My $64,000 question

there are many things i would change about myself. i've never liked my nose. the new salt and peppery hair is one too many spices in my ideal recipe. unassisted 20/20 vision is a wet dream always two steps ahead of me through consequences of both my own and not my own choosing. but these are all tangential to the $64,000 question i am sometimes asked by friends on the beginning of their own journeys. it is the question that seems to have the most obvious answer. 

thinking back to those young shoebox sized days in peckham, i can still feel the first ever scare. before the now of then even. i had a mark on my arm that froze every atom in my being- cooling the air around me. after all, i hadn't protected even the most precious of encounters so this was surely the kiss of death i had always known was coming. since back up in the mountains, reading usa today precociously. it is the same feeling i had at 7 finding out about this killer disease that older people like me got and then always died of. fresh alpine blue wind coming in from mom's window while next to me isaac cried himself to sleep after leaving ouray. frozen ice cream tummy and a head like i sneezed too hard. that feeling still accessible, but the cognitive dissonance resolving fear into action. i wanted to know more.

even growing up in texas, the long reach of the waves were so deep as to break up time in all our shared histories. big cities first, reaching out amoebalike to  smaller hubs and then into the capillaries of even the smallest of  towns. if you grew up in the 80's, at some point you found one of the wave's crashing onto your perfectly manicured front gardens and somehow affecting you. for my family, it was a painter and his lover. friends of my mother's and men whom i distinctly remember my first spark of community with. knowing who i was started with the courage of these brave men who in an instant were gone. taken by what i read about on the mountain. if it got them, i knew it would get me. and i was scared. so i learned more. 

i remember calling james from the bathroom in peckham. he had just started working on dover street. his first grownup job doing what he so wanted and most definitely was suited to do. i remember having trouble dialling his number as my head was so light and my fingers heavy. his first grownup job getting his first grown up problem. i remember him talking me down off my perilous edge of fear and calming me. he was always good at that. and he was right. it was a bruise. i had nothing to worry about. crises averted. life saved. but the metallic shock taste still lingered for days when i thought about it. little did i know that it was only an omen of much worse things to befall that one roomed world of ours.

you would think that after all of this knowledge of destiny and fear that the first thing on my list to change would be being HIV positive. and for a while, i suppose you would have been right. but only from before it actually happened. oddly enough, when it did happen it didn't really do what i thought it was going to do. instead of taking me over that ledge of self limiting terror i felt 11,340 feet in the cold colorado air it grounded me with such gentle force as to change me forever in ways i have yet to fathom.

sure, i have this visitor in my body who wants to eventually take it over. and if i let it, well that is not a good situation for either of us. but it doesn't know its own power, it is only doing what it is meant to do. doing what its purpose in this intricate stained glass reality we call now is to be. difference was, i knew things about it that it did not. i was taught well by the Talkmitts, Covingtons, and even Boardmans of this world. i was prepared in a way that not many people are lucky enough to experience after nursing james back from that sweat drenched night. believe it or not, it finally made sense to me. that fear i felt when michael and austin died was actually a gift. it drew me to learn about the monster. when james spoke my name for the first time after being intubated for months gave me the hope to learn even more about the disease. 

and now, almost ten years later i find myself on a new journey of self knowledge. it gives me the strength to tell my story to anyone who is willing to listen to it. after all i have been through, how could i ever wish my hiv away?  it has given me so much purpose in life that i would never have known without it. i am not saying that i wouldn't have had another version of this life even without hiv, but i am saying that he can stay happily living in fiction. and maybe one day, i'll visit him. but for now, i know that my immunological condition is just another fact of life like the damn hayfever currently KICKING my ass in this muggy london sprummer. there is nothing i can do about it other than respect it, live with it, and try to do some good together with it. 

it is my debt to all of the Michael and Austins of this world. every night when i take my medication i say a silent word of thanks for all of the brave men and women who went before me. i honour their sacrifice to research. i acknowledge the horrific terror they faced knowing that a gruesome and painful death awaited them. i cast hope to the moon that my children will not ever have to know this world firsthand. 

it is also what fuels this whole journey. it is what brings me such humility and gratitude when even more friends agree to take on the challenge to raise funds for the catalyst of personal discovery i am on. the Michaels and Austins of this world igniting the spark of service in hearts across the globe makes my relationship with my hiv an amazing thing and one i would never give back.

so next time someone asks you if there is anything about you would like to change, pause for thought. maybe that salt is making you look distinguished. maybe your grandkids will love your nose just like you loved your grandpa's. take pause to look around you and try to find the good in where you are, because sometimes you really have to look hard for it. but if you should fall off that ledge and find love for yourself hopefully you can then go out and try to do something to make the world more beautiful. 

seriously, all we can do is try. 

