tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-69262945392602771142024-03-13T09:34:17.089-07:00sfnowthenSome stories about what San Francisco was like then, in the mid-1970s and the 1980s and some observations about what San Francisco is like now, in the post-Y2K era.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger25125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-86661624985827203922014-06-12T19:57:00.000-07:002014-08-18T11:13:55.656-07:00always remember<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2XrjZ-qf7e0/U5j5YNsGaWI/AAAAAAAACSA/paAowQfLZjg/s1600/roger-david-87-011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2XrjZ-qf7e0/U5j5YNsGaWI/AAAAAAAACSA/paAowQfLZjg/s640/roger-david-87-011.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif;"><b>May, 1987</b><i><br /></i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>At about which point, as if someone's simple longing has made it appear, comes a single needle-stroke through the sky: the first star.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>Let me be able to warn them in time.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">—Thomas Pynchon, <i>Gravity's Rainbow</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She had the handwritten notes Roger used when he spoke before a Congressional hearing on the federal response to AIDS in August, 1983. At that time the epidemic had killed over 750 mostly young American males and Roger's group tried to emphasize that many, many more Americans would die without a centralized coordinated effort that could, like in wartime, bypass the bottleneck of government regulations. But they were speaking to bureaucrats and the warning was essentially ignored.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She painstakingly copied the cursive script of his signature on those notes beneath the summation of his testimony, ``I came here today to ask that this nation with all its resources and compassion not let my epitaph read, `He died of red tape.' ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She put the date of that speech and the date of his death fifteen months later on the panel and got it ready for the first display in Washington, D.C. in 1987. A decade after Roger wrote those words the quote was used on the invitation to a Castro Theater preview screening of an HBO movie based on Randy Shilts book ``And The Band Played On.'' Little had changed in the outlook for HIV infected humans during those ten years except that now the number of Americans who had died was nearly two hundred thousand.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The <i>Bay Area Reporter</i> was one of the free tabloid newsrags dropped off in stacks with five or six others just inside the door of coffee houses, taverns and cafes each week and it carried a small section near the middle for obituaries of people in the San Francisco gay community. Through the 1970s and into the early 1980s there might be one or two entries per weekly issue, usually depicting older men, where they were from, where they'd worked, friends left behind, but men who had lived full lives and had died at a not unexpected age. In the mid-1980s this changed utterly, photos of young men began showing on the pages, at first, when the disease was so emotionally charged, with descriptions ``died suddenly after a brief illness,'' or ''died of pneumonia'' or ``died of cancer'' as if that could be expected of a 32-year old in San Francisco. By 1986 the stigma was gone, too many were dying and people began actively sending notices, it was the last record a friend or lover or companion would have to show they'd even been on the planet. The <i>B.A.R.</i> obits became a medium of communication among a community becoming devastated by the virus.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Every week now there would be a dozen or more entries filling most of two pages, showing men who made it to age 28 or age 36 or even into their 50s, where they worked, their passions and quirks, military service, names of loved ones, family, children, caregivers left behind. So many that the paper ran a little request, ``<i>Due to an unfortunately large number of obituaries, Bay Area Reporter has been forced to change its obituary policy. We must now restrict obits to 200 words. And please, no poetry.</i>''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">You'd see a person enter a bar in the early evening, grab a copy of the latest issue from the stack by the door and carry it to the rear, flip through till he found those pages and scan the names and photos before he'd fold it and join the others on barstools. He had to do this before maybe having a little fun this one more week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Once Gert did the same, looked over those two pages and said to the friend with her, ``I don't know anyone this week.'' The friend had already seen the paper and said, ``Keep going, this week there's a third page.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1983</b></span></div>
BARNARD SCOTT, BRAITSCH FREDERICK GEORGE III, CLAY PAUL CHATTY CATHY, FELDMAN MARK, GAMBLE DICK, GRESHAM JIM, HEACOX TIMOTHY J, MCGOWAN JIM BIG MAMA, OSTLUND JIM EMPEROR VI, RUSSO JOHN, SULLIVAN JIM<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1984</b></span></div>
ACKERMAN LEE HUNTALAS, ALEXANDER MICHAEL, ANDREWS CURTIS KENT, AUSTIN WILLIAM, BACHMANN RICHARD HAYES, BAKER DONALD GRAND DUKE IV, BALSIMO JOE, BARTON ANDREW FRENCH JR, BEACH LAWERENCE LA-LA WAITE, BELL ARTHUR, BERDELL JONATHAN, BLOCK STEVEN M, CAMPBELL BOBBI, CARAVALHO DAVID, COLLINS MICHAEL L, CONROY PATRICK D, COOPER BILL, DAGUE PAUL, DAUTH DENNIS CHARLES, DELAY THEODORE STUART TEDDY, DEMING BARBARA, DILILLO JAMES ANTHONY TONY, DUTCH PETER GIBSON, ERLAM-TAYLOR DOUGLAS, ERNST KENNETH J, ESTES ALLAN, FALCON RICHARD, FAULKNER MICHAEL WARREN, FELFE FLOYD F, FILEP ROBERT BO FOX, FREEMAN BILL, GAINES LARRY, GASSAWAY WILLLIAM S BILLY, GIBSON NORMAN HOOT, GIBSON PAUL, GOAD DAVID WAYNE, GRISANTI DON ALBERT, GROFF ROBERT, HAGOPIAN ROBERT, HARPER SHERIDAN, HUGHES MARK, JACOBI RICK RICHARD STEVEN, JONES JEFFREY ROBERT, JONES ROY, KAHN DAVID F, KINGSLEY SCOTT CHAPIN, LOBRAICO FRANK, LYON ROGER, MARROCCO STEPHEN P STEVE, MARROCCO STEPHEN P, MCCLURE JAMES H JR JIM, MCCRAW ROGER, MCDONALD DOUG, MCLEAN DONALD LORI SHANNON, MONTGOMERY MICHAEL, MOORE ERIC, MURPHY JIM, MURRAY JOSEPH E JR, NORTON DAVID, NOSEWORTHY ALLAN P, OATES TOM, PEARSON GERALD, PONYMAN JOHN KUHNER, RAMOS PHILIP EMPRESS PATTY PACKARD, REARDON J MICHAEL, RICCARDI JOHN, RICE RAYMOND OLIVER, ROGERS TOM, RYAN RIC SCHNOOKS, SELL JIM, SHERRILL RONN A, SHIELL MICHAEL CLINQUE COLONEL, SIMMONS JAMES DAVID JIMMY, SIMS JON, SPOTTS THOMAS R, STANLEY JOHN C, STEPHENSON DAVID ALBERT, SULLIVAN RUSSELL, THOMAS BOB, TOLER ANDREW, TUCKER CHARLES, VELARDE-MUNOZ FELIX, WALSH GARY, WEAVER LARRY, WEIS FRANK C JR, WEST JAMES, WILKER WICKER TOM, WILLIAMS JEFFREY SCOTTY, YOUNT DENNIS, ZAUTKE DICK ZELDA, ZYGIELBAUM JOE<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1985</b></span></div>
ABRAHAMS STEVE, ALLEN DALE M, ALLEN DAN-DULANEY, ARMBRUSTER DOUGLAS, ARVILLA ALBERT, AVEDON MICHAEL, BAKER WAYNE E, BALDWIN TIMOTHY DANIEL, BATEMAN PETER J, BAUER JEFF, BAUER THOM, BAUS DANIEL J, BEALE ROBERT BOB, BEST RON, BISHOP JOHN JOSEPH, BLAKE ARTHUR, BLOMQUIST STEVEN C, BOESZ THOMAS W, BONNEY HENRY SMITH JR, BONNEY WLLIAM, BRANNON JOHN D, BRASHEAUR MARY, BROWN BOB, BROWN MICHAEL G, BURGESS NATHANIEL WAYNE, BURKHART GERALD, BUTLER ROBERT D, CACCHIOTTI LOUIS, CALDWELL KERRY SCOTT, CAMPBELL DWAYNE E, CARRADO NICHOLAS NICK, CASSIDY MICHAEL, CASTILLO RICHARD, CASTRO PAUL, CICLINI MIKE, CLERICI DAVID JOHN, COHEN DAVID GEORGE, COHEN DAVID, COLEMAN TODD, COLLINS RICHARD L RICK, CONRAD FLORENCE, CONSTANCIO CHERE, CORNEL DAVID WILLIAM, COX MARTIN JAMES MARTY II, CROTEAU DENNIS JOHN, CROTEAU DENNIS, DALGLEISH BRIAN C, DAVIS MILTON SCOTT, DAWES MICHAEL GARY, DELAGUARDIA VALENTINO, DEVIETRO GARY, DIAMOND PAUL, DIETRICH EUGENE, DOLLARHIDE GARY, DONOVAN ROBERT J, DOYLE TOM, DUMALO NELSON, DUTCHER DAVID L, EDMONDS HARRY, EDWARD DALE, EICHSTAEDT AL, EISENBERG RICHARD MICHAEL, FELDT RANDY LEE, FLETCHER ARTHUR V, FLETCHER JOHN ARTHUR, FLINT PHILIP, FLOREST RAYMOND D, FLYNN RAYMOND, FRAWLEY MICHAEL, FREEZER W JAY, GARCIA RICHARD DUTCH, GARNER RONALD L, GENGLER JEROME JERRY, GERKEN ANTHONY E, GIUSTI JOSEPH JOEY, GLEN KENNETH JAMES, GOBLE DAVID P, GOOD JOHN