My final post shall be delayed until my immune system learns how to do its damn job properly.

I survived my week on the playa.  I survived my ride back to Vancouver.  Currently I’m surviving the long haul back to Toronto.

Since I’m using a pay computer at 5:45am in Winnipeg of all places, this is not the time for an extensive update.  Keep reading when I get back: there are a few more meaty posts left in me.

The island trip fell through, due to interpersonal dynamics in which I am uninvolved and of which I am unaware. Instead, I spent more time on Wreck Beach. More sun, more psychedelics. In a concrete planter on the UBC campus I discovered a large crop of healthy marijuana plants. This, I suppose, is what I meant when I mentioned Vancouver’s reputation.

It looks like I’ll be taking a double-decker bus to Burning Man. It’ll be a leisurely three-day trip with stops at hot springs and so forth. Seemed like the most fun way to get to the Playa, if not the most efficient.

I would like to say more, but my head is really getting into some spaces that are impossible to verbalize without sounding like an asshole or madman. I’ll think about it more and try again later.

I’ve spent most of my Vancouver stay (thus far) at Wreck Beach, a hippie-infested, clothing-optional paradise with a beautiful view of Vancouver Island.  Mushroom chocolates, beautiful women, furious drumming – what more can I say?  It’s as though the locals are saying: we’ve reached the end of the continent.  What more is there to do but celebrate?

The summer is nearing its conclusion, and this may be the last real post I make.  I’ve been invited to spend a couple days at a full moon celebration in Tofino, followed by several days camping on a tiny forested island nearby, helping to construct a house.  When I get back from that, I’ll try to at least indicate that I’m still alive, but since it’ll only be a couple days to Burning Man, most of my time will go into preparations rather than lengthy blog posts.

I’ll be sure to make a final post or two after Burning Man, as well, but by then I’ll be back in Toronto and will have told many of you all about it already.  Stay tuned also for coming-home party plans (which might very well be jointly a party for Nick, who is currently in India).  Until then, keep on truckin’, y’all.

I didn’t mention it last post, but from the Circle of All Nations I got a ride to Ottawa, where I stayed almost a week with Sophie and her brother Alex, who are super-cool.  I also got to see Lindsay again and meet her semiexboyfriend Shawn.  Lindsay, Shawn and I took acid and wandered into Gatineau Park, where we had only got to commune with nature a short time before we discovered the entire remnants of a woman – purse, clothing including underwear, makeup kit, crack pipes, everything except the woman herself – strewn by the side of the road.  This was eerie enough to warrant a police investigation, so we gathered up all the stuff, marked the place where we’d found it, and gave it to the first police officer we came to.

I also, in the last few days of my visit, hit it off fabulously with Amy, a girl from Guelph who was visiting the next-door neighbours.  Seriously guys, you want to talk about enantiodromia?  ‘Cause I can tell you all about it.

From Ottawa I decided to bus it not to Florida but to Vancouver.  I’ve therefore spent the past three nights sitting on one bus after another, eating rest stop junk food (fortunately I had the foresight to bring some more wholesome victuals) and curling up awkwardly to half-sleep at nights.  The forests north of Lake Superior transitioned into the great prairies, which – a day and a half later – suddenly became the Rocky Mountains, whose sharp and craggy peaks stood in stern contrast to the gentle Appalachians.  Chasing the setting sun, we drove through the mountains overnight and arrived in Vancouver this morning.  Let’s hope the city lives up to its reputation.

For those of you who were wondering, I found my bag with everything still in it (including my travel pass) except my notebook.  That’s annoying, but not a huge loss.

I didn’t end up staying at the Rainbow Gathering.  Everyone was speaking French, and I couldn’t follow a word of it.  So when a (bilingual) lady offered me a ride to a native “Circle of All Nations” happening about four hours north of Montreal, I accepted.

This turned out to be a wise decision.  There was a significant flaky New Age presence – a workshop entitled “The Teachings of the Incas” turned out to be about ascended masters and chakras and “co-creation” – but also traditional sweat lodge ceremonies, a Huichol shaman, drumming and so on, all set against a beautiful lake in the woods.  The air was clear, the stars were out, and the company was great: definitely a positive way to spend a weekend.

All the talk about healing, though, got me thinking.  Healing is a major part of most religions, but why?  Isn’t there more to exploring the nature of the cosmos than simply not being damaged goods?  I see myself as a machine, and perhaps the machine needs to be repaired.  But once it’s in working order, isn’t there some function it should be serving?  What seems to be the case is that psychological damage is so ingrained and commonplace that we can’t even imagine what a healthy relationship to the universe might entail, or – better yet! – what an entire society might look like if wellness, not affliction, were the norm.

