Interview with Anonymous (2017-12-21)

17-12-21-SX.docx


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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

HIV in My Day – Interview 20


December 21, 2017
Interviewee: Anonymous (P); Interviewer: Ben Klassen (BK)

Ben Klassen: Alright, just getting started this afternoon. We like to start by asking how you first
became involved in the gay community or started engaging in gay life.

Participant: Let’s see, that would have been… The first time? Like, not – not teenage hookups
with friends?

BK: Well, I think that’s part of the story.

P: Yeah, yeah. Well, I guess that would have been fourteen or so there, but I didn’t really get
involved with the gay world until I moved to Vancouver from Victoria in ‘84. I moved over there
to be with this guy I met – we were boyfriends for about two and half years or so – it was
interesting. And that’s when this whole AIDS thing came out, which freaked us all out. So, it
kind of put me back into the closet and ran away – I wasn’t very comfortable with the gay world
back then. Not at all, yea. It was a different time – it was rough, it was violent, lots of gay
bashing, and no police support. You know back in the early-eighties.

So, when the AIDS thing came out, like I did I – my friends actually right now refer to me as a
4x4 fag as opposed to a queen or anything like that, yeah – so I have kind of always been the
redneck gay guy. Ah, and I didn’t find there was really a place for me in the early-eighties, so I
felt really uncomfortable with that and when the AIDS thing came out that really just freaked me
out and I ran away from the gay world, and I didn’t come out again until – oh, I would have been
twenty-one then. So, I didn’t come out again until I was about twenty-eight after that.

BK: So what was there, in terms of Vancouver’s gay community, it wasn’t exactly, even without
the epidemic…?

P: Right, no, yeah, it was the old, you don’t know what you’re getting into. I guess I have to be
in drag all the time and be very effeminate and I never really found there was a place for me. I
tried to find places to get involved in, like hiking groups and things, but they kind of just turned
out to be like jerk off sessions which kind of pissed me off… because I just wanted to go hiking.

Um, yeah, yeah… it was different. Yeah, I guess my first boyfriend wasn’t a great introduction
to the gay world, so… I forget the prime minister’s name I can see him and his wife… Lillian
Vander Zalm! That’s right. And he wanted to ship everyone off to an island like a leper colony
or so from the fifties. And that was sort of the whole atmosphere I was coming out in, so I didn’t
feel comfortable coming out of the closest at all. And then years later, it was interesting because
I talked to a friend of mine who was a therapist at UBC, and we were talking about comparing
coming out stories and it was uh… it was more like not coming to terms with being gay. That
was only – ended up in retrospect – ended up only being part of it. It was more like who am I as
a person and where do I fit in in society was the big issue. So, once I came to terms with who I
am and where I’m going, the gay thing just fell into place and it was easy and the gay world was



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

easy to enter into. Yeah, and at that time I guess HIV was getting a bit more of a – hang on – no,
it wasn’t, no that was before AZT or anything. So, still – yeah, it was still a death sentence.
Yeah, so the second time I came out of the closet… [laughs]

It’s funny because people asked how do you identify as gay and stuff? And I said, if I have to
identify as anything I identify as a nudist first then gay as second. So, I was always down at
Wreck Beach at the time. So, that’s where I met my next – my second first boyfriend, and he
introduced me to all my gay friends who I still am very close to now. And it was a great
introduction to the gay world. I got to meet a variety of people and I would say in the first two
years probably 10 percent, maybe 15 percent of those people all died. Just after the first year and
a half that I met them – yeah, real quick, real quick, some of them. Like, the gentleman who
introduced me to you, I met him at that time through my first boyfriend and we’ve been friends
ever since then, and he was positive back then right at the beginning. So, it was a really scary
time watching friends who were positive and other friends die, and how my positive friends
would relate to that and the lack of acceptance there was in the medical community, and no
support or anything. Yeah, it was crazy, it was crazy. Very closeted.

BK: Yeah, I don’t think your experience of returning to the closet because of HIV is unique. I
think a lot of gay men felt the need to do that to some extent at least, because of the fear and
anxiety around that.

P: Right, for sure, and it was like a curse from god on gays right, and you know you could get it
ten days after on a park bench, and there was all these crazy accusations.

BK: Do you remember what – the first information you were encountering about the epidemic,
where were you hearing about it?

P: Where did I…? It would have been the news I guess, yea the news is – yeah. It was like the
gay disease, the epidemic that was attacking the gay world. Yeah, a lot of – I think the news and
the media offer inaccurate information anyways. What they say may be true but it’s only a small
sliver of the whole truth and they sort of just leave it up to you to decipher, which – I hate to
bring in the religious part, but I think a lot of the religious groups sort of ran with that. It seems
to me – I think Anita Bryan, you know her? Yeah, Anita Bryan, she went down to Wreck Beach
one time with a full camera crew and they’re like, “Look at all these naked people! What about
the children, what about the children!” And you can see all these kids playing in the background
and stuff – it was crazy! So, a lot of really heavy religious people being very vocal. And I think,
probably, Vander Zalm was one of them.

BK: Yes, I think he was for sure.

P: For sure. A boyfriend of mine that I had met, who I guess in my early thirties – he was gay,
obviously, and his brother was also gay and his brother was heavily into the leather scene and
became positive and finally passed away. But my boyfriend, he worked for B.C. Ferries actually,
on, you know, one of the ships, and Vander Zalm was on there and he refused to serve Vander
Zalm, because he wanted to put his brother on a desert island – not a desert island, but an island



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

to keep it away, right? So it was really dynamically political the whole time in a suppressive sort
of way. Yea it was crazy. It seems so long ago now. [laughs]

BK: Yeah, I hope a lot has changed since then but…

P: Well, it’s kind of funny ‘cause I always sort of considered, like, HIV and AIDS pushed us out
of the closet and got us our gay rights. If it wasn’t for HIV I don’t think we would probably have
the gay rights that we have right now. Mind you, I am kind of one of these optimistic people.
But, I mean, look at women’s rights in the fifties – they got the right to vote and they got equality
in the fifties but nothing has changed. Where gays, we were forced out of the closet we were
forced out in the open and demanded equality because we needed the support – we needed the
medical support. And yeah, so I think HIV was probably the biggest fight for gay rights, oddly
enough.

BK: It seems to have definitely politicized – just being gay was political all of sudden again.

P: Yea for sure.

