jack Rabbit Speaks, this time in regards to Burning Man with children and the infrastructure thereof and how to do it and how not to do it.

My favorite part was where it was suggested that Kidsville was not a baby sitting camp.

That one doesn’t arrive in Kidsville, drop the rugrats at the door and go off into the playa sunset to play.

I have had that experience.

“Oh you’re the Burning Man nanny?” She said, as her wild toddler boy feral with sugar and popsicle trails of juice dripping from his little dusty maw, swooped and swung around the camp while I was nannying my charge.

“No,” I said, “I nanny for people who work for the organization, I don’t work for the org, I’m not the,” inserting hands making quotation marks, “the Burning Man nanny, I’m just the nanny.”

I could see the crestfallen look that surfaced on her face.

Really lady?

You’re going to dump your kid on a complete stranger so you can go fall down a k-hole?

I don’t think so.

It’s not the first time I have been asked or had it alluded to that I could or should help out.

And the funny thing?

I will totally help out.

I have always been that person, you need it, I can see the legitimate need, I will offer my services.

But.

It’s on my time, it’s my decision.

And I bristle when the assumption is made that I’m going to babysit so you can play.

Unless, of course, I’m in your employ.

Then go get your play on.

Besides, I know this is going to be a much different experience for me nannying on playa than at any other time I have gone.

I won’t be working the hours that I worked before.

That being said, I won’t be getting paid for said work either.

It’s rather a swap of services for services.

I get a ticket, a place to camp, a ride there and back, all the infrastructure of camp, plus gear so that I don’t have to drop a dime on outfitting myself, and the company of some of my absolute favorite people.

I got all excited when a flurry of messages went out and I found out that so and so and so and so and he’s coming and they’re camping with us too.

And.

Well.

I am a lucky motherfucker.

Literally and figuratively.

I also sat down tonight and got in a cup of tea with my housemate and a catch up.

It has been a hot minute since we’ve sat and talked and caught up and it was really nice.

I forget sometimes that I have a friend who lives right over my head.

She’s not just my landlady, she’s a friend.

And so it was nice to get that catch up to get that friend feeling and to have some tea and talk.

I let her know all the travel that I will be doing, and also the possibility of travel that I may be doing as well.

Aside.

I need to talk to my friend about that possibility if the camping, The Grand Canyon trip, or maybe a road trip up the coast to the Avenue of the Giants is still on the table.

I have a possible vacation coming up at the end of July.

My employers are going to be in Tahoe and they are not taking me.

Granted the mom did allude to having some household projects for me, but I can’t imagine what they could be nor any project that would colluded to have me being in the city the entire week that they are in Tahoe.

Anyway.

I let my house mate know when and where I would be going.

Petaluma for a week.

Sonoma for a week.

Burning Man for a little over a week, 8-9 days depending on who I want to ride back with, how my burn is going will be the choice.

The small quiet voice in me says leave a little early and get yourself acclimated and back into the default world and set up so that you can go to graduate school proper that next weekend, because that is what is happening.

My first official weekend of graduate school happens that week that I get back from the burn.

Then again.

I think.

Heh.

Well, burn that candle to the ground, get as much as you can, get all the experience, come back dirty and dusty and burnt and start afresh and yeah, like that.

I may see how I feel around that depending on how much reading I can get done before that weekend, plus, I know I will have papers due after I do the retreat, which I will likely write while I am working in Sonoma.

Yeah.

That’s right.

When I looked at my schedule to tell my house mate the dates I would be gone I freaking realized that I would be going from Petaluma right to Sonoma.

Do I stay there and just go from Petaluma to Glen Ellen?

Do I even bother to do the drive back to the city to turn around and go right back to Sonoma?

I mean.

That doesn’t make any sense.

So I may actually be completely out of San Francisco for two solid weeks in August, back one week, then out to Burning Man.

Whew.

That’s a lot.

And I realize.

This weekend.

No emotional sabotage thank you very much, I will be too busy living my life.

And I will get my books and my papers and my readers and whatever else I need to get and get the fuck on it.

I set myself that goal.

Retrieval of said materials and the accumulation of the stuffs to do the things.

My Burning stuff started to arrive today and I now have solar lights to string up on my bike frame.

Makes sense that I prioritize getting my course work for graduate school too.

I only get to be a lucky motherfucker if I keep doing the work.

That makes me.

A lucky motherfucker.

Very lucky.

Tags: all the things, Black Rock City, books, burning man, camping, community, Glen Ellen, graduate school, Jack Rabbit Speaks, Kidsville, lucky motherfuckers, Nanny, papers, Petaluma, reading course work, Sonoma, stuff and things, travel, work, writing