blood like lemonade

“There are wounds that never show on the body that are deeper and more hurtful than anything that bleeds.”― Laurell K. Hamilton, Mistral's Kiss

Once upon a time there was a group of merchants who wanted to go to the sea. A guide was required. They set out in quest of such a man. After finding such a man, they started the trip and saw a temple when they reached a land of wilderness. A man had to be immolated to cross it.

After consultation, the group of merchants said that they could not choose anyone in the company to be killed, for they were all related. The only one fit to be sacrificed was the guide. So they killed him. After performing the rites, they soon lost their way and knew not which direction to go. They then died one after another.

So are the people in general.

Those who seek to fish for treasure in the sea of Dharma should keep the commandments of doing good deeds as their guide. If they break them, they will end their lives in the wilderness and can never be rescued. Furthermore, they will have to go through the Three Evil Paths of Transmigration and suffer forever and ever.

Such men are just like the group of merchants who killed the guide and died in a body as a result....Buddhist Fable.

image credit- peter stein's faust at marathon theatre

“If one good deed in all my life I did, 

I do repent it from my very soul.” 

― William Shakespeare

today's post is full of allegory. after the recent passing of a friend. i have come to a sort of secret compartment in my life. i was talking about how strange it was to have known someone on both a professional (counselor to client) level and as a fellow community member and volunteer. this caused me to pause for a while and consider the hidden cost of being an addictions counselor working with lgbt persons with addictions (who may or may not be hiv positive).
it is a complete recurrence that gay men (hiv + and hiv -) will appear when they need support and then disappear when they no longer feel the need for support (for a variety of reasons). as a professional there is an ongoing and undisclosed cost of knowing and caring for a person and then having them leave your life just as quickly as they appeared. and my experience is that when the "gay" factor, and the "hiv +" factor are combined, i have found that the boundaries have been a bit less distinctive. i might have cared a little more, or offered a little more support. and of course the disappearance of these folks from my practice has consistently left a deeper impression. but after they leave the treatment cocoon, they enter back into the community arena along with me and the rest of our world. because these individuals and i have engaged in a therapeutic relationship, returning to a friendly relationship is strained at best. i know more about them than they probably would like to admit. they have shared secrets with me. if they did not complete, nor were successful with treatment, then this usually means they won't want to see me in person, nor see themselves in my eyes. this is perfectly understandable- almost expected. but it does have a price tag- especially in a smaller community. it is not a deal breaker at all. it is simply that i haven't really looked at my own real needs in all this.
until this week, i have not looked at my own feelings about this whole brief therapy process. with bryan's passing, i now understand that it has had a price. i have assumed that my skills as a practitioner are lacking at times. i have felt that i am too blunt for people too early. i have even felt that i am too old at times and out of touch with current lgbt culture.

“I became what I am today at the age of twelve, on a frigid overcast day in the winter of 1975. I remember the precise moment, crouching behind a crumbling mud wall, peeking into the alley near the frozen creek. That was a long time ago, but it’s wrong what they say about the past, I’ve learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out. Looking back now, I realize I have been peeking into that deserted alley for the last twenty-six years.”

― Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner

although all of these are probable and appropriate, i have never considered that i might need some support around the loss this process brings. i now know that i have just hunkered down, trudged forward, cut my losses and tucked those feelings without processing or examining them with any concern. i don't regret this after realizing this, but i do want to make some changes from here forward. and because of my childhood history of relationship and loss, i have had auto-responses of shutting down when i have become saddened. i have let go of friends because i honestly haven't figured out yet how to do anything else quite yet.
to be less vague, i now understand that i have a primal feeling that i am not okay, so i assume that these losses are the price i am required to pay for being me-(conversely, there are many benefits to being me as well so i don't think this as simply dark and morose).
since my work has recently shifted away from cultural specific clients, i have gained some distance and some perspective on all this. this reminds me yet again that situations and experiences in our lives shape, form, and mold who we are. and all the relationships, fabulous jobs, exciting or relaxing vacations, spas, makeovers, workouts, and new clothes in the world won't really make me any different. i am required to do the work, look at my life and my part in it, feel my feelings, accept them, understand them, and make room for change if needed. and change is probably needed in this case.
i am posting from a quiet place of gratitude today. i hope your holiday brings even a small portion of the grace i feel today. happy thanksgiving.