BK: So, you moved to Vancouver in ’84. That time after you were kind of learning about AIDS
and you withdrew from the community – did you just completely cut yourself off? Like, you
weren’t engaging in aspects of…

P: No fun, sex, social anything like that? No, no, I wasn’t involved at all. My boyfriend at the
time, we had split up, and then after we split up, I thought, “Well I can’t do this,” so then I went
back into the closet. That wasn’t the reason for splitting up. But uh, he did follow me around
wherever I moved. [laughs] So that would have been my only connection to the gay world, to
have my ex-boyfriend move into the building of whatever building I moved into. [laughs] Yeah,
it was kind of odd, but oh well.

BK: That does sound a little odd. [laughs]

P: Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

BK: Was that a way of protecting yourself? Was that a way of dealing with your fear around the
epidemic?

P: Yeah, it was – the epidemic was more like the last straw for going back into the closet. It was
– it was a lot of insecurities of who I was as a gay person and where do I fit in society, And you
know, “My life is going to go down the wrong path, and everyone is going to abandon me.” And
then when the AIDS came out it was like, “Oh, that’s it,” that was the last straw. “I’m done with
this,” and I hid away for a while. But then it wasn’t until – until I had come to terms with myself
that the HIV and the AIDS sort of became easier to understand.

BK: I guess you wouldn’t have had any idea of what the community was doing around the
epidemic in the eighties and…




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

P: No, just what would have been on the news. Like, Little Sister’s was around then and they
were always on the news fighting for equality and stuff – I always remember them. And the
parades, but I don’t remember attending a parade for years – yeah, probably the nineties I started
going to parades, and they were really tiny.

BK: Yeah, they are a lot different now.

P: Yeah, a lot different now. Actually, a friend of mine and I were discussing that they are so
different now – that it’s really almost counterproductive – more of an advertisement tool for big
business.

BK: It’s become that. It’s mostly, like, banks and political parties.

P: Yeah, for sure, for sure. When I lived down in Mexico City for a year in ‘99 and I went to the
gay pride there and all the Mexicans kept coming up and said, “What are you doing here?! You
are either going to get arrested or shot. You shouldn’t be here.”

I thought, “Wow, this is the political part of the gay pride parade.” [laughs] It was very real. It
was a good slap across the face – oh yeah, right, there is still a challenge here.

BK: And do you remember hearing what was going on in terms of what the mainstream was
saying about the epidemic or do remember any experiences that you had, or any information that
you heard about?

P: Yea, it was all negative – all negative. It was just fear and fear mongering, and it was just…
yeah. So, when I met my second first boyfriend and met all my friends there – and some of them
are positive – it was their stories that would really hit home about the abandoning of the medical
industry and no support. Yeah, you could go to emergency, but one friend literally got stuck in
the closet. He was just stuck there for days with nobody coming in, because nobody knew what
to do. You know, how do you deal with it? I think at that time they might have been thinking it
might have even been air borne. I know that was when they still thought it lasted ten days on an
open park bench, [laughs] which seems incredible. Yeah, it’s just a lot of fear – it was a lot of
don’t go near you, don’t get close – there was no pills, nothing. So, it was a death sentence –
absolute death sentence.

BK: Yeah, we have heard a few stories of doctors in Hazmat suits in the early stages of the
epidemic. If you were going to go into the room of an AIDS patient, you were going to gown
head to toe. How stigmatizing must that have felt?

P: Yeah, for sure. You are not really going to put your patient at ease when you see someone in a
hazmat suit. It’s crazy how things have changed, I guess. I don’t know – I am sure if a new
disease came out now we would probably react the same. We don’t really have a tendency to
learn from our experiences.

BK: Yea sometimes I wonder about that – I do wonder. Do you remember how the government
was responding? You mentioned Vander Zalm and the whole quarantine and island bullshit.



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


P: Yeah, like the lepers. Yeah, and there was – well, there wasn’t any meds, I remember when
the meds came out it was like, “Who’s going to pay for this?” It was like $1500, $3000 a month,
right, and who was going to pay for this? So I remember that being a bit of an issue. Yeah, I
don’t really remember. I just remember a lot of – maybe that’s what I focus on – it was just a lot
of fear in media. It was just fear, just stay away. Of course, safe sex promotion started coming
out there, but that was mostly religious saying no sex was good sex. But yeah, there wasn’t really
much happening – it was just fear. I guess it wasn’t until the late-eighties when doctors started
pooling together and seeing the patterns that – you know, from all the people passing away, all
the patterns coming out of that, and saying okay we are getting a direction here moving forward.
But yeah, back then I just remember it being just chaotic random accusations of false facts.

BK: And if you were already feeling on edge in terms of your identity or your place in the world,
having all that additional fear piling on top of your own feelings would have just been
overwhelming I imagine.

P: Yeah, exactly I wasn’t even positive at that time, but yeah, it was the threat. And it was kind
of funny because once I did become positive I was like, “Thank god, it’s over.” [laughs] I didn’t
have to live in fear about getting it. That – I think that was the worst part about HIV was
wondering when am I going to get it? When is my turn? When I became positive there was
already a few drugs out there, but they were terrible, horrific drugs. They were way worse than
the disease was. Like, DDI, d4T, and I forget the third drug that I was on.

BK: Maybe Crixivan? There were a few things going on but…

P: And it was like twenty-four pills at night and twenty-four pills in the morning - these ones
before eating, these ones during eating, these ones after eating. So, it was like a whole day event.
And the side effects were just brutal, brutal. Backpack and a change of underwear. [laughs]

BK: Yeah, horrible gut issues, right?

P: Yeah, terrible, terrible. Until they said, “Okay, the pills are doing more harm than the virus is,
so we will just take you off the pills and let the virus run its course and see what happens.” When
they did that to me, the virus never came back for months and months and months. So, then they
sent me through UBC research thing to sort of monitor why my immune system was keeping it a
bay. So, they would take seven to ten vials of blood every two days for four months. I never used
to mind needles. Now I hate them. [laughs] At first they said, “Wow, it’s you and this guy in
Germany that are reacting so well and its really interesting and we want to find out more about
it.” And then they gather up information. Now, they just find out we’re a dime a dozen – there’s
lots of people that hold off the disease without meds. But it’s good research.

BK: So, you initially decided to go on meds even though you weren’t necessarily sick?

P: Right, at that time it was common practice. So, as soon as you became positive you were put
on these meds and then they were like, “Okay, the meds are terrible, they do more harm than the



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

virus,” so then they took everybody off the meds – well, most people off the meds. And then the
new generation of meds came out which were so much easier.

BK: What year was that when you were first going on meds?

P: ’95-‘96? And I was on for a couple years – a few years. I was on them in Mexico, so I was on
in ‘99. I guess they came off in 2000 and then went back on the new batch in about 2010, I
guess. Yeah.

BK: And with those new drugs, any side effects?

P: Nothing, nothing – can’t even tell, don’t even know.

BK: That’s pretty amazing.