FLO, GOODSTEIN DAVID, GREENE RON, GUERRA CARLOS, GUREL LARRY, HANEY DON, HANSEN ANDREW SCHWEITZER ANDY, HARJO GREG SHANE, HARMAN PAUL, HASEMEIER STEVEN A, HAULK DANIEL R, HAYES GARY, HENDRICKSON KENNETH B, HENRY CHUCK, HIBBERD FRED, HOGGE PAUL M, HOLSTEIN ROLAND, HOLT RANDALL, HOWARD STEPHEN W, HOWELL BOB ROBERT D, HUDSON ROCK, HURLEY BRUCE K, JAXCK RAY ALLEN, JOHANSSON RICK, JOHNSON MICHAEL, JOHNSON PAUL P, JONES LEWIS IRV, JOSEPH BOB BJ, KAHLER BILL, KINDER VERNON L, KING PETER, KINSEY PATRYK CLINT, KLEIN ANDY, KLEINFELTER DON, KNOEPFLER ROBERT FREDERICK BOB, KRAMEDAS TONY, LAMMERS RICHARD STEPHAN, LAVIN TYRONE, LEMLIN GILBERT, LEWIS ROBERT T, LINGWOOD BRENDAN BRENT, LOMBARDI GARY J, LONG LARRY ADOLPH, LUCIANO-MORALES ORLANDO, LUDWIG LARRY, LUNA ADOLFO, LUTHER RICHARD G DICK, MAHANEY GREG, MAHONEY RONALD, MANIERRE GEORGE M, MARCUS RONALD MARC, MARTIN ROBERT J BOB, MARTINEZ THEODORE TED, MASS GEOFFRY P, MAY GARY, MEYER KEITH W, MONTGOMERY DEAN, MOORE ED, MORRISON CLYDE EUGENE, MUSSER RICHARD L, NALL ROBERT BOB, NELSON RICHARD CRISTAL EMPRESS VI, NOVAK ROGER A, ORTIZ ARMANDO R ARO, OSBURN JOHNNIE GEORGE, OWENS JOHN IVOR, PARK RICHARD E, PARKEY DONALD ALLEN, PATTEE MARC, PEDDLE RICHARD WILLIAM, PELLICCIA RENE, PERRY JAMES G JIM, PHELPS ROBERT, POULIOT RONALD S, POWELL WILLIAM T JR BILL, RANA GUY, RAUCH KEVIN SHANE, RIDDLE RAYMOND D, RIDLEY DOUGLAS, ROBERTSON JOE, ROBERTSON JON M, ROCUS PAUL RICHARD, ROESENER RICHARD, ROGERS MARK D, ROMIG OSCAR H, RUSSELL JAMES R JIM, SALLEE THOMAS A TOM, SAUP TONY, SCHMALL JOE, SCHROYER LEE A JEWELRY, SCHULTZ JOHN JIMMY, SEBREE SAM COLE JR, SESTO JOSEPH JOEY, SHERIDAN JAMES, SHERNOFF HENRY, SHINN DAVID WESLEY JR, SHUCK RICHARD ALAN, SILKWORTH GEORGE, SIMMONS RANDY, SMITH BOB, SPROUL MICHAEL SEBASTIAN, STOWE JUSTIN ADA, SWARTZ JOSEPH, TANNER CHARLES LEE CHUCK, TAYLOR DANIEL S, TAYLOR RON, TEMPLETON DICK, TERRITO SAL, THIMMES MICHAEL, THOMAS GARSON, THOMASON-BERGNER JAMES, TIBBITS DAVID, TOUPINE MICHELE, TRUE MARK, TRUSSELL JOHN EDWARD, VALENTINO RICHARD A VAL, VENDRONE TROY THOMAS, VENN DAVID L, VERNER ROGER MEDA, VIDALI RAMON, VIEIRA RUSSELL G, WARREN H LYNN, WEINBERGER MICHAEL, WEISSBERG ARTHUR ARTE LEWIS, WHITE DAN, WHITE GARY, WHITE MELVIN, WHITE MILTON LANGLOIS, WIDMARK DALE, WILLS WILLIAM SCOTT, WOMBACHER PAUL ANDREW, WOOD MARK, WOODBURN RICK, WYCOFF DAVID R H, YIM MARC, ZALEWSKI THOMAS TOMMY, ZOOK MICHAEL SCOTT<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1986</b></span></div>
ABBOTT ROBERT H, ACKER DAVID, ADAM BERNARD PAUL, ALIZIO FRED, ALLEN BILLY, AMATO TOMMY, ANDERSON ALVIN, ANDERSON ERIC J, ANDERSON JOSEPH L, ANDREWS RICHARD ANDY, APPLEBAUM WALTER MARK, ARMENTROUT NORMAN LOUIS, ARMITAGE BRUCE, ARNETT D GUS, ARVIN VERN, ATKINS STEVE, AULIN JOSHWA E, AVELLA JOE, BABCOCK MICHAEL, BADURSKI JEROME C, BAGNALL ALBERT PETER, BANDY WAY, BANNISTER JOHN, BARRA ART, BARTLEY JON W, BARTON MARK ANDREW PETER, BATORI JOHN MICHAEL, BAUGHMAN JAY, BEAN EDWIN, BEARRENTINE MARK MURPHY, BECKER KENNETH ROGER, BECKHAM JOHN LEWIS, BEEBE GEORGE CLARK, BELK EARL, BENCK DAVID, BENNETT CHARLES CHUCK, BEREZIUK HOWARD WALLY, BERNARD GUY, BIERCHEN ELLIS, BIVENS W CARL JR, BLACKWOOD MICHAEL ALLEN, BOATE TOMMY THOMAS NEVIN III, BORDI RICHARD CHARLES, BOSTWICK JUSTIN PATRICK, BOURGEOIS TED, BRADY THOMAS H, BRANCO JOHN KI JR, BRIDGFORD JOHN F, BRINK WILLIAM, BRINSON JOHN, BROWN DOUGLAS C, BUBB BARRY A, BUCHANAN PATRICK JAMES, BUCK CHARLES H, BURCH HARLAN ROSS, BURNS JOHN F, BUSALACCHI SEBASTIAN C, CABRAL PAUL, CAIMI RICKY, CAIN STEVEN L, CAMERON KEN, CARTWRIGHT ROCCO V, CASTILLO JOHN PAUL, CAVARILLO GLENN, CHARLES RONN, CHARPENTIER BOB, CHASTAIN MARY MARGARET, CHLANDA CHRISTOPHER, CHOINIERE WILFRED SWEENEY, CLAFLIN RICK, CLARK JEFF, CLARK ROBERT W, CLEM RICKEY, COASH GERALD DUANE JERRY, COATES BILL, COLE JEFFREY LEE, COLE RICHARD, COLEMAN JOSEPH JOEY, CONNOLLY MARK, CORAL MAX, CRANDEL GEMINI-JIM, CROSSFIELD JOSEPH, CUDA GREG B, CURLEY JOE, CURRY JOEL, D'ANTUONO EMILIO, DADA PONI MON, DAEREC JOSEPH DENNIS, DALTERIO ROBERT M BOB, DAVENPORT LONNIE RAY, DAVIS DONN C, DAVIS GENE RAYMOND, DAVIS JAMES MICHAEL, DAVIS MIKE, DEBOIS JOHN, DEIK NELSON, DEJOSUE GABRIELLE GARY BENT JOSHUA, DELAURA ALPHONSE, DELRE STEVEN, DENNEY DONALD R, DEYOUNG DOUGLAS, DICKINSON DOUGLAS E, DIEKEMA MICHAEL ALLEN, DILLARD DAVID, DILLON ROBERT F, DILLS MARGARET BURKE, DOLAN JOHN SONNY, DOMEN MARK RICHARD, DOUGHTERTY BOB, DOUGLAS FRANK, DREW CHARLES FRANK, DRUMMOND NEIL, DUNAR JON M, DUQUETTE ROBERT JR, DURHAM CHARLES M, DURKIN ROBERT W, DUTRA GEORGE WILLIAM, DUTY JAYMES F JAY, ELIASSEN JOHN TURNER JR, ELLIOT SCOTT, EMERY HAROLD HAL, EPSTEIN ROBERT, ERICKSON RICK L, ERWIN GARY, FAIRBAIRN BRUCE ALLAN, FAULKNER LEE CLETE, FAULSTICH TODD BURTON, FELDMAN MARVIN, FELSON ARTHUR SCOTT MITCHELL, FERNALD STEVEN ROBERT, FLETCHER KEN, FLETCHER RONALD LEE, FLOWEERS MICHAEL G, FOLEY CHARLES P, FOLEY RONALD FRANCIS, FONTES WILIAM, FORREST EUGENE, FOUGHT VICTOR, FOURNIER JEAN A, FOWLER DONALD A, FOWLER PERRY LEE, FRANCHI FRANCESCO, FREDRICKS RICKIE LEE, FRIGO MICHAEL, FRITCH BOB KILOWAT, FROST RAY M JACK, FRY STEPHEN R, FUCHS MICHAEL, FULLER PHYLLIS, GALAS PHILIP-DIMITRI, GALBRAITH GERALD JAMES, GALICIA LOUIS M, GALLEGOS RONALD D RONNIE, GARD THOMAS L TOM, GARNETT GREG, GARZA XAVIER, GAYLORD BILLY, GENET JEAN, GEORGE HERMAN, GEORGE ROGER D, GETTMAN RICHARD H RICK, GIDLOW ELSA, GLENN RUSS, GLUSGAL ILJA, GOEKE WILLIAM JOHN, GOIN N CRITTENDEN, GOLDSTEIN MORTON ELLIS, GOMES STEVE, GOMEZ MICHAEL DAVID, GONZALES ANTHONY G, GRAHAM JAMIE, GRAJEDA JESS, GREEN DAVID DALE, GREENWOOD RAYMOND, GREGORY STEPHEN L STEVEN, GRENNAN JOHN L, GRIFFIN JAMES JOSEPH JOE, GUINS PHILLIP G, GUTHRIE BILL, GUTIERREZ JOSE RAUL, HALE ROBERT ALAN, HALSEY DEAN, HAMILTON-JOHNSON JAMES B JIM, HANEY ROLAND F BOB PUFF PUFF, HARRIS BRUCE CAMPBELL, HARRIS THOMAS C TOM, HART JAMES STUART, HASKELL ROBERT W, HAYGOOD JACK, HEDRICK EVERETT, HEDU JON JR, HEINEMANN LAWRENCE W LARRY, HENDERSON JAMES A JIMMY, HENDRICKS CHARLES MICHAEL CHUCKIE, HENKE JAMES PHILIP CARMEN MELVIN NATHAN LITTLE OWL, HERNANDEZ ANTONIO TONY, HERZOG WILLIAM WALTER BILL, HERZSTAM JON, HETER KENNY, HIGHSMITH JAMES JIM, HODDE DENNIS WAYNE DW, HOLLORAN JAMES F JR JIM, HOLST RAY, HORNCLIFF A JOHN, HORNER WILLIAM, HORNING DONN, HOSTETLER ROGER OLIVER, HOUSENENGA HARLAN JOE, HOWSE EDWIN LENNY, HOYT LARRY T, HULSOPPLE BENJAMIN JR, HUPE ROBERT A BOB, IMMEL ROBERT, INGRAM MARK ERIC, IRVINE JASON T, ISHERWOOD CHRISTOPHER, JACKS JERRY IRA, JACOBSEN ROBERT D BOB, JAMISON ARTHUR TIMOTHY, JASMINE PATSIE D, JENSEN ROBERT L, JETT LARRY G, JIMENEZ FORTINO JR, JOHNSON CORNELIUS NEIL, JOHNSON KEVIN, JOHNSON LARRY WALKER LAWRENCE, JOHNSON SCOTT, JOHNSON STEPHEN P STEVE, JONES DICK, JONES RICK, JORDAN DANIEL JOSEPH, JORDAN M D JR, JOSEPH TONY, JOY RALPH, JUNG DON, JUSTICE RICHARD S, KANE TIMOTHY EDWARD, KASNER FRED B, KELLEY JOHNATHAN, KELLY SEAN THOMAS, KENNEDY JACK, KEY GARY A, KIMES GARY D, KISSEL ROBERT BOBBIE, KOHLFELDT KENN, KOKOTT MARK ALYNN, KOZUB JOHN, KRATZ COLLIN B, KREAMER DAVID, KRUPP LEONARD STEVEN, KURTZ BERT, LAMARCA PAUL V, LAMBERT JAY, LANDSBERGER MARK, LANZARATTA PHILIP, LAPP RICHARD M, LAZZERI JASON JAMES JOSEPH, LEE TIMOTHY, LETAVEC STEPHEN DENNIS, LINDSEY PAUL, LINSKY GARY R, LITTLE ROBERT, LITZENBERGER JAMES ALBERT JIM, LOIGNON STEVEN, LONIEN GARY, LOPEZ ROBERT A, LOPRESTI GERALD GERRY ANTHONY, LOVELL RALPH, LOVORN CRAIG JOEL CURRY, LUIS DAVID, LUNA GUSTAVO, LUNDBERG CRIS MARTIN, LYNCH DAVID R, MACINTYRE NEIL, MADARIAGA JOE, MADREA FELIPE, MAGAN ROBERT K BOBBY, MAGDALENO LITTLE HANK, MAHLE BART E, MAJEWSKY BIG AL, MALONE MICHAEL, MANZI THOMAS-MARK TOM, MARKHAM LEE, MARKUNAS JAMES WALTER, MARTIN CLAYTON L, MARTIN DENNIS ROSS, MARTIN MICKEY T MICHAEL, MARTINEZ RENE, MASK ANTHONY DUANE TONY, MATTHEWS LEWAYNE, MATTIS BILL, MAULSBY DAVID LEE, MAUSER CRAIG, MAXFIELD STEVEN A, MAXWELL DARYL, MCCAFFREY JACK DUSTY, MCDONALD GARY MAC, MCGEARY RICHARD JAMES, METCALF MARK, MEYER ALLEN, MICHEL JUAN DIEGO, MICKLER JOHN JUSTINE, MILLER DALE R, MILLER MERLE, MILLS DON, MOLDOVAN DAVID, MOONERT GARY LYNN, MOORE ROBERT BOBBY FRANCIS, MORENO ARTHUR, MORGADO MIGUEL S, MORGAN LYNN LYLE, MORRIS CHARLES LEE CHUCK, MORRISON THOMAS M, MORT JACK, MOTT DAVID EDWARD, MUELLER JOHANNES GOTTFRIED, MUNOZ CIPRIANO CIPI, MURPHY JOHN, MURPHY ROBERT C BOB, NARLAND STEVEN C, NELSON BOB, NIEHAUS ALLEN HUGO, NOSS GARY, NOYA RAY, O'BRIEN MARK, O'CONNOR EDWARD J, O'CONNOR GORDON KEITH, OBERHOFER RICHARD, OBRIEN MARK, OCHTERBECK WILLIAM CLAYTON E, OLIVER PATRICK, OLSON JACK AUNT