Finding a Good Society in the Mud of Burning Man

Humans Are Human—And Governments Need to Help Them Achieve Self-Reliance and Avoid Panic in the Face of Disaster

Since leaving Burning Man, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about the role that principles play in a society, and what to do when people don’t live up to them.

Burning Man attracts more than 70,000 people each Labor Day weekend to an inhospitable dry lakebed called “the Playa” in northwestern Nevada. Burners marvel at incredible art installations, boogie to electronic dance music, and create and engage in hundreds of different participatory experiences at camps with a staggering variety of themes. These activities range from walking the catwalk after picking …

Can Rain Hold Us Hostage?

I Barely Made It Through England's Wettest Year. Now El Niño Looms Over My California Dream.

We’ve bought sand bags at Home Depot, installed new gutters, and patched up the roof of our house in Los Angeles. We’ve asked a plumber to check our industrial-grade sump …

The Slimy Underworld That Emerges After the Rain

After a Good Soak, the City Comes Alive with Rare Snails, Poisonous Mushrooms, and Slug-Like Molds.

Zócalo’s editors are throwing it back to some of our favorite pieces from the archive. This week: Urban nature explorer Lila Higgins revels in …

Why We Keep Rediscovering the Flamboyant Godmother of Rock

Sister Rosetta Tharpe Was Buried in an Unmarked Grave, But Now She’s a YouTube Sensation

More than 40 years after her burial in an unmarked Philadelphia grave, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, gospel’s first superstar and its most celebrated crossover figure, is enjoying a burst of Internet …

What Do Raindrops Look Like in Outer Space?

How Arizona’s Monsoons Got Me Chasing Storms on Titan

Living in Tucson, Arizona—a Sonoran desert city surrounded by tall mountains—can make you obsess about rain. In 1993, I had just moved into a new office at the University of …

Polly Magoos

For Julien Poirier

 
Old Holborn yellow, Zig Zag “Le Zouave”
Barcelona chocolate, Kronenbourg pint
four rose for you, heated terrace
rain street, an ambulance passes by
Turkish Techno, European tourists