dancer from the dance

We had all see Malone, yet going home on the subway no one spoke of him, even though each of us was thinking of that handsome man -- and he had seen us. What must he have thought of us at that time. What queens we were! We had been crazed for several years already when we danced at the Bearded Lady that winter. We lived only to dance. What was the true characteristic of a queen, I wondered later on; and you could argue that forever. "What do we all have in common in this group?" I once asked a friend seriously, when it occurred to me how slender, how immaterial, how ephemeral the bond was that joined us; and he responded, "We all have lips." Perhaps that is what we all had in common: No one was allowed to be serious, except about the importance of music, the glory of faces seen in the crowd. We had our songs, we had our faces! We had our web belts and painter's jeans, our dyed tank tops and haircuts, the plaid shirts, bomber jackets, jungle fatigues, the all-important shoes....Andrew Holleran


it's a saturday and i find myself reminiscing a bit about my 1970's. it was a decadent and tumultuous decade to say the least. i left home at 16 in 1974 and moved to chicago from the burbs. i worked as a rent boy and a gogo boy until i landed a job as a bartender at 18. i shared an apartment with a puerto rican drag queen early on and learned how to speak with a spanich(ha) accent. i also developed an emotional rhythm sequence that embedded itself deeply into my psyche. 

i assimilated to 1970's gay culture through osmosis. music, fashion, attitudes, tastes, and beliefs all were shaped by our mysterious cultural norm. it was urban, it was rogue, it was survivalist, it was guerilla, and it was inventive. i don't remember making conscious and thoughtful choices about these things as much as i can recall intense peer pressure and a need to belong- after all this urban landscape accepted my twisted  ternderness much more thoughtfully than my family of origin had. 

i was able to hide even further from my nature as i immersed and lost myself in the choreography of that decade. there were parties, drugs, laughter, theater, short romances, and galaxies of anonymous sex. it was the decade which allowed me to say "yes" to pleasure- which i did to excess. platform shoes, low-rise hip-huggers, afros (well.. perms), disco, acid, mdma, sid vicious, the sex pistols, vivienne westwood, radical faeries, harvey milk, the bus stop, the bump, the introduction of middle class cocaine, my only live-in relationship, sparks. and on and on.

the 80's rang in a whole new act in this dance of our culture. but those 1970's were specific and boutique. there may never be the same intersection of indulgence and ingenue on our cultural landscape- mostly because those was the first years after stonewall. maybe my introduction to lgbt culture during that time has allowed me the grace of believing beyond what i know. i am not clear that the generations behind me have that same capacity. i may be in the last of our kind to undestand suppression and to understand freedom  from the outer edges of the pendulum. 

By year

• 1970 – The first Gay Liberation Day March is held in New York City; The first LGBT Pride Parade is held in Los Angeles; The first "Gay-in" held in San Francisco; Carl Wittman writes A Gay Manifesto;^[1][2] CAMP (Campaign Against Moral Persecution) is formed in Australia.^[3][4]

• 1971 – Society Five (a homosexual rights organization) is formed in Melbourne, Australia; Homosexuality is decriminalized in Austria, Costa Rica and Finland; Colorado and Oregon repeal sodomy laws; Idaho repeals the sodomy law — Then re-instates the repealed sodomy law because of outrage among Mormons and Catholics.^[5][6] The Netherlands changes the homosexual age of consent to 16, the same as the straight age of consent; The U.S. Libertarian Party calls for the repeal of all victimless crime laws, including the sodomy laws; Dr. Frank Kamenybecomes the first openly gay candidate for the United States Congress; The University of Michigan establishes the first collegiate LGBT programs office, then known as the "Gay Advocate's Office." The UK Gay Liberation Front (GLF) was recognized as a political movement in the national press and was holding weekly meetings of 200 to 300 people.^[7]

• 1972 – Sweden becomes first country in the world to allow transsexuals to legally change their sex, and provides free hormone therapy;^[8] Hawaii legalizes homosexuality; In Australia, the Dunstan Labor government introduces a consenting adults in private type defence in South Australia. This defence was initiated as a bill by Murray Hill, father of former Defence Minister Robert Hill, and later repealed the state's sodomy law in 1975; Norway decriminalizes homosexuality; East Lansing, Michigan and Ann Arbor, Michigan and San Francisco, California become the first cities in United States to pass a homosexual rights ordinance. Jim Foster, San Francisco and Madeline Davis, Buffalo, New York, first gay and lesbian delegates to the Democratic Convention, Miami, McGovern; give the first speeches advocating a gay rights plank in the Democratic Party Platform. "Stonewall Nation" first gay anthem is written and recorded by Madeline Davis and is produced on 45 rpm record by the Mattachine Society of the Niagara Frontier. Lesbianism 101, first lesbianism course in the U.S. taught at the University of Buffalo by Margaret Small and Madeline Davis.^{[citation needed]}

