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Listen to the interview here:

“What is the fucking point of a helicopter if it can’t land in mud?” asks Carli of the air around her. I certainly didn’t have an answer. I doubt the blond woman who is somehow playing volleyball with herself in the distant background of the Zoom window did, either. “Like, you’re in tech–invent something, come up with a solution to this problem. DRONES or whatever. We had to walk for two hours in like, fucking quicksand. It’s a miracle we didn’t drown. And then I had to sit in the back of a pickup truck to Gerlach like a ranch hand. And I had to leave like twenty-thousand dollars worth of costumes in the RV, which, who the fuck knows where that is or if we’ll ever it see again.” She closes her eyes, puts both hands on her sternum, and takes a deep breath. And then another. I see the shimmer of a large infinity pool beyond the jumping blond woman, and I watch someone wearing white servant attire briskly cross behind her carrying a tray of beverages. She takes a third breath, opens her eyes and smiles. “It wasn’t the Burn I wanted, but it was the Burn I needed.”

“Where are you now?” I ask. I had spoken with Carli two weeks ago about the market conditions for sparkle ponies, and I was eager to know how she’d fared in the unexpected challenges that defined Burning Man this year.  

“LA,” she says, sounding a bit dispirited. “Decompression is usually in Tahoe or Tofino, but everyone was tired, so we just crashed at Eric’s.” Eric is Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google and a religious Burner, and Decompression is the variable amount of time after Burning Man (or any other recreational experience in harsh conditions that requires a great deal of substance abuse and deep house music) during which people with unlimited free time and resources continue to abuse substances and somewhat shallower deep house in a private, luxurious environment. 

“How long will you be there for?” I ask.

“At least two weeks, maybe longer,” she says. “I really need Decompression this year.” Five very tall men in robes–or maybe capes?–pass behind her carrying armfulls of long, light colored wood. “It’s just a lot to process. There was so much that happened and also didn’t happen. It all just felt so out of control, you know?” 

“But isn’t that the point of Burning Man, to relinquish control?” I ask. 

“No, that’s not the point of Burning Man at all,” she says. “Burning Man is about intention and connection, like, intentional connection. That’s something you can control, and there were a lot of intentional connections that I wanted to make that I didn’t get to make. I missed almost every single one of the best sets outside of our camp. Like, if Wes–sorry, that’s Diplo’s real name-”

“Yeah, I know, I matched with him on Raya-”

“Yeah, same–so if Wes hadn’t been in residence at our camp I wouldn’t have danced, like, at all.” I see her temper rising again. She takes another deep breath. “But it was the Burn I needed, I guess.” A man is walking towards Carli wearing black Wayfarer sunglasses, silk pajamas, and a Cheshire cat grin. 

“What the fuck is this, some kind ‘a interview?” asks Chris Rock. Carli turns to him.

“I’m talking with a journalist who’s talking with influential Burners about their impressions of the playa this year,” she tells him. 

“Well, move the fuck over, I’ve got some impressions,” he says sitting next to her on the couch. He leans in and slides the shades to the top of his head. “Here’s my impression of every lil’ white chick on Saturday morning who some tech dude flew in from LA: whaaaaaa, the generator don’t work and I can’t blow-dry my extensions or make my green smoothie, and the mud’s too deep to ride my e-bike that the tech dude paid for to my boyfriend’s camp for molly and sex.” He laughs. I laugh. She does not. “Alright, y'all have fun with your interview, I’m gonna go watch a bunch of rich white dudes build a statue of a white dude that they’re gonna burn tonight.” Chris walks back towards the volleyball court.   

“You’re burning a man tonight?” I ask. 

“It feels like the right thing to do,” she says. Chris Rock is now playing volleyball with the blond woman. “They’re building it out of palo santo, so it will be extra special and meaningful.” 

“Doesn’t palo santo burn very slowly?” I ask. 

