This is the 8th year I'll be going to Burning Man, and it's the 20th anniversary of the event. This year's ticket is gorgeously-designed, like last year's (photographed while driving through the desert to the event as a passenger in Derek's car).

The first year I went to Burning Man was 1999, and that year the tickets looked like any other normal Ticketmaster concert ticket. It also cost $65, while this year's tickets began at about $185. Here's what I wrote in my online journal on August 16, 1999 before I attended the event. And here's the diary I wrote about my experiences at Burning Man in 1999.

It's interesting to read what I was thinking about seven years ago, and to see photos of my friends and myself looking so much younger. I couldn't have imagined this future that I live in right now. In 1999 when I attended the event, I lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I worked at a now non-existent company, Wildweb.com. Going to Burning Man in 1999 changed my life in so many ways. I decided to move to the West Coast a few weeks after returning to Boston and I left for good one month later. I met Owen at Burning Man in 1999, and we both ended up moving to San Francisco. I met Esther and Jason at Burning Man in 2001.

Owen, Esther, Jason, Andy, Jeff and Mindy won't be going to Burning Man this year due to work, school, world travel, and oher reasons. I'll miss them so much, but I'm still glad to be going to the desert. And I'm very glad that Chris has decided he wants to go. (He's never been before.) It'll be an adventure. We're doing an art project, similar to the one my friends, August, and I built last year (the psychiatric help booth). This year, we'd like to do something very similar (because a *lot* of people in Black Rock City seemed to want someone to talk to about their lives and problems and it was good to be able to help out), but we're thinking of calling it "Help with your past, present, and FUTURE" to fit the future theme.

There's an art installation this year called "Future You Post" by Betsy McCall and her description of the project is:

It looks like an everyday mailbox, with paper, envelopes, and pens available. But the intention here is that you write yourself a letter and it is delivered to you five years from now. The intention is for participants to write their hopes and fears, only to be surprised by them in the future. Especially for people whose off-playa lives are very different from their on-playa lives, the experience of receiving this letter from themselves in 2011 could prove extremely powerful.

What do YOU think about the future? If you could write yourself a letter that you would receive five years from now, what would it say?