P: Yeah, it’s pretty sweet. Yeah, thank god. [laughs] But thank goodness for the medical industry
too because there is no possible way anyone could afford these.

BK: And B.C. got on board with the idea of getting everybody on to treatment as soon as
possible, I think around 2010 as well. That kind of became the…

P: That would make sense, yeah, because it was a big push. When I would go to my specialist
and there was a big push, “We’re all going on these meds,” which worked out good. I think one
of them is the PrEP pill now.

BK: So, you said your initial reaction when you found out you were positive was mostly one of
relief, in a sense?

P: Yeah, and my doctor said that wouldn’t be the normal reaction, but it’s not uncommon,
mostly because building up to it, it’s so much anxiety and so much stress, I couldn’t sleep at
night. And at that time it would be like 3 months waiting for your test results to come back. It
was just awful – it was just waiting and wondering “Did I screw up this time? Did I screw up that
time?” So, once it happened – I became positive – then it was like at least I don’t have to go
through that waiting period anymore. That was brutal. [laughs] Yeah.

BK: I think it makes a lot of sense, actually. I think there are still people that have that
perspective when they find out they are positive especially now that it doesn’t mean the same
thing. It doesn’t mean, “Oh, I’m going to be…”

P: Death sentence. Yeah, for sure, and I guess – I don’t know about now but I guess back then
there were a lot of bug chasers, so I was kind of concerned – well, if I am not that upset about
becoming positive…? And he’s like, “No you’re not a bug chaser, it’s just a different way of
processing.”

BK: Did you feel at the time that was still a death sentence?




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

P: Yeah, that was one of the reasons I quit my job and moved to Mexico. I was in love with this
Mexican guy and he was still in university, so I thought why make him move to Canada if I am
not going to consider moving to Mexico? So, I moved down to Mexico and what did I have to
lose, right? I figured it was only a matter of time anyway. I spent my RRSP’s and had a good
year – it was awesome. And they had pretty good medical down there, too, and it was all free for
HIV and doctors. Well, the doctors of course you had to pay for, but the HIV clinics and their
doctors was all contribution – whatever you could afford, other than that it was all free.

BM: Wow, I didn’t know that.

P: Yeah, Mexico is really good that way. All their medical is free – of course, it’s the worst
medical. And if you want really good medical you have to pay for it, but there is access to
medical for everyone in the country. Same with university, education – it’s all free. In select
universities you go to a private one you got to pay. Yeah, it was crazy – they got a good system. I
would probably prefer to stay here though. [laughs]

BK: We’ve got an okay system here. In terms of HIV care, I think Vancouver is a good place to
be. B.C. and Ontario, I think. You said that eight years afterwards, you stepped back into the
community – you started being involved in the gay community coming out a little bit more. Do
you remember when that was?

P: Yeah, that would have been about ‘88-‘89 – around then. Yeah, and I met three or four big
groups of gay friends. So, one group was into the things I was – 4x4ing and motorbikes and
hiking and everything, and another group was into the bars. Another group ended up being the
rave crowd when the raves started up. Yeah, it was a good variety of people and I am still friends
with all of them, and I met them all through one person, which was funny. But yeah, in that
aspect, it was a great introduction to the gay world because there was a wide variety of people
and everybody got along with each other, everyone knew each other – it was very cohesive. It
was very cool. I started talking about that with some friends, saying – you know, talking about
the pride and how pride changed – it’s that the gay community has changed so much too. Not
that it’s better or worse but – but it seemed to be a lot more inclusive before. Your being in the
closet is like being stuck in a room with a whole variety of people, but now we don’t have to be
in the room anymore. So, we are just out on the streets and you don’t seem to have the same
group of – you know, identity, subculture – the subculture seems to be dissipated, which is good
– the acceptance of society – it’s just different.

BK: Yea, I think there is a positive and a negative there, because you do lose something, right?

P: You lose something – you lose a bit of culture.

BK: But now you can be a gay man and live out in the suburbs or walk out in the streets.

P: And not have to worry about it. I had a lot of friends bashed in the ‘80s and the ‘90s in the
West End – baseball bats or keys. It was crazy. I never have but fortunately I was big. [laughs]
Yeah, it was crazy. So yeah, you lose that culture but then again, being accepted is a lot nicer.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

BK: It’s nice to be able to walk down that street without fear.

P: Yeah absolutely, and while Victoria has no central identity for the gay world like a West End
is, but still with new media it’s pretty accessible. I mean we had the telephone chats but now
there are so many chats out there. The gay world is pretty accessible.

BK: What did the community look like? I mean you have given us a bit of an idea of that
cohesion and more inclusive you said, right? But do you have any other thoughts on what the
community in Vancouver looked like in the late ‘80s into the early ‘90s?

P: Yeah, filthy, filthy thing. [laughs] Yeah, like, one bar – I won’t name it but it’s a pretty cool
bar now but back then it was multiple levels right on Davie street and downstairs it was just
pornos and jerking off and old 80 – well, I thought they were old, but I’m 55 now so they might
have been my age. [laughs] But yeah, it was just lecherous and slimy and dirty. Yeah, it was
weird.

BK: Fun or kind of gross?

P: It was fun. It – yeah, I mean I was never really comfortable with that kind of thing but that
was a multiple place and the next level would be dancing and the level after that was pool tables
and, so yeah, there was always something for somebody – porno everywhere. [laughs]

BK: A bit more sexually charged, maybe, than it even is now?

P: Yeah, for sure. Of course, that’s pretty well all they had, right? I mean, I remember my older
friends who had come out in the late-‘50s or ‘60s or so – sex in the parking lot and the parks or
the Bay bathroom or Sears bathroom, that was the gay culture. And the clubs, it was sex in the
clubs and sex in hidden places was the gay culture, and you grew old as a bachelor. [laughs] So,
that was still very prominent in the ‘80s, and bit by bit, it just sort of dissipated until it became
less that.

BK: Any sense of why that shifted?

P: Again, I think it was, you know, fighting for gay rights, but if it wasn’t for being forced out of
the closet and fighting for medical care and response – medical response – I don’t know if that
would have changed as quickly as it did. I mean it was bound to change but yeah, the HIV and
having to fight for the medical and acknowledgement – and not really even acceptance, just
come and help us. I think that really helped change the whole community. It cleaned it up,
became more presentable, in many aspects.

BK: And again whether or not that’s a good or a bad thing is…

P: Yeah, right, good and bad for everything. Change is always good but you lose something.
Every time something changes you lose something but you gain something.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

BK: Were you involved in any of that activist – not necessarily marching the streets but pushing
for reform or change in any respects?