• 1973 – The American Psychiatric Association removes homosexuality from its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-II), based largely on the research and advocacy of Evelyn Hooker; Malta legalizes homosexuality; In West Germany, the age of consent is reduced for homosexuals to 18 (though it is 14 for heterosexuals).^{[citation needed]}

• 1974 – Kathy Kozachenko becomes the first openly gay American elected to public office when she wins a seat on the Ann Arbor, Michigan city council; In New York City Dr. Fritz Kleinfounds the Bisexual Forum, the first support group for the Bisexual Community; Ohio repeals sodomy laws. Robert Grant founds American Christian Cause to oppose the "gay agenda", the beginning of modern Christian politics in the United States. In London, the first openly LGBT telephone help line opens, followed one year later by the Brighton Lesbian and Gay Switchboard;^{[citation needed]} the Brunswick Four are arrested on January 5, 1974, in Toronto, Ontario. This incident of Lesbophobia galvanizes the Toronto Lesbian and Gay community;^[9] theNational Socialist League (The Gay Nazi Party) is founded in Los Angeles, California.^{[citation needed]}

• 1975 – Homosexuality is legalized in South Australia; homosexuality is legalized in California due to bill authored by and successfully lobbied for in the state legislature by State Assemblyman from San Francisco Willie Brown; Elaine Noble becomes the second openly gay American elected to public office when she wins a seat in the Massachusetts State House; the first National Homosxual Conference is held in Melbourne, Australia; Panama is the second country in the world to allow transsexuals who have gone through gender reassignment surgery to get their personal documents reflecting their new sex.^{[citation needed]}

Gay rights protesters in New York City, protesting at the United States' 1976 Democratic National Convention

Original eight-color version of the LGBT pride flag

• 1976 – Robert Grant founds the Christian Voice to take his anti-homosexual-rights crusade national in United States; the Homosexual Law Reform Coalition and the Gay Teachers Group are started in Australia; the Australian Capital Territory decriminalizes homosexuality between consenting adults in private and equalizes the age of consent; and Denmark equalizes the age of consent.^{[citation needed]}

• 1977 – Harvey Milk is elected city-county supervisor in San Francisco, becoming the third out American elected to public office. Dade County, Florida enacts a Human Rights Ordinance; it is repealed the same year after a militant anti-homosexual-rights campaign led by Anita Bryant.Quebec becomes the first jurisdiction larger than a city or county in the world to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation in the public and private sectors; Croatia, Montenegro, Slovenia and Vojvodina legalise homosexuality.^{[citation needed]} Publication of the first issue of Gaysweek, NYC's first mainstream gay weekly.

• 1978 – San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone are assassinated by former Supervisor Dan White; a protest commemorating the Stonewall Riots leads to many arrests, with commemorative protests the following year known as the Sydney Gay Mardi Gras, later Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras; The rainbow flag is first used as a symbol of homosexual pride; Sweden establishes a uniform age of consent. Samois the earliest known lesbian-feminist BDSM organization is founded in San Francisco; well-known members of the group includePatrick Califia and Gayle Rubin; the group is among the very earliest advocates of what came to be known as sex-positive feminism^{[citation needed]}; The International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA) is established.^[10] Theatrical release and television broadcast of the feature documentaryWord Is Out: Stories of Some of Our Lives, and publication of the book transcribed from it.

• 1979 – The first national homosexual rights march on Washington, DC is held; The White Night riots occur, Harry Hay issues the first call for aRadical Faerie gathering in Arizona, and Cuba and Spain decriminalize homosexuality;^{[citation needed]} A number of people in Sweden called in sick with a case of being homosexual, in protest of homosexuality being classified as an illness. This was followed by an activist occupation of the main office of the National Board of Health and Welfare. Within a few months, Sweden became the first country in the world to remove homosexuality as an illness.^[8].... 

timeline reposted from wikipedia...

the only exception

“My turn now. The story of one of my insanities.

For a long time I boasted that I was master of all possible landscapes-- and I thought the great figures of modern painting and poetry were laughable.

What I liked were: absurd paintings, pictures over doorways, stage sets, carnival backdrops, billboards, bright-colored prints, old-fashioned literature, church Latin, erotic books full of misspellings, the kind of novels our grandmothers read, fairy tales, little children's books, old operas, silly old songs, the naive rhythms of country rimes.

