We've Forgotten

We have forgotten about AIDS.   Well, maybe not completely......but almost.

Of those currently infected with HIV, one in five doesn't know they have the condition, and the majority of new infections are spread by people who are unaware of their own status.

About 41% of new infections last year affected young people aged 15-24, and women accounted for about 51% of new infections.

I am 43, which might as well be 158 in gay years...but I'm okay with that.  Really.

I was 2 years old when Stonewall was happening, 8 when Anita Bryant was singing about orange juice while trying to eradicate gay people.  I was 16 when I saw my first gay pride parade and heard my beloved grandmother spit out the words "Sick Queers", and I was 18 when Rock Hudson died and I began hearing about the "Gay Cancer" known as AIDS.  

I didn't think AIDS would ever touch MY life.  But it has.    I'm HIV negative, but that's as much due to luck as it is foresight, and I thank God I have my health.   But my cousin's husband, who had leukemia when he was 23 received a blood transfusion and that's how he became infected.   A friend of mine lost his wife and two children when he became HIV positive and the dark secret he'd held all his life finally came out.    And an acquaintance in my small town was on a mission to infect as many people as he could before he died.

AIDS touches us all, but these day's it seems as though we've forgotten about it. 

We need to reconnect with those who are "living with, living with not dying from disease" every day.

We need to contribute with whatever resources we have for those who's time is running out.  

We need to be responsible.  

We need to Remember what it was like when we started dying horrible quick deaths and nobody, but nobody gave a flying fuck about a sick queer.

We Need To Remember, and ACT UP.