Oh, and in the spirit of AIDS awareness day (well, it's over here on the east coast, but hey, it's still going on in other parts of the world), I was definitely forced to confront my own thoughts about the disease. I watched a VH1 special earlier (I'm apparently all about VH1 tonight) about AIDS, and I still felt myself become furious when it described Reagan's lack of response to the crisis back in the 80's. So many people could have been saved if action had been taken earlier to educate people about AIDS, and to fund research into and treatment of the disease. It still makes me sick to think about the right wing labeling it a disease of gays and drug users, and all those assholes who believed it was God's vengeance against "sinners" and "human filth." Ugh.

I remember my all-consuming obsession with Keith Haring in the early nineties and how I cried buckets when he passed. His golden three panel alterpiece, with soaring and falling angels in a depiction of the life of Christ, currently displayed at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine close to Columbia University in NYC, is one of the most intensely spiritual and emotional works of art I've ever experienced. I also remember how much I loved Pedro Zamorra on the Real World San Francisco on MTV, and how I was depressed for weeks after he passed away. Even before I met Joe and through him became enamored of gay culture and most things (and people) gay, I was so deeply touched by this intelligent young man who decided to dedicate his life to educating others about his disease, rather than spending the rest of his days in comfort and trying to forget his illness. Just seeing him on television or thinking about him starts up the tears. I know it's dopey to feel this profoundly affected by someone only known through a crappy TV show like The Real World, but he was special. I remember watching Pedro kiss his boyfriend Sean, and thinking to myself, "This should be disgusting, this should strike me as wrong, but it's not. It's beautiful. These are just two wonderful guys who have found love and are expressing it. There's nothing wrong with this."

Since then, as those who know me can attest, I've become about as gay-friendly as any straight chick I've ever known (well, maybe other than Margaret Cho, whom I love). I won't claim to know what it's like to be gay, or to speak on behalf of gay people, but I do relate to a lot of gay guys and girls that I've met. There are a myriad of reasons for this, but I will cite Joe's influence as paramount, as well as my own alienation from American mainstream culture. I much prefer to talk to people who don't follow rigid yet arbitary notions of "right and wrong" which have been spoon-fed to them without reflection on their part. And most LGTB people who accept this aspect of themselves and are comfortably "out" have had to redefine what they had previously learned as "right" or "wrong," and thus question established norms. Questioning established norms? A good thing in this chickie's opinion.