I dreamed of Crusades, voyages of discovery that nobody had heard of, republics without histories, religious wars stamped out, revolutions in morals, movements of races and continents; I used to believe in every kind of magic.

I invented colors for the vowels! A black, E white, I red, O blue, U green. I made rules for the form and movement of every consonant, and I boasted of inventing, with rhythms from within me, a kind of poetry that all the senses, sooner or later, would recognize. And I alone would be its translator.

I began it as an investigation. I turned silences and nights into words. What was unutterable, I wrote down. I made the whirling world stand still.” 
― Arthur Rimbaud

there has been so much hubbub about the supreme court hearings around doma and prop 8. rightfully so, too. this could be another monumental achievement which will affect the lives of so many gay men and women- both in relationships currently and all the downline duos yet to be. 

love is so very under-developed in my culture. it was something that we dared not speak its name just a few decades ago. now it seems as if half the country- including the sequesters with the black robes who are vested with the task of interpreting  the language and the intent of those who came before us.

i am quite simply gobsmacked by the prospect of this momentous  removal of stigma from the landscape of same-sex lovers. it has proved an albatross and a handicap that so many of my contemporaries have had to trudge through life carrying in their backpacks. it has been the source of so much shame-based trauma which in turn has probably created generations of spiritual nomads- wandering through their lives never believing they had the right to settle anywhere. my brothers and sisters for generations have wandered with their deserted hearts living lustfully for the moment without much expectation of a connection which might last more than a season or two. yet here i sit tonight in quiet awe at this current wind which may blow this drought out of our lives forever. history could be made.

i have to admit that i see so many other issues in my culture- specifically derived from the nomadic nature of our hearts that i struggle strangely with being happy about the prospect of marriage equality. but this is my stuff. there is no magic cure. some of us will not assimilate or perhaps every really feel lovable- no matter how beautifully bright and colorful the celebration glows. 

but maybe there is an exception.

On The TEN winter 2012

  TEN Newsletter Winter 2012 Web by   rebuiltdenver

change

image credit... ronald n. tan

i have been appointed to sit on a planning and advisory council for the newly formed office of behavioral health for colorado. this system shift is due mainly to the anticipated health care reform shift which is intended to create parity for mental health and substance abuse disorders in the larger health care system.

man- there seems such a distance to travel. the current status quo is sectioned into quadrants and the  players  du-jour are conditioned to fight for their selective scraps.  my interest is twofold i think.

firstly i remember struggling to contain my behavior and my use when i was younger. because of lack of understanding mostly, i believed that something was intrinsically wrong with me which caused me to constantly fuck up. it was as if it was expected. had my small town, my family, and my educators understood bi-polar disorder better, perhaps an intervention early could have saved me from suicide attempts, running away from home, and the lifestyle of a gay runaway that came with heavy drug and alcohol use and addiction, ptsd, and hiv. lgbt youth and adults, persons with multiple occurring disorders, children of single parents, lgbtq families (of all colors) rarely sit at these policy shaping tables.

secondly, i wonder if the veil of aloofness that accompanies psychiatrists is truly helpful for the patients. i know it is to protect the providers and i can accept that. but i think that relationship is one of the main driving forces  behind behavior change and the nature of psychiatrist-patient relationships leaves the one getting paid in the relationship with far more than the one behind the payments. and since my new task involves advocating for people with no money there are very few people minding after their interests. peer coaching and recovery oriented relationships may offer the lubricant that could enable some of our citizens to seek more spiritual ground.

i am curious about the direction the next year or so will take me. i breathe in hope that a more holistic people oriented system will replace the policy oriented system we currently have. my experience was that i had to jump through substance treatment hoops to be assessed for any other mental health issues. the catch-22 there is that i had become accustomed to self medicating my mental well being and it took several years for me hurt enough to be willing to change. this is a provider driven policy. jump through hoop 1 and then you earn a chair at the big table- where you will asked a plethora of questions and then given a prescription. but make sure you find someone else to talk with because the prescriber will remain aloof.  this process took me  awhile to swallow and accept as well. there was no one i remember offering me any guidance during this process. not like 12 step- where a sponsor becomes a cultural guide. i wish i had access to a guide like that for my medication journey as well as my ptsd journey and my shame journey (all of these continuing btw)

and i guess this is where prevention fits in. had there been education about mental health and lgbt issues, as well as thoughtful early interventions including healthy discussions about substance abuse and mental health medications, i might have had a different path. i wouldn't choose it now, but i would like to make it a possibility for those that come after me.