P: Not so much, no. Um… I was for a little while, while I had a boyfriend who was very active -
that would have been in the late-‘90s though. No, I was never very much of a political person,
but I always sort of thought my political stance was – since I had now become comfortable in my
skin as a gay person and who I am in society in general, that I have never been in the closet
since. So, wherever I go, whoever meets me, they all know I gay. And that worked the same for
– like, I did twelve years working in a warehouse with 300 other employees and I had no
problems telling everybody I’m gay. And they were like, “Wow, are you sure you want to tell
people your gay?” I’m like, “I don’t know? Shouldn’t I?” I didn’t really think about it. It was just
sort of out and acted who I was and did the things that I like to do, and got – I know in a small bit
I had a lot of people – well, there’s 300 people in the warehouse. There was a lot of afraid people
there, a lot of people wouldn’t be in the same room with me, wouldn’t touch the same equipment
that I had touched. They didn’t even know I was posi- - well, I wasn’t positive at that time. But
after a while everybody changed, everybody accepted it. I thought that’s a nice kind of political
contribution to just lead by example and just be a good person and everybody after a while just
realizes that he’s just a regular person, no big deal. I like my grunge music, I like my heavy
metal, I like my 4x4s.

BK: Yeah, absolutely. Coming out – that’s a political thing at a time when there is a lot of
animosity towards gay people.

P: Yeah, for sure. A lot of animosity, a lot of fear, and working in warehouses don’t draw a lot
of compassionate people, it’s rednecks, you know – that’s really a bigoted thing to say. [laughs]
But yeah, you know there’s a style of people who like that type of work and you wouldn’t
assume there would be a lot of gay people in there.

BK: Kind of like a macho work culture?

P: Yeah, for sure. When I became positive, I didn’t tell any of them that I was positive – that
wouldn’t have gone over well I wasn’t about to go that far. [laughs] In fact, my doctor told me,
“Take a couple of years. Don’t tell anyone that you’re positive. Don’t tell your family or straight
friends or anything. Just look after yourself and come to terms with being HIV positive.” I said,
“Well, why?” And he said, “Well, what happens is that they get very upset and you end up
supporting them for their feelings as opposed to they should be supporting you.” He said he sees
it in the hospital all the time. All these people come in to see their very sick relative lying in bed
and the relative ends up having to give moral support to all the people around him because they
are so upset, and it’s exhausting. He said, “Pull back, make sure you’re good with it, and then tell
people, whenever you’re comfortable with it, so you can have the extra energy to support them,
to support your support group…” [laughs]… which was good advice. It was very good advice,
‘cause my sister fucking freaked. “How dare you put me and my kids at risk!” Yeah, she was
brutal. We used to be fairly close but she doesn’t handle the gay thing well at all. So, we just
kind of drifted apart because of that.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

But my brother – he’s a huge redneck and people are like, “Why does he live in White Horse?”
It’s so he can kill things. It’s really easy – they are just outside. [laughs] But he’s awesome. You
know rednecks get a bad rap – he’s very compassionate and very understanding and he’s a
logical person. So, when I told him I was positive he flew down from White Horse and said, “I
have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t know what HIV is.” So, he wanted to talk to my
doctors – he wanted to describe exactly how the whole process works and how the pills worked
and he wanted to have a good solid grasp around it, and after that it was just constant, “So how
are you doing? How are your meds? How is your viral load? How is your CD4’s?” And he was
totally hands off but totally supportive – wonderful.

BK: That is wonderful.

P: Same thing when I came out of the closet too. I was – my sister freaked and my brother was
like, “I have no idea what it’s like to be gay,” so he came down to Vancouver – had him meet all
my friends, took him to all gay bars and stuff. “If anybody touches me I am going to punch
them.” [laughs] He’s just a sweet guy – he knows all my friends, everybody loves him.

BK: Yeah, I think we sometimes have an idea of how families reacted to the epidemic and to
family members becoming positive, but it’s important to have some nuance there. Families might
have behaved in very different ways – family members might have reacted very differently.

P: And the funny thing is, that you know, you try to second guess how family and friends will
react to the whole thing, and you know, you can stress yourself out so much that it works exactly
the opposite. The people you think are going to freak out become your closest allies and your
biggest support, and the people that you think are actually there for you freak out. It’s interesting
– you can never quite tell until you just dive in and do it, but no matter what, there is always
somebody to help you whether you come out of the closet or become HIV positive. It’s a tough
thing to go around and tell people but there is always people there to help you. It might not be
the people you think, but they are still there. Yeah, it’s crazy.

BK: Where did you find support when you needed it, I guess? You seroconverted, you found out
you were positive. Did you tell anyone at that time or did you look for support anywhere?

P: Yeah, my close gay friends, especially the ones that were already positive. Did I find any
other support? Not so – oh, I joined AIDS Vancouver. What else was there? Oh my god, it was
so long ago. I keep thinking Plenty of Fish but that’s not what it was called.

BK: Positive Living?

P: Positive Living? I think so – that sounds familiar, and Loving Spoonful. Yeah, I got involved
with Loving Spoonful for a while and I went to AIDS Vancouver a lot – that was a good
resource. And mostly just my friends, and just at that time I had already had a few friends who
had been positive for like fifteen years before I became positive. So I knew that long term
survivors existed and that I would be okay, so there was that hope. My brother would have been
the only family member that would have supported. My parents weren’t too supportive. My
sister completely opposite – she was the most hurtful one.



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


BK: So, not only could you draw on those friends for support but also their expertise around
living with HIV.

P: That’s right, exactly, exactly - lifestyles and eating habits, and it was right from one side to
the other side. I mean, one friend had been long term survivor and was really into health and
fitness and eating well and my other friend was equally as long with HIV was eating tortilla
chips and beer and just doing everything wrong, but they both surviving quite equally. So, you
know, you pick and choose, and like – okay, so first of all its your attitude. Whatever you eat,
whatever you do, you gotta have a good attitude – you gotta come to terms with it and maintain a
positive attitude. Keep the stress low. Don’t self-destroy or self-destruct.

BK: Do you remember specifically any type of support you got from an organization? Like,
AIDS Vancouver – what kind of programing or services were they offering?