Big Weekend, Big Realisation

it was one of those london moments you sometimes are lucky enough to find yourself having on the bus last night. cllr husband and i were off to the southwark playhouse to watch yet another prequel to the story of us when that almost out of body thing happened and i looked over at my husband and teared up. we were discussing the upcoming weekend's frivolities filled with super secret guest lists and muddy boots clinging to our mud stained cuffs for at least 10 of the next 48 hours. which stage would be when with who and why. words falling out of our mouths with the ease of familiarity and fact. we were just passing the big conference centre when hackney turns to tower hamlets (at least in my mind, if not actually geographically) where the 2012 training centre has been standing for so long i've quit paying it mind when i suddenly found myself watching this comfortable exchange between two people and thought, "wow. this is weird". here i was, in the middle of one of the world's megacities, discussing things my 14 year old self never would have thought within the realm of my possibles.

and so it is starting to seem with this climb up the mountain. i am not taking it for granted, nor am i really looking forward to getting the training up and going on the serious side. but this impossible possible is now becoming a reality. more and more people are donating money. people from across the globe who i have never met before are joining in this journey by reading these words and sending such beautiful messages of support that no artist could capture their power even having an eternity to try. as more and more people join this village it takes the challenge ahead and puts it into a better perspective in so many different ways. each word instils a confidence that seems to cause this mountain to shrink in her immensity. each kind gesture will give us the strength to climb just that bit further. in fact, i spent today doing my first physical work for this journey here at home climbing and descending a single flight of boring stairs for as long as i possibly could. and when i thought it was time to stop, my phone buzzed with the first donation from a stranger. from someone who i have never met face to face. and i then climbed some more. and then more.

and i will continue to climb, not just for the wonderful group of people who are supporting us, but also for my beautiful london. this fairytale life i find myself living is the product of many different systems exerting pressures and influences on my reality. so many that i have found it wise for my own sanity to not try and quantify them all. but one of those guiding hands i take solace in knowing well is buried deep within the DNA of this city: ordered chaos. of course only a oxymoronic force filled with yin and yang would be something i find as comforting and calming as a mother's love but that is just how i roll, i guess. the impossible possible effusing itself through my life in a way that i can only just comprehend if i take time to stop and smell the roses. to remember what rarified air one breathes in this congested city polluted with the dreams and passions of tomorrow.

and for her and all she has done for me, i will climb.

Gracias, Abuela

coming from a latin family, i have always been acutely aware of the importance food has to a community of people forever bound by genetic mystery. my earliest memories are of the smells of a constantly working kitchen. from the sour smells of slowly cooking beans to explosions of cumino, paprika, onions, beer. the only other thing that was constant along with these olfactory representations of love was the soothingly cutting scent of freshly cleaned linoleum. you see, whenever WE were there, the grandkids i mean, grandma was in the kitchen. fideo, carne asada, papas upon papas upon just the right side of charred edges papas. no matter how tired she was from working a full ten at the army hospital, there was always something cooking in that kitchen. little did i know that she wasn't teaching me how to cook, she was teaching me how to love. still to this day, in her ancient age with the silver mane of wisdom all of us will someday hopefully earn, she still makes sure when you go to her house, there is something to eat.

each new guest i have ever brought to her house has always been amazed by the sheer quantity of food that is available. indeed this last time- and as much as it pains to me to know it truly was the 'last time' while conversely filling my heart with the knowledge of my life-long partnership with phil- she was up to her old tricks. when we got to her house, i was greeted by the tangy sweet smells that could only come from what she knows is my favourite dish: fideo. and even though she can't stand for long and has trouble sitting when she has she ensured that my husband, her newest grandson-in-law, would know what her fideo, our fideo, tastes like. there were the requisite beans with some carne asada on the side (some might think the asada would be the headliner of this meal, but they would be so very very wrong) and soft flour tortillas that tio mario would heat up when we reached the bottomless supply on the table. sweet ice tea, paper napkins, paper plates. just like it has always been and shall forever remain. this repeated sonnet of love, honour, and family now indelibly placed in my new husband's heart to one day be repeated in honour of her with our own grandchildren.

it is this that i was thinking about on my journey through my home across the water from where i started. one of those glorious london days where it is spring, fall, and summer all at the same time. she had put on a brilliantly blazing blue for the first #monkeylunch, but in that mischevious way we all have come to love and hate her for, had some clouds hiding in the grey periphery. it was a hot day where you can feel the space in between your clothes and your skin heating up like someone had put a hair dryer up your shirt. but in that way june can be there was a nice breath of fresh air keeping you from becoming a big sweaty mess. almost like a reward for destroying the kitchen the night before.