BLUE BELL, OMER TERRENCE, OURSO ROY JR, OWER RONALD, PAGE L CHRISTOPHER, PAINE ALAN F, PALLADINO MICHAEL PAUL, PASEK BILL, PATTERSON GRACE, PAYNE BOB, PAYNE WILLIAM LEE BILL, PEDERSON MICHAEL, PERRY STEVEN J, PETERMAN JOHN DAVID, PFAFFLIN R SCOTT TONY, PHILLIPS GARY, PIERCE MICHAEL C, PISHEL KAP, POOLE DAVID, POPE BILL, PORTER GLENN, POWERS JIMMY, POWERS MARK WILLIAM, PRAIN DAVID TEDDYBEAR, PRATT STEVEN W, PRICE BILLY, PUHR RICHARD J, RANDLES WILLIAM S BILL, RAPPAPORT DONALD SHERWOOD BUTCH, REED CECIL, REED KENNETH, RENOUD ALAN, RHONE GARY, ROBERTS CRAIG ALAN, ROBINSON JONATHAN F, ROCKWELL MATTHEW, ROLL KENT, ROSSMAN JOSEPH FRANCIS JOE, ROYBAL TONY, RUSSELL BRUCE, RYAN HUGH J, RYAN JOHN ROBERT, RYAN MARK MARQUITA, SALTMAN MARION, SANTILLI MICHAEL J, SARTORI PETER A, SARVER CLAYTON RANDALL RANDY, SAUNDERS GRAY, SAVERINO VINCENT P, SAWTELLE ALAN JOHN, SCHEARER MARK ROYDEN, SCHUETTE BRUD, SCHULTZ ROBERT C BOB, SCOTT VIRGIL F, SHARP DAN, SHEA JOHN JACK KARENANN L, SHELIEKES LAWRENCE J, SHORTELL THOMAS E TOM, SIGERS MARK, SILVA JAMES ALFRED JIM, SILVA SAM, SIMBULAN ANTHONY C TONY, SIMMERER PATRICK J, SIMON RUSSELL GENE CAJUN, SJOBERG JOHN, SKRIVANEK DAVID ERRON, SLICK JAMES E JIM, SLOGAN RANDOLPH ARTHUR, SMITH JACK V, SMITH JAMES C JIM, SMITH WARE R, SNETZINGER DON, SODERLING KURT PAUL, SOLOMON CHUCK, SOUCY MAURICE, SPAETH STAN, SPALDING WILLIAM ALBERT BILL, SPIGELMIRE DENNIS, SPURLOCK LESLIE, SPURLOCK MICHAEL W, STEINRUCK TOM, STEWART CHARLES A SANDY, STJOHN DONALD, STRATTMAN MARK, STRAUSS STANLEY C, SULLIVAN PETER F III, SUMMERS DAVID, SWARTZ LARRY WAYNE, SWINFORD BRUCE, SWINGER ROUGLAS CASSIDY R, TALBOT DAVID PHILIP, TARQUINIO FRANK S, THERRIEN ROLAND RON, THOMAS JAMES CLINTON, THOMPSON BOBBY, THOMPSON DAVID R, THOMPSON HARVEY ENGELBERT, TIMMONS TOM TT, TINNERMAN GREG, TONGE BRENT A, TORRE ARTURO, TORRES HENRY HANK K, TRAFTON CARROLL CAL, TRANTIFIL TONY ROSE, TUTTLE DOUG, TUTTLE JAMES JIM H, TUYNMAN BILL, UHLIR JOHN A, UNDERHILL JAMES BAIRD, UNDERWOOD LONNY, URQUIAGA STEVEN MARTIN, UYVARI ROBERT, VALENCIA ROBERT JR, VALENTINE TONY, VANCE UNCLE EARL, WADE ROBERT OLIVER, WADE ROGER, WAGENER GERD, WALLACE CORMAN, WALLEY CHESTER LEON, WALTERS JOHN, WEBB ARCHIE LOREN, WEBER STEPHEN, WEBER THOMAS E TOM, WELLING JOHN SNYDER, WHITE J SCOTT, WHITE ROBERT BOB, WHITMAN MARIAN DUNLAP JAMES ALBERT, WHITMER DENNIS LUKE, WILHELM ELMER, WILKES KEN, WILLENBACHER THOM, WILLIAMS GEORGE, WILSON GARY DEAN, WILSON KEITH B, WILSON KEITH H, WINCEY LAWRENCE T LARRY, WOOD JAMES GREGORY, WOODS RICHARD D, WRIGHT DOUGLAS, YOUNG JAY, YSEBAERT MICHAEL, ZARZECKI JOSEPH, ZIEGLER THOMAS ARNOLD TOM, ZOLL GEORGE KIT, ZYCH DAN<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1987</b></span></div>
ABLING MICHAEL, ADAMI AL, AGUILERA ALFREDO, ALBERTSON KENNETH W, ALCORN DANIEL DWIGHT, ALEX-5, ALEY ROCKY KENT, ALFORD TOM, AMES RUSSELL J, ANDERSON HUBERT, ANDREATTA LEON SHORTY, ANDREN JOEL S, ANDREOZZI JOHN ROCCO, ANDREWS JOHN LAIL, ANSTADT RONALD L, ARCHIBALD CLARENCE LEON, ARNOLD WILBUR GENE, ARTMAN ZOHN, ASCHINGER SANFORD, ASHFORD GEOFFREY, BABIN WAYNE LOUIS, BADY ABRAHAM T TY, BAKER DONALD, BALLARD CAL, BALLINGER DAVID L, BARBAY THOMAS G, BAXTER DANNY DANIEL, BECNEL JAMES M, BENEDETTI CLIFFORD LEE, BENEFIELD PHILLIP ROGER, BERRY H LOUIS, BIEBER FRIEDHELM, BIRCH TOBY, BIZZO ROBERT, BOONE LEE ROY, BOOZER MEL, BOWMAN CHARLES R, BOWMAN PAUL M, BRADSHAW RAY, BREMMER RALPH, BRESSAN ARTHUR J JR ARTIE, BREWER ART, BREWSTER JAY, BRIGGS EDWARD, BRODINE KAREN, BROOKS RICHARD, BROWER RICHARD ALLEN, BROWN BEN, BROWN TIMOTHY C, BUCHMANN STEPAN F, BUCKLEY ED, BUMGARNER JERRY, BUNTAIN GARY, BUTTERS TIMO, BUTTS KEITH W, CABELKA RONNIE R, CALDERA ROBERT, CALLAHAN JOHN, CALVIRD KIM, CAMPBELL JOHNNY, CANO GEORGE DANIEL, CAREW IOLO KYRE, CAREY RON, CARLSON CARL H, CARLSON RONALD T, CARNEY WILLIAM, CARTER JULIAN JAY, CARTER WILLIAM LARY, CASCONE DAVID, CASE RICHARD CASE, CASTILLO FRANK, CASTRO THOMAS C, CAVANAGH JAMES RICHARD, CERRETA JEFFREY M, CHINEN ROBERT A, CLARK STEPHEN MICHAEL, CLARKE RANDALL, CLOUSE WILLIAM C III, COCHRAN RICHARD S, COHEN FRED, COHEN RONALD LEE, COLLINS JOHN P, CONEY JAMES F JIMMY, CONNERS WILLIAM JOHN BILL, COWDRY ROBERT, COX JC JAMES, COX JOHN FREDERICK, CRIGER MILTON L, CULVER JOHN CALVIN, DAVIES TIMOTHY, DAVINI JAMES MICHAEL JIM, DAVISON EDWARD L EDDIE DUGAN, DEAL DENNIS WILLIAM, DEARING COLIN III, DEBOER RICHARD F, DEGRACIA JERRY, DELANEY L SCOTT, DELGADO FERNANDO, DELVENTHAL KENT M, DEROSIER ROBERT E BOBBY, DERWOYED JOSEPH JOE, DIEHL JAMES JIMMY JOE, DILLEHUNT HAROLD Q, DIVA BOB, DOERR THOMAS, DOLAN TERRY, DONOVAN CASEY, DOOLITTLE-SANDMIRE DEAN A, DOUGLAS DAVID ELLSWORTH SCOTTY, DUFF GERALD D, DUFFY PAUL L BUD, DUNBAR DENNIS J, DUNN LARRY, DUPONT RALPH, EASTMAN RICHARD N, EISENBEISER JOSEPH A, ELLIS ALAN DEAN, ESHNER D BRUCE, ESQUIBEO ROY, EVERDS JOE, EWINS EUGENE EARLE, FALCONER ALAN, FARRAR CARY DANE, FARREY ROBERT, FAULL TIM, FERNANDEZ JIM, FERRARA RONALD J, FIGLEY DOUGLAS, FIGUEROA JOHN D, FILOMENO ROBERT LAWRENCE BOBBY, FINCH MARKUS E, FINDEN MICHAEL C, FINGER HERB, FINOCHIO ANDREW DREW, FISH GEORGE, FITZGERALD EDWARD M, FLAHERTY ROBERT MICHAEL, FLEMMING BILL, FLONORY WYRANT, FLOYD DENNIS, FOOS LAIN M, FORD HENRY C, FORESTALL RANDALL A RANDY, FOX WOOD ROBERT PITCHER, FRANCO SALVADOR, FREYTAG PAUL, FROOKS JAMES F JIM, FULLER DAVID J, GADBOIS CLAUDE DAVID, GARBARINO STEPHANE JAMES, GARCIA RICHARD MICHAEL, GERDING MICHAEL A, GIDOS STEPHEN R, GIFFORD KENDRICK SHEPHERD, GILLIS DONALD C, GILMAN CHARLES, GINSBERG FRED J, GLAS DENIS, GLIED DARYL, GOWER MICHAEL, GRANT ALAN G, GRANT PAUL FRANCIS, GRAVES JAMES W JIM, GRAY STEPHEN BERNARD, GREEN TIMOTHY C LITTLE JIMMY, GREENBERG BRUCE H, GREENE WILLIAM LEYDEN, GREENIER A KENNETH, GREER DAVID JR, GROOM COLIN DAVID, GROOM COLIN D, GROSBERG DAVID, GUBSER PAUL RAYMOND, GUEL FELIX JOHNNY, GUENTHER BERNARD, GUERIN GREGORY J CHI CHI, GUTIERREZ JOE MIKE, HALE MICHAEL, HALL TOMMY, HAMPTON LEON ROSE EMPRESS OF PORTLAND, HANSEN DALE ALAN, HANSON JOHN D, HANSON MARK W, HANSON WALTER C, HARLEY CHARLES ESDORN CHARLEY, HARMON MATT, HARRIS EDDIE R, HARRISON LARRY D, HART TOM, HATHAWAY TEDD J, HAWKINS PETER, HEAD STEPHEN, HEARD GARY, HEATH THOMAS, HEIDLER GEORGE, HENNIG GARTH, HENNIGH RICHARD, HERMES MARK, HERNANDEZ FRANCISCO, HETRICK EMERY S, HIATT ANDREW, HILL ROBERT J BOB, HILTON ROBERT BOBBY, HINKLE CHARLIE, HOFFMAN FREDRIC LEE, HOGG PETER DEAN, HOHL TED, HOLCOMB JERRY, HOOGS THOMAS, HOOPER DAVID, HOPKINS ARTHUR, HORAN EDDY E, HOWARD DONALD, HOWELL PAUL KENNETH MONTANA, HOWKE DAN, HUDSON GALE A, HUGILL STANLEY C, HUMMEL DAVID, HUNT TOM, HUNTER ROBERT C BOB, HUNTSMAN RICHARD A, ICKES DENNIS K, ISHAM DALE BUZZ, JACKLIN PETER, JACKSON DAVID PAUL, JACOBS ELLIS B EBJ, JALBERT GEORGE CHENILLE CROW, JOHNSON GARY STEVEN, JOHNSON GERALD R JERRY, JOHNSON GUY E, JOLLY EDDIE EJ, JONES ALBERT E, JOSEPH LEE, KASEMAKER RUEBEN ROY, KAUFMAN PERRY, KAVULISH JACK, KAYNER DANIEL LAVERN DANNY, KEITH BRIAN, KIMBEL ROBIN J ROB, KINEE JAMES PATRICK, KOENIG ROBERT BOB, KOHN BARRY STANTON, KOLLENBORN GREG, KOLOSKI MARTIN G MARTY, KOMASA WILLIAM BILLY, KOPEK EUGENE JOHN, KOPP EDWARD BRAD, KRICKER JOHN JEFF, KRYSTAL JUDY GUCINSKI, KURTZ MIKE, LADISER SCOTT, LAFOLLETTE WARREN JR CONNIE CADAVER, LAGASSE LARRY LAWRENCE L PIERRE, LAMBERTA MICHAEL J, LAMOUREUX GARY, LAMPYS RICHARD C, LANDRY NORMAN J, LANE WILLIAM R, LANGSNER MARK, LARSHEID ROBERT BOBBY, LARSON BRUCE F, LATHAM JACK PURDOM NICK, LAURIANO DENNIS MICHAEL, LAWSON TODD S J, LEE JERROL DON, LEITHEAD REX REXANN, LEMEK TED M, LEMIN TOM, LEMKE DONALD EARL, LESTER CALU, LIBERACE LEE, LINKER JAY, LOMONICO NEAL, LONG JONATHAN C, LOUGHRAN RICHARD JOHN JR, LOVEDAY MARTYN WILLIAM, LOWENTHAL BILLY, LOWSON JOHN MITCHELL MIKE, LUJAN DAVID TIMOTHY, LUSTIG GLEN, LYNCH DAVID MARTIN, MACKEY ROBERT N, MAGINNIS MICHAEL RENE, MAGUIGAN THOMAS ANTHONY TOM JOHN, MALDONADO JESSE ANTHONY, MALONEY VERNON S, MANN ROBERT E, MARIOTTI ROBERT A, MARRS MARLIN D, MARTIN ADALBERTO G, MARTIN GERALD S, MARTIN MICHAEL, MARTIN RICHARD C, MARTINEZ GILBERT GILFRIEND, MARTINEZ STEVE, MASON JOSHUA, MATHIESON DAVID G, MAYBERRY EDWARD, MAYFIELD MARK ALLEN, MCBRIDE JERRY, MCDOWELL BILL NINA, MCDOWELL MICHAEL, MCGHAN DAVID, MCKINNON MICHAEL E MIKE SUNFLOWER MIKEYBEAR, MCLAUGHLIN JOHN MAC JAMES, MCLEOD WILLIAM M BILLY, MCMANIS DAVID, MCMARDLE THOMAS KHAMBA TOM, MERCIER GLEN, MERLE GARY WILLIAM, MERYHEW RON, METH ROD, METTLER ROBERT BOB, MEYER DON SHIRLEE, MIDDLEBROOK JOHN S, MIELKE WAYNE, MIKELSON TIMOTHY R, MILLER GLENN LEE, MINCEY JAMES F JR