P: Yeah, I didn’t do any counselling at all. Well, I did go I guess twice to just a general
counsellor just to talk through my work, but I didn’t really take that very far. And AIDS
Vancouver was – I found the best support from them was a place I could literally just go to and
hangout, so I had a place to be if I ever felt sort of down or out. I didn’t have to go talk to
anybody but I could just be in the environment and help out and do some things here and there.
That was really good. I mean I had close personal friends who were positive and had fifteen
years’ experience, so talking to them was good. One of my older great friends was the professor
of psychology at UBC, so I always talked to him – we were always bouncing ideas back and
forth. So, when I became positive it was just another idea that bounced back and forth and
discussed and things. I’m not a very shy person so I can pretty much just talk to anybody at
anything and sometimes I walk away going, “Maybe that was a private conversation. [laughs]
Maybe I shouldn’t be talking so much.” [laughs] So that’s never been a problem. Yeah, but
funny enough, family – no, just my brother. My mom and dad were – I don’t think they handled
it well, so they just didn’t… And my sister – well, there’s a few colorful expletives for her. Other
support groups? Yeah, no – just friends. Yeah, friends and being part of the AIDS Vancouver
thing.

BK: And Loving Spoonful?

P: Yeah, Loving Spoonful a little bit, yeah.

BK: Were you helping there or just sort of benefiting from the services they were offering?

P: Both for a while actually. I was helping there for a while and then after a period of time – like,
you know… Okay, I was positive, I was in love with this Mexican, so I went down to Mexico
and came back with a whole business plan and a business idea, so I went back to school and went
to college for like five years. So, then I was now taking their services because I was a starving
student at thirty-five and yeah. [laughs] That was nice. It was great.

BK: It’s really interesting to think of all these different responses that were going on within the
community addressing all sorts of different needs. AIDS Vancouver, you could go and socialize;



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

Loving Spoonful, you could get some food. It’s pretty amazing how the community was
responding.

P: Yeah, for sure, and it was pretty cool too because you kind of felt almost a little privileged
because then, like, the symphony and the ballet – and, you know, plays and theatres – they would
give comps to AIDS Vancouver. So, you could just put your name on the list and get tickets to
the ballet or the orchestra or whatever. They would specifically give blocks of tickets to AIDS
Vancouver, or at least that time they did, so they kind of exposed you to the arts and live theater
– free yoga… [laughs] It’s great! It’s like that South Park episode – did you ever see that, where
it was about AIDS? And they were like, “You can make jokes about aids – well it’s like it’s been
22-and-a-half years since the epidemic started which technically is the right time you can start
joking about it. So, then they were going off about how Jered lost his weight from subway not
because of subway but because he had assistance… AIDS. You need AIDS to lose weight. It’s
terrible – it’s a terrible episode – it’s so funny.

BK: I think I would struggle with that one.

P: I know, but it’s South Park, so if they aren’t doing something way off to one side it’s not
going to be funny at all.

BK: If you can laugh at it I can probably manage to laugh at it.

P: Yeah, for sure. It’s very politically incorrect. Yeah, and that would have been in the early
2000’s. Yea, what were we talking about. [laughs]

BK: Tangents are fine with me.

P: You know, one of the most supporting things that was just influenced my life was Dr. Peter
and his whole newscast, because that – oh my god, that went on for, I don’t know, years on the
news. And he was saying it gave him extra purpose, that his life was prolonged longer than it
should have been because he felt such a need to document this up until the end. And just
watching him on the news every week and his own personal experiences on what he’s doing
today was huge. I think that was crazy influential. Apparently, they spliced them all together and
made a big documentary about it a while ago. And then funny enough, my mom’s church, her
minister was the minister that buried Dr. Peter up island. He was the only guy that would touch
Dr. Peter. And just, why wouldn’t I? Logan – his name was Logan. He was the dean at the
cathedral – great guy, Scottish, and yeah, he helped Dr. Peters a lot. And then he passed away
and they buried him up in Duncan – some odd place.

But that was strange you know – Dr. Peter being so influential and then nobody would bury him.
I think – but you know that was such a long time ago – that might be an extreme memory, but it
seems to me there was a lot of issues, that nobody in the religious community would touch him
because he was gay and HIV positive, and I think Logan was the only one who would do it.
Yeah, crazy, crazy – and kind of a coincidence that it was my mom’s minister. [laughs] She’s in
a good church – she’s great. I’m not so religious but she is, and she’s in a great church. They
have a lesbian minister now.



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


BK: What kind of a church is that?

P: [Laughs] Oh my goodness, one of the churches of England. Anglican? I think so. There’s the
Scottish one and the English one and I think it’s the English one because I think she grew up
Presbyterian and that was a really heavy church. So, I think it was Anglican cause it’s the lighter
one.

BK: It’s good to get a little picture – we don’t want to paint all religious people stigmatizing as
people who were homophobic, because I am sure there were some people stepping up to the
plate for us as well as a community.

P: And I think Logan was probably a trail blazer, but I also think back then it would have been
pretty hard for a minister to actually stand up for the gay world and for HIV because they are in a
very strict industry – a hierarchy – and you can probably do more good if you keep your views in
the closet and just work at it than you can if you make your views public and get fired. And once
you’re fired you have lost all your access to tools and support. So, I think it has been pretty tough
for all of the religious to come to terms with things such as that.

BK: So, you mentioned Dr. Peter. Looking into the ‘90s, where were you starting to get your
information from? Your friends I guess? Does anything else come to mind? You also mentioned
safe sex. When did you start to hear about that?

P: That would have been right in the ‘80s when the epidemic first came out. Safe sex – just do
not have sex. And it was really “We have no idea what’s going on. We have no idea what this is.
We think it’s all the gays fault. But we have no idea, so the best thing is just do not have sex.”
And that got more structured and more education and pretty well the whole ‘90s was safe sex.
Now it’s all kind of gone in the pot.

BK: So, in the ‘90s, was it more about condom use at that point?

P: Yeah, condom use. Yeah, that was pretty well it. Asking a gay community to not have sex
would be, like, pointless. [laughs] Good luck with that one! Especially because in the ‘50s, ‘60s,
‘70s that all we had was sex. In the ‘80s, ‘90s – one, it’s changed so much. It’s now about love
and relationships. So, you know, when you have a minority group that’s based around closeted
sex and then you’re not allowed to have sex, what else do you got? Well, you just keep having
sex.

BK: What does it mean to be gay? It means to have sex with other men. That’s the definition
that…

P: That most people use even today. When really its quite different now. It’s terrible to have to
say, the younger generation… [laughs]

BK: I forgive you.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

P: I never wanted to be one of them, but it’s true. The younger generation, sex is fluid, from how
I understand it. Its fluid – it’s however you feel at the time, and there is no gay sex or straight
sex, it’s just sex. You have preferences but it’s just sex. Gay and straight would be committing or
desiring a lifestyle – a companionship or partnership for your future would be more of a gay
lifestyle and sex is just sex. You know, I love stats, so I was looking up the difference between
gay sex and straight sex, and the only example I could find was some university in Australia had
compared the two and the found the only difference between gay sex and straight sex is gay guys
play with their nipples – straight guys don’t. Other than that, it’s all the same across the board –
everybody does everything.

