You Don't Know About Me (26 page)

We finished planting the tree and Momi came into the tent. She wore a long Indian dress covered with bright beads and trinkets. Her hair was braided and woven with beads and feathers. She carried a buckskin shoulder bag stuffed with something. She was now Yellow-haired Woman. She asked me to come with her so Wachpanne Papa could begin his “sweat-lodge purification.” I'd been sweating all day, so I was fine about missing the sweat-lodge thing.

The sun was dropping behind the giant Burning Man statue. We crossed a big open area Momi called the playa.
It was dotted with wild towers and statues. People drove around the playa in “art cars.” One art car looked like the Fountain of Youth rolling on paddle wheels. From the top, a Spanish conquistador threw water bottles to people. Then I saw a huge boat-car filled with giant stuffed animals. As it drove by, I read the name on its side:
NOAH'S CAR'K
. It got me wondering, so I asked Momi, “Are there any Christians here?”

“Absolutely,” she said. “And Jews and Muslims and Hindus, and Buddhists and Sufis, you name it. That's where we're going now.” She pointed across the playa. “Camp Meccumenical is the ultimate in religious tolerance.”

Before I asked about it, I saw a guy riding a bike toward us. He was fat, naked, and painted green. You haven't seen
gross
until you've seen a naked fat guy riding a bike. I had to find something else to look at. I spotted a girl walking our way. She was dressed in green leafy branches and flowers.

“Why are so many people green?” I asked Momi, as the girl's green bits zapped the memory of the fat guy's green bits.

“Every year Burning Man has a color and a theme,” she said. “This year it's green and renewal.”

The girl waved. “Hello, Yellow-haired Woman.” She had an English accent.

As the girl reached us Momi said, “You must be Spring.”

“Spot on!” The girl spread her branchy arms. Even though her face was green and she was dressed like a shrub, I could see how pretty she was. She looked about twenty. “And who are you?” she asked me.

“We're still looking for his burner name,” Momi answered.

The girl grinned. “Let's call him Gob-smack.”

“Why Gob-smack?” Momi asked.

“ 'Cause he keeps looking around”—she flapped her mouth open—“with his gob wide open.”

Momi laughed. “Gob-smack it is.”

The girl jabbed me in the shoulder with one of her stick fingers and winked. “Pleased to meet you, Gob-smack.”

I was glad we were facing the sunset. Maybe the orangey light covered my blush.

Before I could remember how to say hi, the girl turned to Momi. “So, got tickets to the Sun Dance?”

Momi crossed her arms. “I don't have ‘tickets.' I have witness cards.”

“Right, witness cards. Gotta have one.” She started to dig in a pouch attached to her waist. “How much?”

“Two leaves from the Tree of Founding Fathers,” Momi answered.

The girl giggled. “Last year it was frog skins, this year it's the Tree of Founding Fathers. I love it. Which leaves?”

“One Andrew Jackson, one Alexander Hamilton.”

She pulled out a twenty and a ten. “One Jackson, one Hamilton.”

Momi took the money and handed her a witness card. It looked like a ticket to me.

“See you tonight.” Rustling away, the girl looked back. “Hey, Gob-smack. When the dust blows be sure to shut that mouth of yours.”

I caught up with Momi. “What was that about?”

“She was flirting with you.”

“I mean about the money.”

She shot up a finger. “Ah-ah, that's one of the few rules here: no money. There's only bartering, goods for goods.”

“But you bartered for cash.”

“No, I traded a witness card for Founding Father leaves. And if you won't play along, I'll send you back to the van.”

I didn't get a chance to say any more. Just when I thought I'd seen the grossest thing in the world, I saw the grossest thing in the universe. A group of naked men on bicycles, with shaved heads, rode toward us. “I wish there was a rule against naked guys on bikes.”

“Those aren't
guys
.” Momi put her palms together and bowed as they passed. “They're the most famous biker gang here: the Nudist Buddhist Nut Peddlers.”

I pretended to boot. “Gross!”

“You wouldn't say the same about their rival gang, the Critical Tits Dyke Bikers.” She took my arm and pulled me toward some big tents. “C'mon, I have leaves to gather.”