JIM, MITCHELL DENNIS M, MITCHELL GREGORY A, MITCHELL KENT T, MOGNIS ROBERT M BOB, MONTELEONE NICHOLAS A, MOORE KENNY, MOORE LEE, MORTON GUY MAX DREW RYERSON, MOUNT DAVID LUKE, MUNSON PAUL, MURDOCK KEITH, MURPHY MICHAEL, MURRAY JOHN, MURRAY MARVIN C, MUSGRAVE CHARLES R BOB, MYERS DIRK SANFORD, NAHOUM NICHOLAS ANTOINE NICK, NELSON DOUGLAS, NELSON GARY M, NELSON PETER CHARLES, NEWMAN MATTHEW E, NOVA JAY, O'BRIEN VINCENT, O'CONNOR MICHAEL R, O'CONNOR MICHAEL, O'LEARY JIMMY, O'NEIL SEAN, O'NEILL TOBY R, OCHAMPAUGH CLIFFORD, OLANO MAURO A MARIO CHEMIST, OSTERDOCK KENNETH STEPHAN, OSTRICK ROBERT BOB DIVA, OUELLETTE MAURICE, PALMER MICHAEL R MIKEY, PAMBID RODOLFO BOB, PARKER GERRY, PARSONS ROBERT A, PASKO DAVID, PASQUALE JOHN J, PATTERSON ROBERT D BOB, PAUL NOLAN C, PAYNE JOHN WESLEY, PECK CHARLES A CHARLIE, PEREZ ENRIQUE, PETERS CHARLES J III CHUCK, PETERS JAMES D JIM, PETERSON GENE HAMPTON, PETUYA JOHN D, PHELAN PATRICK J, POLITZER STEPHEN B, POLKA THOMAS FREDERICK, POLLARD DEMETRIUS, POTENZA PATRICK THOMAS, PRICE JOHN, PROCTOR KENNETH BRUCE, PURNELL KENN, QUINN JOHN PATRICK JACK PATRICE, QUINN WAYNE DOUGLAS, RADABAUGH DENNIS, RAPSTAD ALLAN FRANCIS, REED KEVIN DOUGLAS, REED PATRICK J, REEVES O ERIK, REIFF PHILLIP R, REILE HAROLD R, REYES EDWARD JOHN JAMAL, REYNOLDS BOBBY, REYNOLDS THOMAS ARTHUR TOMMY, ROBERTS MICHAEL, ROBERTS STANLEY L, ROCKWAY ALAN, RODRIGUEZ MIGUEL, ROSE ETHLYN L LYNN, ROSENDO RON, ROSS TERRANCE A TERRY, ROSSER JOHN STEVENS, ROTH GILBERT F, ROTHMAN JERROLD W, RUSSELL LARRY, SANCHEZ ASEL J, SCAGGS JERALD WENDY, SCHLENKER VERNON A JR, SCHLIE RICHARD G RICK, SCHNEIDER EUNICE B, SCHOONMAKER FREDRICK, SCHROEDER JAMES O JIMMY, SCOGGINS DAVID L, SCOTT ROBERT L SCOTTY, SEEGER GARY L, SELFRIDGE MARK S, SELSBY FRANK R, SERRELS RYAN D, SHAFFER LAWRENCE C LARRY, SHAPIRO ALLEN J AJAY, SHAW HAROLD R, SHEPARDSON WILLIAM H BILL, SHEPPARD REX, SHUTWELL KEN, SICKLER DENNIS, SINCLAIR CHARLES ROSE FOXY, SITLINGTON MARK L, SMITH EUGENE R, SMITH PHILIP J, SMITH RICHARD ALAN, SMITH TOM M, SMITH TOM THOMAS MICHAEL, SMITH WAYNE F, SNYDER BILL, SOKOLOWSKY DAVID GLEN, SOLLEY WILLIAM BILLY, SORENSEN CHRISTOPHER NORMAN, SOUZA RICARDO ANTHONY, SPOONER JERRY LEE, STAKE RONALD K RONNIE, STAUFFER THOMAS B TOM, STDENIS JOHN, STEPHENS DAVID E, STERLING MARC MARVIN MAVIS, STEWART KARL, STOCKS RICHARD L DICK, STUTZMAN KURT RICHARD, SULLIVAN ALLEN CLARK, SULLIVAN HOWARD P, SUTTON DAVID DIANE, TATRO CLYDE JOANIE, TATUM ROBERT L, THAYER CHARLES A CHUCK, THIEL DONALD R, THOMAS JAMES S JIMMY, THUESEN CONSUELO CONNIE, TORREZ CIPRIANO E, TORRISE ANTHONY JR TONY, TOWNSEND JACK, TREWEEK BOB ROBERT, TROESTER KURT, TROWBRIDGE JOHN, TRUELOVE RICHARD, TRUJILLO ALFREDO S COWBOY, TURNER PHILIP ALAN, TWIGG JOHN M, TYLER DENNIS TOBY, UNDERWOOD STEPHEN, UTTER GORDON JAMES JIM, VESELY JOSEPH VINCENT JOE, VIGIL JOSEPH JOE DADDY, VINEYARD JAMES D JIM, WADDELL TOM, WAKEFIELD SHAWN, WALL JAC, WALLACE ROBERT BOB, WARD ROBERT BOB, WARMACK KENNETH D, WATERS REESE RIRI, WATKINS EUGENE V JR DEB, WATSON DAVID L, WATSON MICHAEL DEAN, WATSON WILLIAM PERRY, WEBER MARTIN, WEDDELL STEPHAN, WHITCOMB WAYNE W, WHITE GARY LEE, WHITESIDE WILLIAM HOLT, WILL HANK, WILLIAMS DARRELL, WILLIAMS DAVID LEE, WILLIAMS GLENN, WILLIAMS JOE, WINTERHALTER DAVID DAVE, WIRTALA JOHN MATTHEW, WOOD JAY C WOODY, WOODRUFF NORMAN E, WOOLDRIDGE MICHAEL R MIKE, WORLEY DARRELL C, WRIGHT JON JOHNATHAN, XERO MARTIN KENNETH E ALLISON, YARGER NEAL A, ZEILINGER ROBERT, ZIMMERMAN PETER A, ZINZER ANTHONY TONY, ZOUTTE EDWARD BUSTER<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><b>1988</b></span></div>
ACOSTA MANUEL, ADAMS CHARLES FRANCIS, AHCIN ALAN JOHN, ALDRICH TED, ALESSIO CARMEN P, ALMAZAN CLARENCE RICHARD DICK, ALTIERI THOMAS J, AMITUANAI LEO, ANDELSON SHELDON W, ANDERSON CRAIG K, ANDERSON JON, ANDERSON ROBBIE MARIE, ANDREETTA DICK, ANTONINO MICHAEL, ARCELONA ROBERTO, ARCHAMBAULT GUY GABY, ARMSTRONG DUKE, ARNETT CHUCK, ATKINS JOSEPH, AUERBACH STEPHEN M, AYLING TOMMY, AZOON VICTOR C, BACHUS DARRELL, BACKSTROM DAVID, BAKER KENNETH RAY, BALDERSON TODD, BALDWIN DONALD ALLEN, BALDWIN JAMES MAXWELL, BALZOUMAN RENE JAN, BANDY JOHN HERSCHEL, BARANYI ROBERT STEPHEN, BARBER BRUCE ALAN, BARLEY JIM, BARNHOUSE GARY L, BARRETT WALTER LEWIS, BASSETT PAUL ROGER, BAXTER LEWIS LEW R, BECKMANN FRED, BEENKEN DENNIS E, BELL GARY, BENSE CHRIS, BERLIN MORT, BERZOK RICHARD S, BINDER DONALD FRANCIS, BIRDSLEY MICHAEL S, BISHOP KEITH, BODINE GARY B, BOEHNKE RICHARD A, BORGEN DONALD, BOSCH NIKOLAS A, BOUTIN JONAHAN POWERS, BOWER MICHAEL, BOYLE EDWARD J, BOYLE RANDY, BRADFORD JAMES HOWE, BRADLEY DANIEL BRUCE, BRADLEY DAN, BRECHT BRIAN LEE, BRONKHURST JOSEF, BROWN GARTH A JR, BROWN JEFFREY THOMAS, BROWN JOHN K, BROWN KENT B, BROWN TOMMY GENE SHIRLEY, BROWN WILLIAM BILL, BROWN WILLIAM F BOB, BULLARD BENJAMIN GAINES, BUONACORE JOHN, BURDICK KEITH JAMES, BURKE TIMOTHY RYAN BUNNY, BURKS DONALD ANTHONY THOMPSON, BURNHAM ROBERT S, CABRAL JOSEPH M, CARPENTER KEN, CARTER DOUGLAS L, CASS LYNN B, CATES SANFORD EUGENE, CAVAZOS RICHARD W, CHAPMAN MCKINLEY MAC, CHAPOT STEPHEN MICHAEL, CHOW DAVID, CHRISTOPHER, CLARK JIM LLOYD, CLICK MICHAEL WILLIAM, CLIFTON PATRICK T, COCHRAN SCOTT, COCKERLINE JONATHAN EVERETT, COGLIANESE ROBERT L BOB, COHEN KENNETH I, COLANDREA CARL, COLLY PETER, COREY JOHN G, CORRALES JOSE EARNESTINE, CORREA JOSEPH, COSTANZA VINCENT F, COUNTS CLIFFORD WAYNE, COUNTS THOMAS JEROME, COX ARTHUR LEE, COX DAVID, CRACIOLA JOHN ANTHONY, CRAIN DON, CREELMAN MICHAEL, CRIOLLOS STAN, CURRY JOE ROGER, CUTLER A RICHARD, D'ALLESANDRO SAM, DAHL MICHAEL, DARBY STANLEY, DAVENPORT ROBERT E, DAVIS CARROLL, DAVIS DEAN, DAYTON JEFFRY, DELANEY C MARK, DELEON RENATO AQUINO, DELIO RON, DELPOZZO EDWARD N, DEMARCO FELIX JR, DENNETT DARYL C, DENUCCE PAUL ANTHONY, DEUTSCH STARR, DEVER DENNIS BRENDON, DEVERY WILLIAM H BILL, DEVINE DENNIS ELLIOTT, DEWOLFE MARK, DINGO DONALD ROBERT, DOMBROWSKI TOM, DONELLA LARRY, DONOGHUE MICHAEL EDWARD, DOUGAL BETTY JEAN, DRU JASON, DRURY THOMAS M, DUBOIS RICK, DUGGAN STEPHEN MICHAEL, DUNN TRACEE, DURAN PAUL JR, DUVAL VAL, DVORSKY DAVID, DYKSTRA RONALD C, EATON JOSEPH, EDWARDS RICHARD N, EIDE RONALD J, EISBERG MEREDITH, ESPOSITO PETER PAUL, ESSEX JACK, FABRO KENNETH, FARRIS MARK A, FASANO MICHAEL, FASULO CHARLES E TONY, FAULKNER CHRISTOPHER, FERGUSON WILLIAM J, FERNANDEZ JOSE LUIS, FERRO ROBERT, FIANTAGO GLEN PETER, FIGGINS DANIEL, FLOWERS WAYLAND, FORD SCOTT A, FRAZIER ANTHONY TONY, FREEMAN HAL M, FRENCH DAVID, FREY DOUGLASS SCOTT, FRIBERG JOHN W, FRIEDLIN WILLIAM ROBERT BILL, FRITZ WALTER R BABA WAWA, GALE DENNIS C, GARCIA MARC ANTHONY, GARNER CHARLES W, GARRETT DAVID JACKSON, GARVIN PATRICK J, GELL NICK, GEORGE JEREMY ALAN, GEORGE PERRY ANTHONY, GERHARD STEVEN L, GIBSON RICHARD RICK, GILLESPIE PAUL, GIZA GARY JOSEPH MARK, GLYNN TOM, GOILLOT JEAN-CLAUDE SEBASTIAN, GOLDEN DOUGLAS BRYAN, GOMEZ GEORGE ANDREW, GONZALES JOHN EDWARD, GOODWIN JOHN M, GORMAN WILLIAM THOMAS, GRAVES RODNEY, GROTE PETER, GUIDO PAOLO, GUNN WILLIAM BILL, GUSSETT JAMES R JIM, GUTHRIE ERIC ALLEN GUITAR, GWINN DUNCAN, HAAS RICHARD JR, HAINE JAY JAMES M, HALL DAVID R, HAMMOND CARL L, HAND HARVEY DOUGLASS, HANEY DENNIS LOREN, HANSEN HENNING, HARNOIS BOB, HARRIS STEVE, HART MALCOM SEAN, HATCH ANTHONY S, HAYNES JOHN WILLIAM JR, HAYS STEVEN G, HEATH DONALD, HEBRON HERBERT, HEEFNER JEFFREY K, HEINZ MARTIN, HEISCH EDWARD C, HENDERSON DON DONNA MAE, HENRY BRENT, HERLIN JOHN K, HERNANSEZ ANGEL, HERRALA DAVID MICHAEL, HILL MARTIN EDWARD MARTY, HIRANO MARK DOUGLAS, HIRSCH PETER LEANDER, HO JERRY, HOELSCHER WILLIAM L BILL, HOEY JEFF, HORNEMANN DAVE DAVID, HORNSBY JAMES BYRON JIM, HOROWITZ LEW, HORSTING PETER J, HORTON WILLIAM K BILLY, HOUGH LARRY DEIDRE, HOWARD DUMONT, HOWELL SCOTT ERNEST, HRLIC DENNIS LEON, HUMPHREYS LAUD, HUNT LARRY DEAN, HUNTER ROBERT N, HURD WALTER B, HYER JOHN, IVEY EDWARD LEON EDDIE, JACKSON DANIEL NICHOLAS MOMO, JAMES JONATHAN, JARAMILLO JOHN PAUL, JEANSONNE DANIEL A, JETTER RICHARD, JOHNSON DOUGLAS MARTIN, JOHNSON FRED, JOHNSON JERRY BOUVIER CANAAN, JONES TIMOTHY JAMES, JOPLIN MARKALAN, JORDAN CHARLES R CHARLIE, JORDAN DALE KNIGHT, JORDAN GLENN S, JORGENSON ROBERT, JOYCE PHILIP STEPHEN, JURISTO KATHY, KAFKALIS NIKOS, KAHN CLIVE, KAMINSKY BERENS KIMBERLEY REID, KEENER DARRELL GLENN JASON, KIMBALL KIRK, KING CHARLES E, KING JAY A, KISSINGER JOHN, KLASSEN DENNIS JAMES II, KLEINOW JOSEPH H JOE, KOSLOW RONALD LEE, KRUPP EDWARD J, KUKIELKA JOHN, LAKOSE PHILLIP R, LAMB RONALD DALE, LANDOLFI JOSEPH F, LANGFORD STEVEN ROBERT, LARSEN SCOTT W, LAZIER JERRY