BK: Interesting.

P: So, there is no gay sex. [laughs]

BK: And do you wonder if part of the reason that sex is, for younger people, a little fluid is
partially because there is more acceptance? You don’t have to commit as much from one side or
the other…

P: Yeah, that’s right, yeah. I know one of my nieces was very fluid with that. She’s married now
to a great guy, but not always. Yeah, and it wasn’t anything like, “I think I’m straight. I think I’m
gay.” She met someone she loved and they had a relationship, then she was off to the other side.
It was kind of cool – I kind of like that – I am kind of jealous actually. Yeah. Not that I ever want
to be with a woman. [laughs] I’m not saying that. But you know, it’s kind of neat.

BK: I think it is interesting how that seems to be shifting. Did you experience a lot of stigma or
did you see a lot of stigma when you started getting involved in the gay community or around
HIV, and then did you actually experience that yourself after you got your diagnosis?

P: What kind of stigma?

BK: Like, fear around HIV positive people or dislike of HIV positive people?

P: Oh yeah, lots. Oh yeah, lots and lots. I see when I am on the chats now sometimes you will
come across “No HIV+” or “I’m negative, you be too.” But through the ‘90s, I remember we
didn’t even really have computers – at least I didn’t. I got my first computer in ’99. But it was
segregation: “If you’re positive, do not approach me.” Yeah, there was lot of negativity
surrounding it, and when I became positive, that sort of transferred it into this real essence or this
feeling that I was toxic. That was probably the hardest thing to get over. The deep feeling that
you’re toxic and you don’t want people touching you, and you don’t want to express yourself
sexually or affectionately. It was tough. I am not quite sure how people go through that now.
There is probably still a sense of toxicity. But I am just wondering if that was based on the
negativity that not just gay world but the whole world had. You don’t tell people you’re positive,
and if you do, then you’re shunned. And the gay world was close – it was inclusive, it was
supportive, unless you want to have sex. [laughs] And then it was like, “Well yeah, but not with
me.” That was tough – yeah, that was really tough.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

BK: So, it wasn’t unusual to have HIV positive friends and HIV negative friends all hanging out.
That was part of what the community looked like, but the line gets drawn when it comes to
actual sex?

P: Yeah. for sure. And even with friends, while not as harsh as strangers it was still, “Well, you
know, you don’t want to have sex with this person because they are positive.” But it also kind of
worked in reverse too – I wouldn’t have sex with a negative person or date a negative person for
decades. Actually, it’s only been recently – the last few years – I would consider dating someone
who wasn’t positive. So, it kind of works in reverse too, you know. I have had a few guys want
to date me who were negative and they were totally cool with the positive thing, but I wasn’t
cool with them being cool with it.

BK: So, some internalized fears?

P: Yeah, thinking, “I’m toxic. I don’t want to give it to somebody,” you know, which I did twice.
It’s hard. And you know, I did give it to two people accidentally, and practicing safe sex both
times. But that’s a far worse feeling then actually becoming positive – way worse – it’s horrific. I
mean, becoming positive, my personal story was a fairly easy transition because I had a lot of
friends, a lot of backups. But giving it to somebody else is just a horrific experience I never want
anybody to experience. Yeah, it’s terrible. I don’t know if that would change now with all the
meds, but yeah.

BK: Well, the wonderful thing is if you’re undetectable, you can’t – that’s what all the science
seems to say. Undetectable is untransmittable, right?

P: Yeah, for sure. And with the PrEP pill, you know, being one of the retroviral pills, I think it
would be pretty difficult to get it while you’re on PrEP. But even still, who can afford an $1100
prescription a month? How do people pay for that, anyways? A rhetorical question, I guess.

BK: Some people have good insurance. That’s part of it. But it’s a huge topic of discussion right
now in the community.

P: I’m afraid that it’s a false sense of security I don’t really – like, for the HIV it may work great
– if I am taking my meds and I am zero transmission. If you’re on PrEP, you’re not going to be
able to receive it. That sounds great, but that might be a false sense of security. I mean look at
syphilis or Hep C – but syphilis, it’s everywhere, right? It’s brutal and PrEP isn’t going to stop
that. So, that’s what I mean by false sense of security. It’s like, “Look, I’m safe now. I can have
bareback sex.” Warts – yeah. [laughs]

BK: I think that’s one of the biggest challenges that the community is working through now is
that these new things open up so many opportunities for relationships and for sex, but then
there’s all these other things to…

P: Yeah, for sure.

BK: When did you get over that feeling of toxicity?



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


P: Yeah, probably years – I would say… Well, I have been positive for, what – twenty years
now? I would say the last five years, I started to stop thinking about being toxic and I think that’s
because of – kind of about when the new generation of drugs came out that work so wonderfully.
And if they failed, then there’s a whole slew of drugs beside it that you can go to. So, it kind of
took the whole death is imminent away from the stigma and I think that’s when the whole
toxicity feeling drifted away, which is around the same time I considered dating someone who
was negative too. Until then it was like, “No, no forget it.” And I think that feeling of toxicity
stayed for about 15 years period. Yeah, it may have not ate away at me like it did at first – like,
for the first five, eight years, yeah, it was pretty prominent. As soon as I would think of HIV, it
would be being toxic was my first thought, my first response. Now I only think about it when I
am in conversation with somebody.

BK: Well, hopefully I am not making you feel toxic. That would be not in line with my
intentions.

P: [laughs] Not at all! Yeah, yeah, no – but since then, I have had some straight friends that fell
into the drugs scene a little too heavy and came out HIV positive, or other gay friends who
became HIV positive, and that’s the thing I start out with is asking, “How do you feel about
feeling like you might be toxic?” And they are like, “That’s exactly how I feel.” So – so, you
know, I used a lot of my own personal pain to be as supportive as I can for people who are new,
like my friends who were supportive of me when I became positive.

BK: That’s pretty amazing.

P: It’s pass-it-downs, you know?

BK: What advice do you have for folks who are newly diagnosed? We are seeing younger gay
guys still getting HIV. What would you say to not even just younger guys but people who are
newly diagnosed as someone who has been living with this for a long time now?

P: Yeah. I would probably really play it down now, yeah: “Oh, it really makes no difference in
my life” – which it has. [laughs] And you know, don’t worry about sex, don’t worry about love
and affection and touching people, because those were the biggest things for me. So, those would
be the things I would bring up with someone first because those are what hit me hardest. Just not
worry about that feeling of toxic, or that feeling of not worthy or not able to love somebody or
hold somebody. Yeah, I think that most people are pretty aware that it’s an easier thing to live
with now. I mean it’s just not that hard to live with anymore – I hate to say it. I would prefer not
to be positive but it’s pretty easy to live with. Take two pills at night and that’s it.