Camp Meccumenical wasn't like any revival meeting or Bible camp jamboree I'd ever seen. There was every creed on earth, from Amish farmers to Zen monks. Some looked real and some didn't. Most of the Amish guys were wearing fake beards. And then there was the guy dressed like a Plymouth Rock Puritan. He carried a gun with a funnel-shaped barrel that was actually a Super Soaker. He kept shooting people with “holy water.”

After sunset, Momi traded her last witness card. Her buckskin bag was stuffed with leaves. The air cooled as we walked back across the playa.

At Camp Renewal the tent was closed. Momi said Wachpanne Papa was inside “preparing the new-life lodge.” She and I ate salami and cheese sandwiches from a cooler in the van. I thought the bread was homemade because it was dusted with sweet flour. Then I realized it was alkali dust. Momi explained that dust was the official condiment at Burning Man. After we finished the sandwiches, she asked me to take a walk and come back in a half hour to help collect witness cards at the door.

“Can't I just take a nap in the van?” I said.

She shook her head. “Yellow-haired Woman has rituals to prepare herself for the Sun Dance.”

Walking out on the playa was like being on another planet. In the darkness, the statues and art cars glowed with bright neon colors. The best was a phoenix rising from a real ring of fire. The people walking around had glow sticks looped around their arms and legs. Some looked like they were wearing neon pajamas. Some looked like walking skeletons.

I went over to the phoenix fire, got out my GPS, and checked the distance to Portland: 221 miles. I'd be there the next day. Then I pulled out the new chapter of
Huck
that I hadn't had a chance to read. There was a funny part about Tom Sawyer kissing his aunt on the mouth. It made me think of the girl I'd met earlier, Spring. When she came to the Sun Dance I wondered if she'd still be green and covered in foliage. I wanted to see her real skin and what was under her leaves. But I also hoped she was still green and leafy. Otherwise, I wouldn't recognize her.

At the end of the chapter, I stared at the last two lines of
my father's poem. “My verses will now fade from sight/Giving rise to things Allbright.” Walking back to Camp Renewal, I kept wondering: the bad book was
one
thing, but “things” is more than one. What did he mean by “Giving rise to
things
Allbright”?

As we let people into the tent, Momi and I collected over two hundred witness cards. I did the math; it added up to more than six thousand dollars. Whether you called them frog skins or Founding Father leaves, it was major bucks.

Spring was one of the last ones there. She was green and leafy but had changed her foliage for a dress made of cattails. Her head was covered with a wild wig of green glow sticks. She looked like a woodland fairy after a nuclear accident.

“I'll save a seat for you,” she said as she went inside, throwing me a wink. Something flashed on her eyelid but I couldn't see what it was.

As Momi closed the tent I went inside and walked behind the low circle of bleachers. It was dark except for the hazy light of glow sticks. Spring was easy to find with her green fountain of glowing hair. I climbed up the back of the bleachers and sat next to her in the top row.

Her glow-stick wig lit up her face. “Aren't you going to ask me why I changed into cattails?”

“Why did you change into cattails?”

“They're the traditional gift you bring to a Sun Dance.”

I wanted to ask if that meant she was going to give her dress to someone, but every way I tried to put it in my head it sounded crude. I just said, “Oh.”

She stared at me and pointed at her eyes. “Just so you know, I can see you with these.” She closed her eyes. I jumped. Her eyelids were painted with green eyes. “But I can read your
mind
with these.”

I tried to sound like I'd seen plenty of girls with a double set of eyes. “So what am I thinking?”

Her fake eyes kept staring. “You're wondering who's the freaky girl with four eyes.”

I chuckled. “The four-eyes part is right. How did you get them on there?”

“Tattoos.”

“They're permanent?”

She opened her eyes, closing her green ones. “Don't be silly. They're stick-ons. But I had to have them for tonight.”

“Why?”

“ 'Cause even when I blink”—she flashed her green eyes—“I won't miss a nanosecond of the Sun Dance. And, I can keep my eyes on
you
.” She shut her eyes and pushed her fake eyes closer. “Just remember, I
know
what you're thinking.”

I laughed nervously and tried to think of something to hide the sinful thoughts wallpapering my mind. I was saved by a rapid-fire drumming.

“Here we go,” Spring whispered, squeezing my knee.

