In the heady days of the Sexual Revolution of the 60s and 70s, when women gained agency over their own sexuality, when the Pill and legalized abortions reduced the risks of pregnancy, and gonorrhea and syphilis had medical cures, most of us did not bother with practicing safe sex. Safe sex hadn’t been invented yet. Safe sex wasn’t even on the radar of most of us in those days. My father had come out in the early ’70-s, on the heels of the Gay Liberation Movement, when he was in his early 40’s. In case you think it’s weird that a gay man would marry and have children, it’s not. Or at least it wasn’t in the 1950’s. It’s what a lot of gay men did. I’ve met several people my age whose fathers turned out to be gay later in life. My mother knew he was gay before they were married, but they were deeply in love, and they didn’t have the understanding of homosexuality back then that we do now. So, here I am (and my brother and sister, too).
Then HIV and AIDS came on the scene.
AIDS can touch any one of us at any time. My Dad died of AIDS. I rarely say these words, but when I encounter ignorance, insensitivity or intolerance I will to get the point across. My Dad was one of the early ones, having contracted the disease in 1984, and dying the following year, in 1985, at the age of 53, younger than I am now. Most people who die of AIDS actually die from organisms that are around us everyday. These are viruses and diseases that healthy immune systems can fend off with ease. It was most probably the thrush he ‘acquired’ in his mouth and throat, which made it difficult for him to swallow, or the sarcoma he ‘acquired’ on his skin, or the fact that he weighed less than 95 lbs at his death, and couldn’t seem to eat enough to gain any weight (he could hardly eat at all, or keep down what he ate) that finally did him in.
I had read a little about this new disease that first was reported as targeting Haitians, then homosexuals, for a year or two, before I got a call in the summer of 1984 that my father had rented an apartment in Santa Monica and had holed up in secret to die. My brother, sister and mother somehow tracked him down, got him to a hospital, and they nursed him back to a semblance of health. My brother, my hero, sang songs to him every day and he regained a will to live. That’s important to someone under a medical death sentence, the WILL to LIVE. The next year, against all of our wishes, my dad went back to South Korea to teach English. Six months later, we got a call from a doctor in a Korean hospital, telling us that he was dying, and that we might want to come and get him.
It was my turn now, and I rushed onto a plane and made it to his bedside within three days. He weighed 95 lbs, and looked awful. He could hardly eat, and could not walk. I managed to check him out of the hospital and get him on a plane to the US. I fended off South Korean “Health Officials” who wanted to interrogate him about his contacts and sex partners in Korea. I had to carry him most of the way. He was the first ever AIDS case in South Korea. In 1985, hospitals in the USwould refuse to accept patients they knew had AIDS, as it negatively affected their death records. There was no cure then, and there is none now. All that there is available are ‘cocktails’ which can keep a patient alive for a while (if you can afford them). AIDS is still an inevitable death sentence.
When I got him home, we set him up in an apartment. The gay community supplied a hospice worker who would attend him for a time every day, and my brother moved in with him to see him to his last days. I never saw him again in life, nor did I ever visit his grave in Washington State until this year.
I missed him then and I miss him now. I am in large measure a product of his care, his nurturing of my intellectual curiosity, my thirst for knowledge, justice and human rights, and his gentle manner in raising me. I miss him even more now, as I grow older and come to value age, wisdom, and experience in ways I didn’t when I was young.
That is why this AIDS Awareness/Prevention benefit is so important to us at WZRD Chicago, and why we are so committed to raising awareness in Northeastern Illinois University’s student population, as evidenced by Peter’s first-hand experience in having lost his father to the disease. We are fortunate to have many other student –run organizations who agree with us in the support of this benefit: The Justice Studies Club, Theta Chi Omega National Sorority, the Honor’s Society, Seeds Literary Arts Journal, The NEIU Hip Hop Club, and the Independent Newspaper. Check out some awesome entertainment with our ramp up event that features Hula Hoops of Fire and the Windy City Wizard on Friday, October 14th in the University Commons from 12-2 pm. The benefit itself is set to help the AIDS Foundation of Chicago and will take place at NEIU in Recital Hall on Sunday, October 16, from 12:30 pm to 3:00 PM . Featured artists include: The Stick and Move Dance Crew (who say that Hip Hop is Healthy Independent People Helping Other People!), Francois LeRoux – the Ha!man – from South Africa, and Denise Kinsey, (who helped train the Twilight Wolves) with S’uk’a the wolf. Speakers include: Dr. Lawrence Stockdill who will speak on HIV/AIDS and social justice as well as Arick Buckles of The Illinois Alliance for Sound AIDS Policy (IL ASAP), who is a caseworker/activist in the field of HIV/AIDS. Please contact stationmanager@wzrdchicago.org with any questions.