BK: Yeah, it’s a pretty amazing contrast to 1995 or even 1998.

P: Yeah, for sure. It’s crazy and two pills to – two pills with the PrEP one is technically three
pills but that’s a lot better than the handful of pills I was taking twenty years earlier, which were
gross. Oh yeah, one of them had to be chewed too – that was DDI that was gross. They were
huge horse pills.



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


BK: Oh, I have heard about those. People used to put them in the blender.

P: Yeah, or you would mash them all up and drink them with water. I was getting tired of all
that, so I would just pop them in and chew them all up. Yea it was gross. [laughs] Yeah, advice
to young folks – or rather, newly positive. Yeah, just take time to get used to it first of all – really
own it. And that’s another thing – like, just life in general it’s – if you got something going on,
you got two choices: either it can run your life, or you can run its life. So, when you become
positive you got a choice: either you can let it run your life and it can take you down, or you can
take control over it and understand it. What does it mean? Are you really toxic? No not really.
No, it’s just an inert feeling you can get over. But yeah – take time – get used to it, own it.

BK: Get your hands on lots of information.

P: Yeah, for sure – really understand it and own it as more of a spiritual, personal thing. “This is
something that I have and I can control it,” and then go out and look for love like you would
normally.

BK: I think that’s good advice.

P: [laughs] I hope so!

BK: How do you think the epidemic – we talked about this a bit already – changed the
community or shaped the community, if you feel it did at all?

P: Yeah, absolutely. I would say it made it more cohesive and it brought people out of the closet.
We touched about that but yeah, I really think it was fundamental on the growth of the gay
community and acceptance, and it had to happen. People were dying all the time and you needed
medical care, and the only way you could get it was to demand it. To demand it you came out of
the closet. So, I think it really helped the community a lot. And you know, with drag queens and
things, they were always sort of outside the gay community – they were always sort of shunned
and laughed at. It’s like, that is the gay community. The drag queen community – and they were
influential a great deal for getting equality and getting HIV the medical attention it needed. It’s
like, they were the flag bearers at the front of the parade demanding all these and we were just
groups coming out of the closet walking behind them. And it seems to me they sort of led the
fight – were the drag queens, which was pretty cool. But I don’t think they would have had it any
other way. [laughs]

BK: Do you have any specific – can you remember anything in particular that drag queens were
doing?

P: Oh yeah, all the benefits and all the – it seems to me Loving Spoonful was started by a good
portion of drag queens, I think. But yeah, benefits – if the drag queens hadn’t sort of started with
benefits they were certainly involved with getting attention and money and support – everything
from drag bingo, which is so much fun – and yeah, everything at bars. Yeah, it was always the
drag queens at the head, at the lead. I don’t know many actual functions the drag queens started



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

but they were certainly there all the time for anything – pretty influential, greatly respectable too.
And I loved them too because, you know, back in the ‘80s when there was a lot of gay bashing,
you would hang around the drag queens because they might have been heckled but you didn’t
fight a drag queen. They would just take off that stiletto and bash you with it. [laughs] So, I
always stuck close to the drag queens. Some six-foot guy in heels is… [laughs]

BK: Yeah, maybe not a good target to pick.

P: Yeah, you don’t pick on the drag queens. [laughs] They will take you down. Well, thank
goodness you don’t need that anymore, right? Well, not that you don’t need it but it’s not as
important. We aren’t looking around every corner and over our shoulder every time – who’s
going to be behind us?

BK: Yeah, there is a lot less fear. You still hear about things once in a while but it’s not all the
time like it used to be.

P: Yeah, for sure. But it’s interesting because even with this conversation, because you’re doing
a retrospect on HIV and AIDS, but the HIV and AIDs thing is kind of drifting away and crystal
meth is now kind of the biggest issue with the gay world. Not just the gay world but like – wow,
I would probably say without statistics meth is probably screwing up our society more than HIV
did. Probably more people are dying – I would be interested to know if more people are dying
from Crystal Meth than HIV did. And certainly, now that fentanyl is involved with it, it’s brutal.
One begins to clear up and it’s just replaced with something else.

BK: I wonder if we have learned anything from HIV and AID – from the crisis and how we
responded to it as a community. Would any of that be useful in an instance like fentanyl and the
opioid crisis that’s going on right now.

P: Yeah.

BK: Any thoughts on – maybe not that specifically but – lessons we might have learned as a
community?

P: It’s interesting because when HIV first came out, nobody knew what to do. You want to be
involved, you want to be helpful and supportive, but what? How? With who? For what? And
that’s kind of how I think the drug problem is in the gay world right now. Well, how do you stop
people from doing drugs to protect them from fentanyl. Who’s selling this stuff? Who are the
people doing it? Why are they doing? Like so many drug problems, it’s not just people on the
streets, it’s just common everyday people with everyday jobs. Like, back in the day when coke
was the big problem, it was lawyers and doctors who were the big cokeheads. That’s a blanket
statement. [laughs] But it’s not people on the streets, it’s your next-door neighbor. So, how do
we learn from our HIV experiences and apply that to the crystal and fentanyl situation? I don’t
know – where do you even start? Yeah, it’s a tough one. Yeah, I don’t know – that’s almost
beyond me.




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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

BK: It’s a bit of an abstract concept – how can we take lessons we learn from one thing and
apply it to something else?

P: Well, I know when I went back to college, we had to do a report on drugs and society. So, I
did all this research and I came across the Frankfurt Accord which I guess was in Europe. And
Frankfurt, the whole area was just destroyed by drugs. So, this is how the red light districts all
came to life. So, they legalized all the soft drugs and put a heavier crime on all the hard drugs.
Since the soft drugs were all legal, they took all the policing money from that and applied it to
policing hard drugs. And then how they dealt with their own problems – they figured that the
reason people get addicted to drugs is because of social integration failure, in the sense that you
just don’t fit in – you don’t feel worthy, you don’t fit in, there is no place for you and you fall
into addiction, whether its shopping for shoes, going to the gym, doing drugs, drinking – you
know. So, that legalized soft drugs, put more policing on hard drugs, and promoted stronger
community and building a sense of community, and their drug problems all dropped and their
crime rates all dropped. So, we kind of began to follow that with safe injection sites and things.
It’s like, “Okay, let’s make the transmission of disease less by safe injection sites,” and I think
we were supposed to build up more community, but it doesn’t seem to be making much of a
difference. But it certainly worked in Frankfurt.

BK: It’s a colossal problem right now and I certainly don’t have the solution either.