what i hope is that this effort will help shine a greater light upon the idea that our people who get hiv, hep-c, many cancers put themselves in the vulnerable positions to contract these illnesses because earlier behavioral health issues went unaddressed. i am becoming an advocate for a behavioral health transformation- prevention, holistic treatment, and recovery. we might save lives, we certainly will save heartache, and undoubtedly save resources.

i dream that we can move towards a more inclusive system- and philosophy. the sheer numbers of people that  are being shut out is increasing before our eyes. and all the while we are barraged with messages of how more and more people don't deserve to be at the big table. and the rest of us writhe passively, numbed out by the sheer audacity of separatism and the cacophony of shrews.

on the ten- winter 2011

wow...
publishing this issue really has me thinking..
we are winding up our 4th year of putting this little periodical together. i remember when i started it..
i was just taking on the facilitator role for a social networking organization in denver. i had come to realize that living in colorado meant living alongside hiv stigma. it was very real and often painful for many of my neighbors. i wanted to visibly assure others that indeed there were hiv positive individuals, living in colorado, who were doing well, were not ashamed, and were finding success and happiness.
and here is the current incarnation- colorful and hiv very much in your face...

peace and happy new year.


TEN Newsletter Winter 2011

Autumn Newsletter 2011

the human aspect of hiv matters very much to me..

TEN Newsletter Autumn 2011

bear hug

In the winter of 2004, I dropped into a Sunday service of The Denver Church of Religious Science at 1420 Ogden. To my surprise, there was a small dark room peppered with normal looking folks all hugging teddy bears  of all colors and sizes, some bears in bow ties and some bears in leather vests and chaps. Everyone was listening to this guy (turned out to be Jim Chandler) giving what must have been a sermon.  It was the bear-hug service. It felt as if I had stumbled onto the set of a “Will and Grace” taping. It was completely surreal and I hope I never forget it. Here’s a tiny blurb I found about Bearhug Service.

On Valentine’s Day, our little messengers will make their final trip to Hospice.  Each hospice resident will have the opportunity to select their special bear – a bear to be there even when their family or caregivers cannot.  A bear to give them comfort on their journey from this life expression.  The caregivers at Hospice who give so much from their heart will also choose their bear, to fill their hearts again with our love.  And, any family members or friends of those in care may choose a bear to help mend their hearts at this time of loss.

The next time I saw/met Jim Chandler was when a friend and I were looking for a space to house a recovery meeting for meth users. There was another genre of recovery meeting that has just moved into the Ogden location and it seemed perfect. Jim was a complete advocate to get us clearance to use the space. He talked about how many of his gay male church members continued to struggle with meth issues, many to the point of devastation of their lives. He indicated he felt it was like a plague and wanted to help with more than just lip service. It turned out he took quite a bit of flack from his board. Many were not at all happy that tweakers would be roaming the halls of the church in the evenings unsupervised. Those meetings that started in those days are still going strong and it is not completely known how many Denver gay men (and others) that have been supported in finding their way back into a healthier lifestyle. He would never have acknowledged it, but it was because of Jim Chandler that gay men in recovery from crystal meth had easier access to find their own sober voices.

These are my experiences with Jim Chandler. He did a lot more than this for our community without fanfare and without a calling card. He didn’t always require grant money and he didn’t require research strategies to do outreach and help provide services. He was not perfect by any means, but he was a valuable and colorful member of the Denver central HIV community.

When I started this newsletter, I immediately asked him to contribute. He always did, without reservation- something I struggle to get service providers who get paid very good salaries to care for HIVsters to do. He sent article after article peppered with his own brand of idealism and religious science. I was truly saddened to hear about his transition. And I am still sad. I feel for his longtime companion Steve.  I guess I will continue to have a bear hug service for the both of them. 

Summer Newsletter 2011

www.ontheten.org

Surprisingly, the TEN (Treatment Education Network) newsletter is still going strong. We are halfway through our 4th year and the content gets stronger. I still think it important for PLWH in Colorado to have visible proof that other people live with HIV and lead positive and happy, healthy lives-especially in rural Colorado. It must feel so isolating to be among so few. This was the initial purpose for the creation of this publication- to reassure all the readers that indeed there are everyday folks who have moved past the stun and the stigma and have gone on with their lives.

The 30th anniversary of HIV in America is probably a good time to reflect on all that has changed. If you know someone who may be challenged by their situation, please forward this to them. Maybe it will make a difference. In honor of my own 26 years of knowingly living with HIV, I am posting  a vid of Carol Burnett singing Stephen Sondheim's "I'm Still Here". MWAH!



TEN Newsletter Summer 2011