ALLEN, LAZIER JERRY, LEE TIMOTHY G, LEETZOW KEN R, LEVENS TIMOTHY, LEWALLEN ANDREW, LEWIS MICHAEL J, LEWIS STEPHEN W STEVE, LIEBERMAN RICHARD ALAN RICK, LIND CARL, LINDGREN JOHN, LINOTTI EDWARD L, LOMAS RANDY, LONG THOMAS ROBERT, LOUIS CRAIG STEPHEN, LOZA JOEY A, LUM ARTHUR KAMEKONA, LUNSFORD JOHN DANIEL, MACKENTHUN RONALD L, MAHLER THOMAS G TOM, MANANARES HENRY, MANCE JACK E, MANLEY JOHN DANIEL, MARAIS RAYMOND E, MARCO STEVEN F, MARCUM DAVID, MARRERO LARRY A TITO, MARSHALL KURT RIDEOUT JAMES ALLEN JR, MARTIN RICHARD ZIM, MASSON GUY M, MATLOVICH LEONARD, MAY DENNIS R, MCCARTHY ROBERT BOBBY, MCCLENAHAN TERRENCE CHARLES TERRY, MCDONALD ROBERT EUGENE, MCKENNEY KENNETH S, MCMAHON GEORGE P, MCMULLAN JOHN LESLIE, MCPHAIL ROBERT GERALD BOB, MEIKLEJOHN ROGER W, MELTZER ANDREW ANDY, MENAGLIA JOHN, MENJIVAR CARLOS MAURICIO, MERRICK GORDON, MERRIMAN JOHN JAY, MEYER WILLIAM BADEN BILL, MEYERS DAVID, MICHAEL BERNARD, MICKLER ERNEST MATTHEW ERNIE, MILLER DUANE R, MILLER MARTIN JOSEPH, MILLER SCOTT JAY, MILLETTE CHRISTOPHER I, MILTON STEVEN DEE, MINIX MARK JAMES, MISSO KENNY, MITCHELL ROY, MOCK JAMES E JIM, MOLINA MARC, MOLINAR DAMAS TOM JR, MONAGHAN GREG, MONAGO MICHAEL JOSEPH, MONK RONALD RICHARD, MONTORO DANNY, MOODY ROBERT W JR BOB, MOON DENNIS EDWARD, MOORE DARYL S, MOORE RICHARD VERLON, MORDINE MERV MERWIN, MORRIS GLENN H, MORRISON STEVEN, MOTTERSHAW WILLIAM CURTIS BILLY, MOWER MAX, MUCCIO JOHN ALFRED, MUNKERS CHRIS, MUNN JOHN STEWART, MUNOZ OSCAR R, MURRAY PAUL JAMES, NADEL WILLIAM, NAMETH MICHAEL EMPRESS JANE DOE XII, NEADER TIM, NEAIL SCOTTY E, NEAL CHRIS, NEE GERALD B LA JERRY, NELSON CAREY ROBERT, NELSON RICHARD LEE, NESZERY DAVID EARL BEAR, NIEDERMEIER ANDREAS ANDY, NIKSICH GARY STEVEN MR GARI, NIXON TOBY RAY JOHNNY, NOELL HUGH RICHARD, NOLAN MARVIN MR DOLLY, NOONAN MOM, NORRIS STEPHEN WADE, O'DELL RICHARD GILBERT, O'NEAL JOHN MICHAEL MICKEY, OLDHAM HAROLD RICHARD, ORDONEZ RICHARD DAVID RICK, ORESIK LARRY WAYNE, ORTIZ LESLIE PAUL, OSBORNE ROBERT DEAN, OYER STEVEN L, PACE TOMMY, PALMER GLEN ROY, PARHAM MICHAEL ANTHONY, PARIS JOHN, PARNANEN DAVID A, PASSADORE TIMOTHY J, PAULSEN BOB PUSSY, PAXTON GEORGE RAYMOND, PAYNE KENNETH W, PAYTON RONALD OTTO, PELLIGRINI GENE, PENTICO JAMES TOMMY, PEREZ DANNY, PERGER STEPHEN GREGORY STEVE, PERRY CHRISTIAN JAMES, PETER, PETRONE KEITH FRANCIS, PHELPS LARRY BABY NORA, PIKE JAMES JIM, PLACENCIO DONALD, PLATT JAY, PLEICKHARDT KENNETH G, PLOTZ DAVID F, POLLOCK KEN, PORTER GIG, PORTER OWEN, PROCESS DENNIS LEE, PUCKETT SAM B, PUDDU JOE, PULIAFITO FRED, PURSELL DAVID FRANK, QUINONEZ THOMAS, RAMER GRANT A, RAY CLIFFORD JEROME LARK JANAY STONE, REA MICHAEL, REISER RANDAL K, REISWIG JEFFREY J SADIE, REYES-SMITH JOHN LB, REYNOLDS BRUCE L, RICHARDSON REYNOLD H, RICHMOND ANTHONY C TONY, RIDGEWAY GRANT E, RINEER RONALD L, ROBERTS DAMIAN JEFFREY, ROBERTS DICK, ROBISON DANIEL L, RODRIGUEZ A J SKIP, ROMERO RICHARD LEE, ROSCHER MARTIN, ROSENBAUM CHARLIE, ROY PHILIPPE, RUBENHALL JEFFREY, RUGGEVIK JENS MATEAS, RUGGIERO RICHARD, RUHLMAN DAVID PAUL, RUIZ DAVID ALLEN, RUSSELL BOB BOBBY, RUSSELL GENE, SABATELLI C DAVID, SADOWINSKI JOSEPH MICHAEL, SANCHEZ JOHN J, SANTIAGO LEONARD SKIPPY, SANTOYO RICHARD, SAVOIE KEN J JIM MOORE, SCAVARDA LOUIS, SCHARDING STEPHEN, SCHEINGARTEN STEVEN B, SCHMIDT JERRY, SCHNEIDER ROBERT E ROBBIE, SCHOTT JOHN ALBERT J JR, SCHWARZ MARTY PLANET, SCHWARZE WILLIAM KARL BILL, SCIERA JEFF, SELCOW BURTON M SCOTT, SHANNON JEFFREY RICHARD, SHAPIRO ROY, SHARPLESS JACK, SHEEHEY TIMOTHY JAMES, SHERMAN ORI, SIEGLAR PETER, SILCOCK DARWIN, SIMMS JACK, SINGER CHARLES TAD, SMITH DAVID E, SMITH DAVID GRANT, SMITH DONALD ALAN, SMITH GREG LEE, SMITH LEONARD MARVIN, SMITH LYNN M, SON WILLIAM BILL, SORRELL PAUL JOSEPH SPEITH, SOUZA PATRICK JAMES JIM POOKIE, SPANGLER WAYNE CLOWN SABLE EMPRESS XXI, SPECHT JOHN THOMAS TOM, SPITLER WILLIAM HEENEY BILL, STANZIONE MICHAEL JR MIKE, STARK EDWIN L, STARK ED, STARLIPER GARY, STARR MARK E, STENSON DOUG GUGGIE, STEVENS NICHOLAS NICK, STEWART BARRY, STOCKMAN G ROBERT BOB, STOKER JIMMY G, STONE DALLAS LYNN, STONE GREGORY, STONE JOHN H, STONER JEFFREY SCOT, STORCAMP MYLES BRUCE, STOW MARTIN FORREST, STRATTON RUSSELL W, STURDEVANT PHILIP EUGENE JR, SULLIVAN LEN, SWANSON JEFF, SWENSON RONALD ALLEN, SYLVESTER, SZWED WAYNE STANLEY, TAYLOR LANCE, TERRY RICKIE DALE, TEXTOR LARRY G, THEODORAKIS C DEAN, THOMPSON KIRBY LAVOY, THRASHER BILL WILLIAM CHASE, TODD BRYON R, TOTH ARTHUR, TOZZEO LAURENCE LARRY, TRANTHAM DOUGLAS H, TRINCHERO ROBERT ANDREA, TROJANSKI JOHN, TRUAX A BRAD, TRUJILLO ROBERT H BOBBY, TUBBS JAMES JIMMY, TUCCIARELLI BIAGGIO A, TURNER ROBERT BOB, UNDERWOOD ARLOFF V WOODY, URIARTE ROBERTO, URIBE JAN ELDSON, VANARSDALEN WILLIAM BILL, VERKADE RICHARD DICK, VERWHOLT WILLIAM R BUZ, VITALE ROBERT BOBBY, VOLENTIR STEPHEN PAUL, VOLLAN RICHARD E RICK, VONDEPPEN WALT ARLINGTON, VONDIECKOFF HENRY BARONESS EUGENIA, VOWELS CHARLES RICHARD RICKY, WACHSNICHT DAVID WAYNE D W, WALKUP RENARD, WALL STEPHEN A, WALTZ CHUCK, WARD MARK, WARF ANTHONY TONY LEONARDO, WASSON ROBERT L FAT FAIRY, WATSON ANDRE A, WELCH FREDERICK EUGENE, WELDON JESSE THOMAS, WHITE DAN, WHITE O GAVIN, WHITE RUSSELL MADISON JR, WILLIAMS CLIFFORD, WILLIAMSON EARL CHARLES, WILSON BARRY R DAVID, WILSON FREDERICK A FREDRICK, WILSON ROBERT N BOBBY, WINSATT E MICHAEL, WINTERNITZ JOHN DAVID, WOLF MICHAEL FRED, WOLFE MICHAEL EDWARD, WOOD BILL THE KLUTZ, WOOD JOHN GILBERT, WORTHINGTON JOHN V, WRIGHT GLENN ALLEN ERIC, YOUNG DENNIS, YOUNG HOWARD, ZEFF ELLIOTT DANIEL DANNY, ZELMO-HERMAN KIT, ZEMKE WILLIAM WILLI, ZIMMERMANN PAUL C, ZORBAS JOHN, ZUBEE JOHN SKIP<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A new kind of shop window display began showing up in the Castro, the first held photos of KS lesions that Star Pharmacy put up so people could identify the so-called 'gay cancer' as they examined themselves, then Cliff's Variety had a window completely empty except for a single framed photo of an employee everyone in the community had known. You'd see people stopped outside clothing stores and card shops and antique stores in the neighborhood staring at the photos. The clone gays had expended so much time and energy developing the svelte smooth muscled look that T-shirts with tight jeans were a daytime clothing staple, sayings like ``I Can't Even <i>Think</i> Straight'' or ``Nobody Knows I'm Gay'' or the ever popular ``So Many Gerbils So Little Time.'' Soon this insouciance had all but disappeared as the reality of the epidemic's full measure set in and you'd see another T-shirt, the forlorn hope, ``I Only Want Two Things: A Cure and All My Friends Back.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Pynchon again:</span></div>
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<i>. . . last word from Blicero: ``The edge of evening . . . the long curve of people all wishing on the first star . . . . Always remember those men and women along the thousands of miles of land and sea. The true moment of shadow is the moment in which you see the point of light in the sky. The single point, and the Shadow that has just gathered you in its sweep . . . ''</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>Always remember.</i></span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ld5ZRWZLr2M/U5j8O4zAu-I/AAAAAAAACSI/kmMJKAQYj4M/s1600/DC88-071b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ld5ZRWZLr2M/U5j8O4zAu-I/AAAAAAAACSI/kmMJKAQYj4M/s640/DC88-071b.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>October, 1988</b></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-10031308686904024922014-06-05T17:03:00.000-07:002014-07-05T19:44:08.756-07:00gert<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mWD7j9_8BCo/UtMfnTjCdOI/AAAAAAAACFU/htJerEhw6BE/s1600/macys-cop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mWD7j9_8BCo/UtMfnTjCdOI/AAAAAAAACFU/htJerEhw6BE/s640/macys-cop.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n April, 1988 the night before she was to leave on the four month tour Dan phoned to verify that she would be home, he had a going away gift. She told him sure, she'd be packing all evening so come over any time. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan arrived holding a gift-wrapped package a bit larger than a phone book. It was very heavy and inside was a single volume from 1930s encyclopedia, almost four inches thick, bound in maroon leather. Embossed gilt type showed it covered subjects beginning with the letter M, everything from <i>Maasin to Mzabites</i>. On the cover page he had enscribed a message, ``Dear Cindy, there's nothing better than a good book to relax you after a long day on the road,'' and beneath that wrote, ``You might look especially under the section 'Measures and Weights.'  ''