P: For sure. So, maybe that’s how we get drugs out of our own community – we start building
that social connection, that social awareness, that sense that we do belong and there is a place for
you. The gay world was really hit hard with that until we came out of the closet – a sense of less-
than worthy – lots of drug and alcohol abuse.

BK: So, I asked you a little bit about any advice you had for long-term survivors but any advice
you might have on the health care provision side of this or HIV prevention side of the equation? I
guess, how we can either prevent HIV or how we can treat HIV in a better way?

P: Yeah… Attitude – I think it’s mostly attitude and healthy living – good positive attitude – not
– you know, quite often we all have problems with self-doubt. Just look at yourself in the mirror
and think, well I am a good person today and eating right – you know, eating healthy. I’m not a
big vitamins person – you know eat fresh food, stop eating processed food. I was in the cooking
industry for awhile and it was like, every time we process a piece of food you lose a piece of
nutrition and it’s valuable and you have to supplement it. So, eat fresh fruits, fresh vegetables
and a balanced a meal – it’s so cliché but it’s so true, and that just gives you energy and focus.
And just make sure you always think that, “No matter what everyone else thinks, I am good
person.” [laughs] But yeah, really, a good positive attitude and that will boost your immune
system for anything – you won’t get sick and if you do get sick your immune system works a lot
better. But we are fading away from proper eating. The bigger our cities and the more pressure
we get from society, the less we eat right, and the less exercise we do. It’s crazy…

BK: I do like the idea of trying to maintain a positive outlook and you’re certainly not the first
person – the first long term survivor – that we have talked to that has really emphasized that. So,
that seems to be a bit of a theme.



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“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)


P: Well that is a good point. That is – yeah, when I became positive, all of a sudden life was a
little bit nicer. You cherish life a little bit more, and I don’t think that’s just positive. Anyone
who has gone through cancer I am sure comes out the same way. I think you just appreciate
things a little bit better. You slow down – you take time to enjoy things. I guess, I wouldn’t be
limited to sick people, but I certainly think it makes a big difference. Just enjoy the little things.
We have so much outside pressure. Yeah, it’s crazy – our society is crazy. And green – cover
yourself with green. [laughs]

BK: I think I am out of my formal questions, but we want to leave some space for you to share
anything you didn’t get a chance to, or if there are any aspects of your story or your experience
that you wanted to share. Take a moment to think about it if anything comes to mind.

P: Gee, I don’t know. I think we kind of covered everything – yeah. As serious as you have to
take everything, don’t take everything so seriously. [laughs] And educate – you know, I think
that’s what helped me a lot was not just going with a sense of doom and toxicity but actually
learning about it. I learned that from my brother because each time I had a significant thing to
tell him, the first thing he did was fly down and say, “Educate me, because I have no idea what
you’re talking about.” That’s the best thing – just educate yourself. And google searches are
crazy – they don’t necessarily give you the right answer – they give you the most recent answer.
So yeah – real understanding of what’s happening.

BK: Do you find yourself sometimes taking on that role now as a long-term survivor?

P: On educating people? I always have. Oh my god, that’s part of trying to get me to stop
talking. [laughs] Yeah, and I like that – I like that. You know, I’m probably not involved in the
community as much as I should – the general community or the gay community – but it’s nice to
come across people in terrible times and it’s nice to help people. It’s nice to give them advice.
Oh my god, yeah, you get older and you build up all this experience, then you end up being that
“Oh, well you know, back in the ‘80s…” [laughs] It’s so true – you end up being all the cliché
stuff, but you end up with a lot of personal experience. “How did you get through it?” you know.
You can sort of second guess what that person’s thinking before they actually say it because you
have gone through it, and so you can almost guide their conversation because you know what the
ultimate concern is, kind of before they do. So, you can help them come to terms with that,
without being a know-it-all or a “This is what your problem is.” Let them self-realize.

BK: I think the reality is, if you’re a twenty-year-old guy in the gay community today, chances
are you don’t really know what it was like in the ‘80s or ‘90s. I mean, you have no clue. And so,
you do know a lot because you went through that right?

P: Yeah, it’s true. Just our comparison on gay pride – it used to be so political and so serious and
so needed and this year I was watching and going, “Oh my god, I’m so bored.” It feels like it
goes on for six hours, with, you know, TD bank, and then another business would go by and –
yeah, it’s different. And there is knowledge and wealth in everything – like, it works in reverse
too. I don’t really know what new culture is about – new social culture, that’s like thirty years
younger than I am. What do people think about now? I remember when I was twenty, thinking,



21


“HIV in My Day,” Anonymous (December 21, 2017)

“Oh my god, my parents are so ancient and so out of touch,” because they were like the nuclear
family from the ‘50’s where the mother was very doting and the father just sat there with the
newspaper and everybody had martini’s. [laughs] And I grew up in the ‘60s and ‘70s – it was all
hippies and drugs, love, rock and roll. Yeah, completely different from what my parents grew up
with, and the generations after me are completely different environment now too.

BK: I think the hope is that we can learn things from each other, across that generational divide.

P: Yeah, so true.

BK: But then having those kinds of conversations is often challenging. There’s not a lot of
spaces as a community where we can have those kinds of conversations.

P: Yeah, no, I think that’s right – there is not a lot of that conversation. But yeah – and like, I
have always been the kind of person who wanted to engage and learn from other people and I get
very inquisitive and want to explore things. Even at a young age I was like that. So, I was always
sitting down with the older generation and would say, “So what was it like?” and their stories are
completely different. Being gay in the ‘50s and ‘60s – brutal – it was crazy. Growing old alone
was the best thing you could hope for. Yeah, things to learn, which is interesting because, like
you know, when I came out of the closet, there was that cohesion in the gay world, and… I was
talking to a friend not too long ago – I don’t have any young friends. When I was young, I had
old friends and they died of old age years ago. So, I would have been in my twenties or thirties
and they would have been in their sixties, and we were great friends for years, and they just
passed off ‘cause they were just old. But I don’t see that now. I don’t have any young friends
now, so it’s… And I have no idea how to meet young people, where before you only had the bars
in the ‘80s and ‘90s – there was lots of bars, so it was easy to be social. But now it’s all the
computer and you get like two sentences of a chat and you sort of move on to the next person.

BK: Yea, I wonder why that generational thing isn’t there anymore. It’s strange to me.

P: Yeah, for sure.

BK: Anything else? Any final thoughts?

P: I can’t really think of anything else. Yeah, no. It’s – yeah, it’s all intertwined with each other
– the gay community, the HIV thing, coming out to the straight world – yeah, one led to the
other. Which one? I don’t know – all of them. Yeah, it’s pretty cool.

BK: Well, thank you so much for sharing your story with us. We really appreciate it.

P: Yeah, for sure. I hope it helps somehow.