“Not if you douse it with rocket fuel,” says Carli. “Elon is bringing some and a flame thrower for each of us.” This sounds like an exceptionally bad idea. “Everyone thought it was a great idea and a way to like, intentionally get all of our sadness out about how the Burn went down.” Three more tall men in capes–or maybe robes?–pass behind her carrying wood. I see that one of them is Diplo, er, Wes. The unmistakable profile of Elon Musk follows behind them, yelling something that I cannot discern. Carli glances back at them. 

“So what’s your intention for this little Burn?” I ask.

“I want to send good vibes to Carlos,” she says. Her eyes well up and she bites her lower lip, hopefully not particularly hard given the quantity of filler in it. Chris Rock spikes the volleyball (volley ball? Idfk), which hits the blond woman in the nose. He dives under the net to attend to her.

“Who’s Carlos?” I ask gently. 

“One of my favorite playa boyfriends,” says Carli, giving in to tears. Chris Rock is looking at the nose of the blond woman, who appears to be crying as well.

“What happened to him?” I ask. 

“He didn’t make it,” she sobs. I had heard that someone had passed away at Burning Man, and my chest tightens. 

“Oh god, I’m so very sorry,” I reply. “How did it happen?” 

“The back of the truck was too full,” she says, prompting a fresh round of unflattering snorts. “It was him or this totally random chick from Topanga who glommed on to us, and fucking Travis Kalanick chose her.” A tissue box slides in from screen-right courtesy of an arm clad in a staff button down. She takes one, blows into it, and hands the soiled tissue to a disembodied hand. “Thank you,” she says to the member of staff above her. She looks back at the screen. “I threw him the only two Wetnaps I had left and one of my Athletic Greens packets, and you only get like thirty a month. I did what I could.” She puts her face in her hands and sobs a few more times. Her nails are very long and painted in a tie-dye finish. “He wouldn’t have been a fit on Eric’s plane anyway.”

“There weren’t enough seats?” I ask. A member of staff–perhaps the owner of the hand–has run out to the volleyball court with what appears to be a bag of ice for the blond woman. Chris Rock steps back and sort of shrugs.

“I said a fit,” she corrects. “He would have been like, the only normal guy, you know?” As a normal guy, I totally know. “Ok, I’m tired, and I need a nap before tonight, because it’s going to be a lot, so….” 

“Of course, go take your nap. Thanks for talking with me again, Carli,” I say. She blows me a kiss, and I’m left staring at my own face in the Zoom window. I wonder how the blond woman is doing, if her nose is broken.

I wonder how normal people are faring at the moment. I imagine they’re trudging through drying mud in boots that they will absolutely not throw out after helping their neighbors and disassembling their own camps and barely making their commercial flights from Reno back to wherever it is they come from. 

The next day someone sends me a story on Instagram. I see in the still frame half of Chris Rock’s unmistakable face and half of the face of a nondescript white male in chrome goggles. Chris is wearing the same black Wayfarer shades and faded black baseball cap that he wore during his playa exodus, so I figure it’s another version of the same video of him and Diplo–er, Wes escaping the Playa, but the background is lush. I click the video. The frame jerks from the two of them to just Chris, who’s taking a selfie video. 

“Well, we got our motherfuckin Burn in, didn’t we Wes,” says Chris. He pans the camera to Wes, who shakes his head and smirks. Chris pans the camera back to himself. “What do you think would happen if a bunch of trippin’ rich white tech bros who have only ever lit the fuckin’ La Labo candle next to their king sized bed build a statue out of wood, drench that fuckin’ thing in ROCKET FUEL and then light it with twenty flame throwers?” Chris Rock takes off his shades and widens his eyes. “WHOOSH,” he yells. “That’s the sound of a forty or fifty or whatever million dollar house goin’ up in FLAMES.” 

Chris raises the camera above his head, revealing a residential inferno and a hoard of people in robes–er, capes?–following behind him. Among them I spot Carli and several other blond women (one of which has a white bandage on her nose), their extensions blowing in the breeze. 

“The good news is that everyone is fine,” continues Chris Rock, “and everyone set an intention before they set everything on fire, so it isn’t arson if it’s intentional.” Chris Rock laughs and puts his arm around Wes just as the video ends. 

It wasn’t the Burn they wanted, but it was the Burn they needed. I guess.

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