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan had always known her as Cindy unaware that during the past months in the workshop she had taken on a new name and that by the time she returned from tour would barely respond to Cindy. He sat in the living room, a mischievous grin like a little kid who's hidden a Whoopee cushion as he watched her open the book.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> year before she had worked at a Macy's fragrance counter on the first floor near the escalators. It wasn't the type of job she'd ever planned on doing but in 1980 there was a lull in the small theater shows she had worked with and an old coworker told her of an opening in the ticket office of the Union Square store. Macy's rented out space to private services, an optometrist, cookie bakery, and in this case a ticket vendor. Customers could use their Macy's card for sports events, music concerts and of course theater shows. At that time she just assumed this job would be temporary, that new shows at the Alcazar and Little Fox and Hippodrome would open soon, little knowing that local theater would be one more casualty of the still unseen epidemic. After a few weeks she brought in one of the forms used at her theaters and showed it to the boss when he made his daily breeze through, crowding the space already cramped with two employees. She demonstrated how it gave a better accounting of the various discounts and promos that made keeping track of multiple simultaneous events a nightmare.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He watched over her shoulder listening until she finished, then thanked her for showing initiative and said that might've worked for those small houses but this wasn't amateur hour here, ``I deal with major promoters at stadium size venues all over the Bay Area and we'll just keep doing it my way.'' Thanks but no thanks.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After he left she muttered, ``This is why I worked in those little amateur theaters, no fucking bureaucracy.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A few days later she was called down to a Personnel office, a union rep and a store manager and her boss were there, the boss saying he wanted her fired and he didn't want anyone else with previous experience to be hired. The meeting was mostly legal formality, she told her story and it was noted. To work in the store you had to be union so she couldn't be fired and instead was transferred to a cosmetics and fragrance counter on the main floor near the elevators, a job where few lasted very long. But she found two gay coworkers, Edward and Gerard, who shared an enthusiasm for casual insubordination and soon they had rearranged things so that they all were working together in the same area.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Shift schedules and break schedules got organized to give the trio maximum overlap, thus they could run up the street to Bardelli's on mid-afternoon break when the restaurant was quiet and the sun lit the gorgeous stained-glass peacock over the little entrance-way. The owner's son worked the bar and she finally had to tell him not to put so much vodka in her drink, words she never thought she'd hear from her mouth. They'd come back into Macy's through the employee entrance, squeezing by security seated at the large bank of black-and-white monitors that covered the store, silent customers seen at odd angles from above, moving out of the bottom of the picture and entering on an adjacent screen from the right. The guys would glance over and shake their heads.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A month or so after she was moved downstairs, when the ticket service operator disappeared with hundreds of thousands of dollars he hadn't paid those major promoters of stadium size venues, the store manager who'd sat in when she was transferred came down and said, ``I guess we should have listened to you.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">dward and Gerard would have so much fun putting makeup on her, mascara around the eyes, cheekbone highlights and multicolored lips, redoing her after a few hours. A new look deserved a new name and she'd noticed in the employee rule book that you had to wear a nametag while on the floor but it didn't say the tag had to be in your name. Lorelei and Mitzi and Gert all got nametags and though she'd just grab one from the drawer Edward and Gerard became convinced that her personality for that day was reflected by the name.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KLUGSny3LVo/U5n-5qGth3I/AAAAAAAACSY/IxKVXATwfl4/s1600/cindy-macys2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KLUGSny3LVo/U5n-5qGth3I/AAAAAAAACSY/IxKVXATwfl4/s320/cindy-macys2.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Lorelei was aloof and cool, would answer a customer's question with, ``Edward knows more about that than I do, he'll be glad to assist you,'' turning away and moving to the far end of the counter. Mitzi was scatterbrained, ditzy, the little finger held to the front teeth and a ``Tee-hee,'' as excuse for any silly act.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Gert was the one they feared, Gerard watching as she pins on her tag then running to Edward, ``It's Gert!'' And they would step lightly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">But mostly it was just playful fun to get through a day, none of them planned to make a career of this, it paid the rent so they could live in San Francisco. They'd stand around and mutter catty remarks about the customers that streamed past, gossip about people they knew, and brag about their carousing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I was a docent on Angel Island last summer,'' Gerard is telling them, ``we get to see so many places where the public isn't allowed.'' Edward, ``How would you know? You probably spent the whole time in the men's room.''</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-IKYWG7D3Y50/U5n_g6uOCvI/AAAAAAAACSg/zNSn5xSzOGQ/s1600/jun-6-2014-029.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-IKYWG7D3Y50/U5n_g6uOCvI/AAAAAAAACSg/zNSn5xSzOGQ/s320/jun-6-2014-029.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``We've made Thursdays `Gay Night' at the ice rink in San Mateo, a bunch of us get in cars and drive down and take over the place. At some point in the evening they do these theme skates, Just the Boys, Just the Girls and when he gets to Couples Only the announcer adds, `That's Couples, Boy-Girl, Girl-Boy.' Like that stopped us.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She opens her drawer behind the counter one morning to see a female doll bound and gagged with a ransom note.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Edward explains it to them, ``Macy's likes to hire gays because we're such fashion trend-setters, you go out on the street and look at all those well-dressed shoppers and most of the guys are imitation our styles.'' Gerard, ``The only people I see out there mimicking your style are pushing shopping carts.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">And of course, and not the least, their sexual exploits, ``I was about fifteen and already fully aware of where my yearnings lay. There weren't a lot of outlets there in the middle of Indiana but I found some advertisements in a paper and answered one. I got home from school first so could get the mail and sent a reply to this man. We were going to meet up but the way he worded the second letter put me off, I got scared, he wrote, `I cannot emphasize this too greatly, you must have absolutely no body hair.' ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Edward paused to let this sink in then said, ``But I did go meet the second guy.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Sunday nights at the discos became locals night, what with so many antique shops, hair salons, restaurants closed on Monday the Castro boys didn't have to mingle with the bridge and tunnels types. Gerard is telling how they left the Troc a little before the 6 a.m. closing to get a cab ahead of the crowd and be at the Balconey when it began serving alcohol. ``We have to wait a bit outside and get in the cab just as everyone else starts streaming out the door. The driver sits there a minute and watches, then picks up the mike, 'Better send the rest,' he says. We pull away and I ask what that was all about. 