Sometimes It's Good to Be Negative

June 27th was National H1V Testing Day in the US. I don't know if it's a new "holiday"; this year was the first year I heard about it. And the way I heard was through a message from the President that I received on F@ceb00k. It cited a pretty frightening statistic that 1 in 5 people who have the disease (in the US) don't know they have it. And it gave a link to a little video clip of the President and his wife getting tested together on a trip they took to K3nya.

Just a couple of days later I was reading a local English language paper and there was passing mention that a local gallery owner had recently died. I was in shock. He wasn't a close friend, but he was an acquaintance who I'd spent some time with socially. Coincidentally, we had met at a party for the President's inauguration. I pulled up the photos I'd taken of that day and saw his smiling face and kept thinking how he seemed so (relatively) young and healthy just months ago and now he was dead. Immediately I thought of our conversation about my project photographing the gay night life and specifically the hustlers and how he'd mentioned one of the guys I knew in particular and how he had worked for him. I can't remember if he said it explicitly, but it was apparent, they'd had sex. Which got me wondering about what he had died of.

After asking in a few places, I got the response I suspected and feared: he had died of pneumonia -- a common cause of death with people who are H1V positive. Apparently he hadn't had a check in years and could have easily still been alive if he had.

I've worried for awhile that an @IDS epidemic could explode here in Va11arta. Somehow I managed to live in eNYC for 20 years and have gay friends, but never knew anyone who was H1V positive or who had died of @IDS. But here I know at least half a dozen people. And with all the in-the-closet and gay-for-pay activity, it's really scary. And the thing is that so many people, Mexxican and foreigners, are not from here. I can see them getting sick and going home to their families or other places to die. Which would further mask how big the problem might be.

I've been tested numerous times over the years. But it had been almost a year and even though I'm a "no glove - no love" kind of gal, there's always the shadow of doubt, so I decided it was a good idea. I contacted a guy I know who's the director of Va11arta Enfrente S1DA (Va11arta Confronts @IDS) and found out where their new location was and went. It was the usual struggle with my bloodtest phobia. I struggled with the poor volunteer for at least 15 minutes, putting my finger out and saying I was ready and then withdrawing it at the last second, but finally I had it done. I'm happy to report being negative.

After that I made sure to tell a couple of my hustler friends how I'd gotten tested and gave them some details about the place and how it was free and easy and we should all get it done.

And then one night I was out with friends at the club, when I spotted the hustler who I knew had been with the guy who just died. I debated for a few minutes how I'd even approach the topic, but decided that I would just dive in. I followed him into the inside disco and took him by the arm and told him I needed to talk to him. I confirmed he knew the gallery owner and he confirmed that he knew he'd died. He asked if I knew what from and I told him I did. Heart attack? No. Someone killed him. No. (Only in Va11arta would that be someone's second guess to how someone died!) I told him about the pneumonia and how it was a typical cause of death with @IDS. His reaction was, "He didn't have @IDS. I don't think he had @IDS." I told him I knew that he did and I wasn't telling him that to be gossipy. He told me he had always used a condom when they'd had sex. This was actually quite shocking to me. Because even though we both know it, the hustlers almost never admit to actually having sex with men. I told him that was good and that I'd recently been tested and we all really needed to be tested and use condoms to care for ourselves and for each other. I asked him again how he'd been and he told me he was a little lonely so I gave him a hug and told him to take care of himself.

The funny thing is that this is the guy who I've talked about here over a year ago who freaked me out more than anyone here in Va11arta. He once tried to get me to go to his place and was actually pulling me by the arm down the street until I broke away and ran back into the club and told them to close the door and help me. I tend to keep my distance from him and he hasn't been so creepy in quite awhile. And in the end, I still have compassion for him.

On a related note, I finally had Chuyit0 tested for "Feline @IDS' (FIV) and leukemia yesterday on what I've designated as his (2rd) birthday. Happily he's also negative! It's part of clearing the way to adopt another cat. My neighbor gave me a kitten to care for last Saturday and I'm debating whether to keep him. More about that another time.