The Death Sentence That Defined My Life
By MARK TRAUTWEIN
NYT
San Francisco
I HAVEN’T died on schedule.
Most people don’t think death has a schedule, at least a knowable one. But if you were infected early in the AIDS epidemic, you thought otherwise. At 61, I have now lived half my life with AIDS, my constant companion and distant cousin, the inseparable identity I won’t let define me, the everyday fact and special circumstance that bent the arc of my life in every way.
Although there was not yet a test for the disease, I mark the beginning of my AIDS life in 1982. It’s hard to imagine now the intensity of sexual liberation that gripped gay men then. Oppression was out. Freedom was ours, and we declared it with sex.
But after a tryst with a famous, closeted actor, a huge raincloud of a bruise appeared on my arm. I was hospitalized with a blood disorder that had no apparent explanation. Befuddled doctors guessed a lot, and asked if I drank gin and tonic. I told them it was my father’s drink. Less absurdly, the disorder had been seen among gay men in New York. The phrase “gay plague” was in the air, but no one knew what it was or how anyone got it. It seemed so random then, picking off strangers and acquaintances for no particular reason, but always, you told yourself, for reasons far from you. Then suddenly it wasn’t far from me at all. I left the hospital certain that I had “it.”
(More here.)
NYT
San Francisco
I HAVEN’T died on schedule.
Most people don’t think death has a schedule, at least a knowable one. But if you were infected early in the AIDS epidemic, you thought otherwise. At 61, I have now lived half my life with AIDS, my constant companion and distant cousin, the inseparable identity I won’t let define me, the everyday fact and special circumstance that bent the arc of my life in every way.
Although there was not yet a test for the disease, I mark the beginning of my AIDS life in 1982. It’s hard to imagine now the intensity of sexual liberation that gripped gay men then. Oppression was out. Freedom was ours, and we declared it with sex.
But after a tryst with a famous, closeted actor, a huge raincloud of a bruise appeared on my arm. I was hospitalized with a blood disorder that had no apparent explanation. Befuddled doctors guessed a lot, and asked if I drank gin and tonic. I told them it was my father’s drink. Less absurdly, the disorder had been seen among gay men in New York. The phrase “gay plague” was in the air, but no one knew what it was or how anyone got it. It seemed so random then, picking off strangers and acquaintances for no particular reason, but always, you told yourself, for reasons far from you. Then suddenly it wasn’t far from me at all. I left the hospital certain that I had “it.”
(More here.)
Powered by Blogger
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home