'The doorman wanted forty cabs so the dispatcher sent fifteen. After I saw all you people I knew we needed the other twenty-five.' ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Edward is recapping, ``I was up at the River and this one bartender was so hot that when he asks what I want I toss my room key on the bar and say, `I want you to come up to my room so I can give you a blowjob.' He says, `Can't, gotta work.' So I say, 'In that case I want a scotch and soda.' ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He looks around to make sure there are no customers, then continues, ``After I get back I'm down in the men's room at the Castro theater and this guy's giving a blowjob by the urinals and he looks at me and says, ``Don't leave, you're next.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Edward smiles at Cindy, ``I'll bet you wish you had a penis.'' She doesn't even pause, ``Oh I think I've had a few.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">For almost a decade Gerard had been the featured cartoonist in the national gay magazine <i>The Advocate</i>, he was given a full page each month for his cartoons that depicted svelte young men with beefy shoulders, tight butts and impossibly thin waistlines. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Over time Gerard begin bringing in cartoons he'd done of a Cindy character, lanky and blond standing at the cosmetics counter eyes rolled as she says to a customer, ``Lady, I'm way too cool to even talk to you.'' or the ice princess approached at a club, ``Don't ask, I won't dance.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As the 1980s ended Gerard's cartoon page had to be cancelled, the world he depicted had all but disappeared, the happy-go-lucky gays with their campy problems had given way to one where all humor was bitter, the rainbow flag at permanent half-mast. As a gift he did a multipanel story for her, ``Bleachy Locks and the Three Dicks,'' with Cindy playing the roll he would have normally drawn for a gay man.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The employees went on strike and initially most everyone came out and picketed but after a while most drifted away. But not their little group and being out on the street every day gave them an authority; prior to this they could've cared less about being in a union. They sang rally songs in Union Square, calling themselves ``Wilson and the Pickets.'' By the time the strike ended everyone working the floor knew them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he took Dan's book with her on that first tour and later, when they did small displays and could fly with quilt in large duffels (once a skycap grabbed at the straps and groaned, saying``What'd you got in here, dead bodies?'') she'd carry it on the plane. At security the book would glide into the x-ray tunnel and she would watch the woman at the monitor stop the conveyer, back it, glance up to see who was standing there and then shake her head, smiling.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She left it under her seat in DFW and realized it as soon as she got in the terminal so ran back down the tube into the now empty cabin. Three stewardesses prim in navy uniforms were huddled down the aisle with the opened book and as she approached one looked up and said, having read the inscription, ``Why you must be Cindy.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They returned the book and thanked her for the best laugh they'd had in years.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">hen the workshop got underway she'd stop in to sew for a while after work, there was no organization, just people showing up. Many wanted help sewing a single panel and over time those who were there most often took the time to assist them, usually doing the more difficult parts themselves. She'd forget to remove her Macy's name tag and people began calling her Gert. Soon, if someone needed thread or fabric or instruction, it was ``Ask Gert.'' Jack was always there, after Joe had died and then Wade had died and Jack had taken the HIV Early Retirement Plan he had nowhere else to go. You could hear him across the room, his voice rising over the drum of the machines, an imploring ``Gerr-eert.'' Because no one else bothered she learned to fix the constantly snagging and breaking machines so that ``Can you wait until Gert gets here?'' was the usual recommendation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It had been over a year since Roger had died, her other life still overlapped, the life where she was Cindy, a girlfriend wanting her to get out more, you need to meet some new people, drove a group down to a sports bar in San Mateo. They pass the brightly lit entrance and Mollie begins to circle for a place to park. Cindy goes, ``Stop, let me out!'' Mollie says, ``Wait so we can all go in together.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She's already got the car door open, ``If I walk in that place with three other women I'll never meet anyone.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They're at a table now chatting across the aisle with a group of guys. The room is jumping, multiple TV screens flicker as waitresses hefting drink trays drift past walls of framed photos of leaping catches, corkscrew swings, newspaper headlines in Second Coming type, a noisy sports bar in the early evening, surrounded by memories. Mollie is at the cigarette machine when one of the guys asks Cindy where she lives. ``San Francisco?'' he says, ``Aren't you worried, things are kind of scary up there?'' She thinks, take it easy Cindy, give this guy a chance, she scans the place, all the activity, ``Things look pretty wild right here if you ask me.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">But the guy persists, ``No, I mean aren't you scared with all those fags dying of AI . . .'' which was all he got out of his mouth before she is up out of her chair, ``Why don't you just go Fuck Yourself Asshole!''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She pulls Mollie away, ``Come on, we're going.'' and Mollie says, ``Cindy, I left you alone for <i>ten seconds! </i>—what did you do?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">itting in the living room the night Dan brought the book she did as he asked, pulled it open to find Dan had labouriously hollowed out the interior and in the open space lay an enormous anatomically correct battery operated dildo, the infamous three D-cell Folsom Street Special, the ones kept up on the wall display behind the counter, Are You Man Enough?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She sits there just staring at it, Dan says, ``You need to name it, why don't you call it Steely.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I'm not going to call it Steely, Dan.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Then what? It should have a name.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She looks up at him and says, ``Pee Wee.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The next morning during the final loading of Stella as everyone hugged and well-wished she showed the book around. They were going out into America, across the whole continent and had no idea what to expect. Their joke was that they had raised enough money to get to Boston and after that it was just a big uncertainty.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Except it wasn't really a joke.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A week later, when they would've reached Phoenix, Marcel had a little anxiety attack as he opened the office that morning and saw the Western Union Overnight Special Delivery envelope that had been slid under the door. He knew what these cost, Gert wouldn't have wasted the money unless it was important, unless something had gone very wrong.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He ignored the blinking phone lines to open the telegram and then relaxed as he read the blocked words, <i>``SEND BATTERIES!''