Burning Man

Salty drops of perspiration beaded my spine and moistened my armpits. Even in the shade of Arctica, the heat pressed in like a blanket. This wasn’t helped by the mass of dusty bodies waiting in line to buy ice. Swimming in a heat-induced miasma I lazily scanned the crowd and sipped on water. Suddenly, an explosion of curses drew my attention.
With every breath he drew, this man was hell-bent on verbally gunning down Celine Dion, though the singer was nowhere to be seen. He eviscerated anyone who came to her defense.
I couldn’t help but notice the Donald Duck tattoo smiling mischievously from his rapidly gesticulating forearm.
He spit insult after insult until he was interrupted mid-sentence by a fit of coughing. Hacking, he came up asking for water. I fished around in my weathered red bag, looking for my Camel-Bak straw. He glanced at his hand. Briefly I saw clouds of worry breeze across his face. “Blood,” He said simply. I looked down at his palm, only to find that it was slicked red. “I only got one lung,” he said wiping his hand on his cargo shorts, “I’m Poppa Bear. What’s your name?” he asked slurping on the offered Camel-Bak.
We got to talking as the line shuffled forward. When he laughed, I could see the gaps left behind in his broad smile.
After we had purchased our ice, he offered to give my friend and I a ride back to our camp in his art car. I rode shot gun. As we rolled along, Poppa Bear told me that he’d been going to Burning Man for sixteen years. The only year that he’d missed was when he had to serve time in jail for beating the living daylights out of a group of men that had tried to rape a little girl. When his case went to court, he said that the judge looked at him, with his broad chest and tattoos, and at the mens’ broken faces, and sentenced him. “Protect the innocent,” he told me.
Our camp’s prayer flags and jolly roger swam into view. We slowed to a stop. He gave me his address at 9:30 and C. A day or so later, a couple camp-mates and I went looking for Poppa Bear in a golf cart. We roamed C for a while, but most of the camps were dark. We stopped by a camp on a corner and asked if they knew Poppa Bear. They said that they did; his camp had some bright lights out front and that he was probably drinking a huge bottle of tequila. We kept searching, but we were never able to find his camp.