The drum settled to a slow beat. Between each thump I
felt a silent thump in my knee where her hand had squeezed. The drumbeat moved into the dark space the bleachers circled. The Tree of Life was a black silhouette. Yellow-haired Woman beat the drum and spoke in a low flat voice. “The beating heart of Mother Earth we do not always hear. We hear it now.”

Across the space a ball of fire ignited. It was Wachpanne Papa with a torch. “The fiery eye of Father Sky we do not always see. We see it now.” He wore a full eagle headdress. His upper body was bare and covered in white dust. I was surprised by his big barrel chest. His lower body was wrapped in Indian-looking material, like a long tight dress.

Yellow-haired Woman kept beating her drum slowly. “As we hear the heartbeat of Mother Earth, so she hears us.”

Wachpanne Papa lifted his torch. “As we see the fiery eye of Father Sky, so he sees us. So he sees me, Wachpanne Papa, who the Great Creator took to the center of the earth. There, he showed me the heart and soul of Mother Earth. It was a breaking heart. It is breaking still.” The drumbeat changed to a thudding groan. “It was a weeping soul, weeping still.” The drum growled and moaned. “Then, Great Spirit, you gave me a vision of how to mend the breaking heart of Mother Earth. Of how to return her weeping soul to song.” He raised the torch and shouted,
“Hetchetu aloh!”

The audience shouted back.
“Hetchetu aloh!”

“What's that mean?” I whispered to Spring.

“ ‘It is so indeed.' ”

Wachpanne Papa lowered his torch and walked around the circle of bleachers. His voice changed to one that was
casual and friendly. “Welcome two-leggeds, and any four-leggeds or six-leggeds or eight-leggeds that may be crawling on you.” The audience laughed. “Yes, we can joke as long as we stand outside the hoop of the world, but all is sacred once we step inside.” He stopped at two torches set in the ground like a gateway. He lit the torches. “Welcome, East, which brings us light and understanding.” He kept circling around and looked up. “Welcome, wings of the air.” He lit two more torches on poles. “Welcome, South, which brings us warmth and growing.” As he walked he looked at Spring and smiled. “Welcome, roots of the ground.” Her cattails rustled as she giggled.

He lit two more torches. “Welcome, West, which brings us rain.” Walking, he spread his arms. “Welcome, Great Creator. Thank you for stepping outside your tepee of clouds sewn together by lightning, and leaning close to hear our song.” He lit the last two torches. “Welcome, North, which brings the cold, cleansing wind.”

The lit torches made four gates in a circle carved in the dirt. The drumming quickened as he moved back around it, waving his whooshing torch and pointing at the crowd. “You, the people. You are the outer hoop of the world that runs around it like ants, doing what ants do: digging holes, building mountains, and copulating so your holes and mountains are filled with the peoples of the earth.
Hetchetu aloh!
”

“Hetchetu aloh!”
everyone echoed.

He stopped by the torches of the east. The drumming went back to slow. His voice grew soft. “But tonight, you are here not to dig, or to mound, or to copulate.”

The crowd laughed. Spring giggled.

Wachpanne went on. “You are here to give your hearts, beating with the heart of Mother Earth, and your eyes, seeing with the light of Father Sky, to the Sun Dance.
Hetchetu aloh!
”

“Hetchetu aloh!”
everyone shouted.

He stepped through the torch gate into the circle, sweeping a hand around it. “This, the inner hoop, is the world, our only world.” He pointed to thick lines on the ground running from the rim of the circle to the Tree of Life in the center. They were dark and made of brush. “These lines of sweet sage and the wisdom of all medicine fathers are the beliefs of the world.” He walked, stepping over the lines. “Some beliefs are held by so many, they are called religions. These beliefs are as bright as the twelve moons. Some beliefs are held by so few, they are only pinpoints of light. Whether big or small, all these faiths, and beliefs, like the spokes of a great wheel, lead to the same center of the world.” He moved to the Tree of Life. Three unlit torches stuck out from it. He lit one of them. “They all lead to the same Maker of All Things.” He lit another torch. “To the Tree of Life.” He lit the last one. “This is where Father Sky and Mother Earth came together and brought forth the world.” He stuck the torch he was holding into the bare side of the tree, and whispered,
“Hetchetu aloh.”