staying up quite late to finish the brownies, roll and decorate the carnitas, and make a guacomole i know my abuela would be proud of, the kitchen now looks like somebody murdered a mexican restaurant in it. the mole literally dripping from the ceiling and i am still not sure how that happened. but that is what happens when you cook with a purpose. with passion for the meal, with love for the recipients. grandma would kick my ass is she saw the state of my kitchen, but she would understand. i get carried away when cooking, and as phil says, i wouldn't be able to cook any other way.

but on my journey through london, walking past landmarks of mine and my cities shared histories, i realised just how lucky i am. here i was, a fully fledged member of the greatest city on earth. the man who i am so lucky to have found to complete my personal equation is someone who dedicates his life to public service to her. my nearest and dearest friends all wear the badge of progressive socialism with pride while all living to make this world a better place. and to top it off, the organisation i was doing this for is somewhere that i have found a home in to do the things i have always wanted to do. as i delivered the products of the previous nights maelstrom of flavours, love, and laughter to friends who believe in us and are supporting us through this mental and physical challenge, i pause to pay thanks to london. for giving me a world to call my own.

and then she rained on me as if to say "you're welcome, kid".

Team Us

its been a day. one of those busy busy not so busy days that start at 1130 but you feel like you accomplished the world in but a few moments of megacity time. life moves at such a face pace these days, i guess that was innevitable. we all get so caught up in what we should be doing or what we would be doing that we sometimes forget to notice what we are doing. so much of our time in a frenetic search for meaning, remuneration, recognition, self satisfaction that we take advantage of the wonderful gift of life chaos bestowed upon us when 23 met 23 all those years past and fate smiled upon our development. but today was not one of those days.

when i started this journey, i mean really really started it i was a frightened kid on his way to america with the love of his life emaciated from an unknown known virus that neither of us wanted to acknowledge. each time he couldn't walk up stairs without becoming winded, my heart hardened and childhood edged that much further away. still we laughed. we drank, we danced. we even went to mexico and saw a bar fight right out of one of those corny western movies you watched as a kid on latenight tv when you were supposed to be asleep. but we knew.

i remember holding him the night we got back to the uk. one last night before my new world was to be born marked by an eternal, sweat drenched silent embrace. i guess you could say if i had to mark a point when this journey began it would be when we both knew It was here. and with It came letters upon letters upon letters upon more frightening letters.

PCP CBC MRSA BP CMV IV HDU SP ICU

HIV

I remember falling asleep in front of those huge blue metal doors that led to medically induced comas and watching the queen mother's funeral with nothing but the reassuring whooshwooshes of the machine keeping my world alive. i think the doctor's name was ian, but i definitely remember him carrying all 15 stone of me in his arms like a newborn into the waiting room and covering me with a blue nhs blanket. and i guess that is where the exact moment can be found. this kindness of a stranger, someone who never met me nor has seen me since caring not just for my deathly ill partner but also coming and extending a human kindness to me that i could never return nor would be expected to. there, at that moment, in my 24th year of life i was imbued with an eternally holy duty to honour the human heart's ability to care unconditionally.

fast forward ten years and you find me today in my house, up in a grey damp london sky after an amazing week celebrating the marriage of two close friends and the impending nuptials of a pair life long members of our extended london family. my ex whose life was on the line all those years back and i have been exchanging emails about Slavoj Zizek which just goes to prove how AMAZING the NHS is. i am broken (thanks #steeeeeeeeeeeve & co.) and enjoying a quiet day of Dallas and getting some just us time with my cllr husband after i had been working on #mountianmonkey2013 through the morning getting some time with madame the speaker and encouraging a few local businesses to join in. tesco, cab ride, pick up a prescription, unpack, email email email email. all cluttering up the day in a nice way that i would never say no to.

and then suddenly two became three! mr the consort decided he is going to do the climb with me and madam the speaker! without missing a beat, my own consort agreed to come up the mountain and raise some funds for positive east.

wow

three people, who while close to me and are part of my london (and my husband), have still decided to take on this ridonkulous mental and physical challenge to help me help those who they have never met. those who they will never meet. those who, like i was all those years ago asleep on the cold concrete floor in front of two blue metal doors, need someone to minister to them. to give them a blanket. to give them hope.

i am moved to tears even now by the graciousness and love i am surrounded by. if you had asked me ten years ago if this is how things would have panned out, i would have laughed and called you craycray. but here we are. together. repaying my unpayable debt.

i truly have no more words.