The Slacker Speaks...

To those of you remaining faithful readers, my apologies. Thanksgiving, the birthday of a good friend and a Hanukkah party all piled up quickly. The good news is that the rest of my Hanukkah week will be a quiet one, something that I relish.

Part of a celebratory trio for a friend's birthday, we all enjoyed the film Bohemian Rhapsody. The actor portraying Freddie Mercury did outstanding work. During his heyday, I was a bit of a Freddie fan. I loved his vocal range and willingness to push limits as an artist. I can't say I liked the drugs, booze and sex which contributed to his HIV onset and early death, but his handlers and others with whom he surrounded himself seemed to encourage risky behaviors. I've often wondered whether the stars fans support who burn bright do so at the mercy of a sense of immortality.

The film took me back to the eighties, a time when more than one friend received diagnoses of the mysterious illness which came to be called HIV. I still remember vividly the controversy and editorials found in both the local and national press, the darkness, prejudice and vitriol hurled at gay activists, children and adults identified as having HIV and the unsuccessful lengths some celebrities went to in an effort to avoid public exposure. Politicians and government agencies did nothing to help matters and it was largely through the efforts of doctors, researchers and gay activist groups that any meaningful response to a frightening epidemic began.

My first trip to an area hospital's AIDS floor as it was called, involved donning a floor length sterile gown, mask and shoe covers before entering the bedside, upon which I was forbidden to sit. Nurses insisted I use the single chair and no physical contact such as a hug or simply grasping my friend by the hand, was permitted. The nurses on this floor had volunteered to be there and at least a couple had done so after having a friend or relative die of the disease they were so desperate to fight. Working on a panel for the now famous AIDS Quilt later was my way of paying homage to the lives lost and supporting the partner of the first friend who had died. That partner is today advancing into old age, happily same-sex married, and still committed to supporting HIV-related activities and organizations serving persons with HIV. Discrimination still exists despite the gains in knowledge about this disease and its prevention.

As a twenty-something, seeing mortality up close sobered me. My once carefree attitudes to personal behaviors vanished almost overnight, replaced by a sense of foreboding. Once thought to infect only gay males, HIV is now commonly found in all segments of the population and is on the rise among the elderly. Women have not been spared and the push to know one's status, the slogan accompanying World AIDS Day, December first, is a cataclysmic shift from the ignorance and fear that once shrouded this viral entity and all of its manifestations.

Freddie's untimely demise in 1991 was tragic but I like to think his spark, and that of others who preceded him, was fuel for the research and medical gains made in the fight to understand and prevent HIV, an effort which continues.

Until Next Time...