Anyway, speaking as someone who now feels well – or well enough – my search for a function is drawing me next to Florida, to meet up with a friend of mine.  We will see what happens.

Well, I`m about to get to the Rainbow Gathering.  As you all might imagine, there won`t be internet access while I`m there.  Hopefully I`ll have something interesting to say when I get back.

The shoulderbag I was using so I wouldn’t have to carry my enormous knapsack all over Montreal turned up at the Metro lost-and-found office.  Unfortunately said office was closed today, and I’ve been without my journal and notebook.  That’s been making me a little crazy.

It’s not been all bad, though.  I got to see my old friend Lindsay and several of her friends.  We climbed the mountain yesterday, and today we visited the Tamtams.  Drumming helped me forget about the bag.

(I’m afraid my Discovery Pass may have been removed from my bag by whoever found it, or by someone else.  If that’s the case my trip is essentially over – I may not even make it to Burning Man.)

Getting to the Gathering is also posing a problem.  Greyhound will take me as far as Sherbrooke, PQ, but from there it’s another 60km to the actual site.  Since Craigslist has failed thus far to provide me with a rideshare, I’ll have to either hitchhike or – failing that – walk the 60 kilometres, which amounts to a two-day hike with a heavy backpack on.  I could maybe do it in a day, but my body wouldn’t be very happy about it.

Not a very interesting entry, I know, but in the absence of my journal this outlet has to suffice.

Wandering aimless and discontent into Kensington Market, I encountered a lady I’d met at CoSM in New York.  She was with her boyfriend – whose name is Pan, I shit you not – and both of them turn out to know my friend Mike from Peterborough, whom I was trying but had failed to meet today.  They encouraged me to delay my departure even further and come to the Trinity-Bellwoods drum circle tonight, where Mike will also be in attendance.

I was still reeling from this vivid display of synchronicity when they mentioned offhandedly that they were planning to go to a Rainbow Gathering in Quebec a few days from now.  I’ve never been to a Rainbow Gathering, but I’ve heard enough gushing about it to know I should attend.

So yes, I’m staying in Toronto tonight, and maybe also tomorrow night.  But after that I’ll go to Montreal for a couple days, visit some of my family who lives there, and then join Tina and Pan at the Gathering.  I have no regrets: as I see it, I’ve given up a couple more days of travel time, but received a much-lacking sense of direction.  That’s certainly a fair trade.

Flash. I am back in Toronto. It is after 2AM and my friends are helping me bring my stuff back to my apartment. We go eat at Fran’s afterward.

Flash. Ges is giving me a Tarot reading. He warns me about falling into old behaviour patterns, about getting trapped by Toronto. Morgan and Mike Bailey join us and we sit at Spadina and Bloor and talk about ourselves. I forget to call my sister.

Flash. I am picnicking with my friend N. I am going to Chicago.

Flash. Now N is my lover. We are having an affair: her boyfriend doesn’t know. I am struck by the suddenness of it all. It feels like I was just hanging out with Ges and Morgan and Mike a minute ago.

Flash. I am not going to Chicago.

Flash. N and I are at Futures, talking (heh) about communication. It’s easy to state facts, I say, but difficult if not impossible to convey a nuanced emotional reaction to those facts, or at least to cause a similar reaction in the reader or listener; one almost needs a sort of telepathy. N points out that that’s what art is for. Or sex. If we can’t capture ideas straight on, maybe we can reach around and catch them from behind.

Art or sex: but I’m still struggling with my art, and neither of us are telepathic yet.

Flash. I burn my fingers on Morgan’s censer.

Flash. I wake up next to N. Weren’t we only friends just a little while ago? Where has the time gone? I begin to perceive a sequential unfolding of reality. This is the constant changing of the Trip. This is time speeding by while the moment remains eternal.

Flash. It’s Monday evening, and I was supposed to leave Saturday morning. Ges warns me about getting trapped. I am not going to Chicago. N and I are lovers. N and I are friends. I forget to call my sister. I burn my fingers. I am back in Toronto.

I wake up next to N. Where has the time gone? We are on the beach in the west end, and it is night time. The sky and water meet seamlessly at an invisible horizon. Someday soon, in a flash, I will be back on the road – maybe headed east to Montreal, maybe south to Florida and New Orleans, maybe west through the Rockies. But for now I am in Toronto, in the incommunicable present, and this too is part of the Trip.

Is was and ever shall be, world without end, etc. Amen.