The temple was about twice as far from center camp as the man had been the previous evening. Again, the recommendation was "don't take your bike." On the way out there I passed a simple bonfire where the man had been the previous evening. Somebody told me that this was still the man's fire. People had been adding fuel to it all day. Things like the unpainted wooden art projects they didn't want to take home.

I kept walking. I was part of a loosely connected group of group of burners, just two or three at time separated by quite a bit of space. I looked up at the sky at some point. There was a streak of flame growing way up there. I kept watching and realized that it was a parachuter with a huge flame tail. Then I realized there were three or four other ones up there to. One of them was headed for the ground MUCH faster than the others, who were more like hovering. I kept watching and the guy got closer and closer to the ground. I kept thinking "deploy your chute and stop falling." The freefall type kept zooming down. What a concept. Pondering mortality on the way to a temple burn after watching a flaming burner die because his chute didn't open.

There wasn't so much other pagentry for the Temple burn. We walked out to where it was, and then found a spot upwind from where the ash was going to fly. Mostly people were quiet, but there was some murmer of conversation.







By this time I could hear some people sobbing. The temple just quietly burned.

















Sometimes the sound of a timber falling punctuated the general roar of flames.







  

  



I saw the above on the post of a street sign.



By this time exodus had started. I was walking near the edge of the road because there was always another heavily loaded vehicle headed for the exit going by. I think these speed bumps had been added by somebody that got tired of the dust storms that rushing cars kicked up. They were the only traffic calming measure I saw on the playa.

  

That phone booth where you could talk to God was keeping the couple in it positively riveted. It was hard for me to shake the feeling that on the other end of the line was some frat boy playing with them. But then, maybe that God has evolved since the time I picked up the phone, many years ago now.