</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-38447769679945566502014-03-08T17:43:00.001-08:002014-08-11T20:39:09.703-07:00naked brunch<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_p8diEgQovU/UpF51zd9GHI/AAAAAAAABbU/T1upg-GmwJE/s1600/kids-on-dock1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="379" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_p8diEgQovU/UpF51zd9GHI/AAAAAAAABbU/T1upg-GmwJE/s640/kids-on-dock1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>In the Introduction to his best known work William Burroughs explained that the title meant ``exactly what the words say . . . a frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork.''</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ou have received an invitation to one of the weekly lunches that the wealthy matrons Mimsy and Delia preside over at the Poodle Dog, old world wood-panel elegance, rich leather banquettes, sparkling crystal. Soft music. Catty gossip and gentle quips volley around the table amid giggles and Oh My's while waiters in formal attire hover discreetly, serving carts glide past and the maître d'  keeps a close watch. At these lunches sit the crème de la crème of San Francisco, opening night at the opera and symphony, private boxes, parties in ballrooms of estates that have ballrooms, without these women there would be no society page, no society. You have arrived.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As you lift Chef François'  famous <i>Bœuf Bourguignon</i>  to your mouth the room light suddenly intensifies, colors bleach in the dazzling glare, all movement and sound halts. Even squinting it is difficult to look around the table. The moment is frozen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At the end of your fork, instead of the famous <i>Bœuf</i> , no longer couched in the trappings of society, you see a chunk of raw meat, dead flesh from the dumb beast that screamed in primal agony when slaughtered, it drips blood that spots the starched and immaculate white cloth. Across the table Mimsy and Delia sit naked, their veins a sickly blue against pale wrinkled skin. They glare at you as lips curl over teeth into a snarl.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">runch on the cafe patio, settled into canvas director's chairs at a round table shaded by a red and navy Cinzano umbrella, protected from the wind by a weathered wood fence, bright magenta bougainvillea cascades over one side and gnarled branches and beards of purple wisteria form a trellis that frames the entrance. After a night closing bars on Folsom Street Joe, Wade and Jack have returned, the wide empty boulevard outside looks completely different in the daylight. The waiter comes over, ``What can I get you guys to drink?'' It's eleven a.m.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack starts, ``I'll have a screwdriver,'' and before the waiter can say, ``No,'' and before Jack can ask why not Wade has grasped his forearm and speaks, ``He'll have an Anita.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The waiter walks away and Wade says, ``We're boycotting orange juice, you must have heard the crap that bitch is spewing about us in Florida. It's scary enough our new President is a born-again, soon we may be boycotting peanuts too.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Three leather men at next table are passing a hand-rolled cigarette, Jack raises his nose into the air, sniffs, smiles, ``Mmmm, something smells good. Is that on your menu, I didn't see it on mine.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Want some?'' Joint is coming across as a waiter passes, three plates fanned out in his left hand, one plate held in his right. He stops, sets the one plate down, intercepts the joint, takes a quick puff then retrieves the plate and continues on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-V7cnoBfUuN8/UsjXmBe6afI/AAAAAAAACDg/pXTkXkObEyk/s1600/ffa-24_-60_-10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-V7cnoBfUuN8/UsjXmBe6afI/AAAAAAAACDg/pXTkXkObEyk/s200/ffa-24_-60_-10.jpg" width="175" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As Jack hands the roach back the swarthy guy in black jacket leans towards him, preceded by his body odor, stubble surrounding his smile, ``You into FFA?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack, just off that boat from Kokomo, Indiana takes a sip of his vodka and apple juice and shakes his head, he doesn't understand the question.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Grimacing the guy repeats himself, enunciating each word slowly like explaining to a child, "I said, Are-You-Into-F-F-A?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack ponders a second, then answers, he has to say something, ``Well I think they had it at my high school.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After the meal and after them buying the leather guys a round of drinks and after the leather guys buying them a round of drinks, as they cross Folsom Street in the early afternoon sunlight to the car, Joe clues him in, ``That guy wasn't talking about Future Farmers, Jack, the places he goes to they give you a cup of Crisco when you come through the door.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Further up the block Jack sees the three leather guys walk to a car where one opens the trunk lid and helps another into the dark and cramped space. Then he shuts the lid.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Wade is unlocking the door to the car, squinting from the sun, ``Where to now—the night is young!''</span></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-enAMUyrhXOU/UuR-dk1H2II/AAAAAAAACGk/pOmlib2dBqQ/s1600/castro-or-folsom-fair_88-01a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-enAMUyrhXOU/UuR-dk1H2II/AAAAAAAACGk/pOmlib2dBqQ/s640/castro-or-folsom-fair_88-01a.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ay and Eddie are getting the store ready for Sunday brunch, arranging the salt and pepper, napkins, thin glass vases with daisies and baby bottles of half-and-half on the tables. And recounting their respective Saturday nights, why they're so hungover. Ray is saying, ``We started at the Eagle and then went Stud, FeBe's, Powerhouse, Ambush and after that I'm not sure. Actually after the Stud I'm not too sure. But I know I was there!''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``You must've been at the Stud before I got there, I didn't see you.'' Eddie is over at the bar marrying the ketchup and the mustard in their respective red and yellow squirt bottles, his face has a smooth sheen and his eyes are dark from the makeup and mascara not quite removed. ``You wouldn't have recognized me anyway. I was Glenda the Gorgeous, you know, that leather miniskirt and dark wig with the bangs. And I was gorgeous, this guy danced with me half the night and kept buying drinks and I don't think about it until we get back to his place and I realize he's clueless.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``So what happens—he want the money back for the drinks?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``We're in his kitchen under this horrid flourescent light and he's casually leaning against the wall holding his white wine, Mr. Cool, and I don't know what else to say so I just go, `So do you like to suck dick?' His eyes get real big and he sort of melts, slides down the wall holding his wine till he's sitting on the floor staring up with his mouth open.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Eddie turns, head up, left arm akimbo and right tossed in the air to wave an imaginary cigarette holder, ``I mean I was hot, girl!''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n a human sense the epidemic was ending about 1992 and was all but over by 1996, that is, so many had died among various groups of friends and with each death fewer were left in each group that there was no one to write an obituary. Even with a miracle cure too many people had died, their world would never return, they lived in a community of ghosts. The protease inhibitors became available in 1996 and the death rate slowed but for the community that had arrived to march and dance in the late 1970s who was around to celebrate? The T-shirt read, ``I only want two things: a cure and all my friends back.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In 1996 a final full display of the quilt was done in DC, after that it would be too large to ever be shown in its entirety again. And around 1996 the first of a new type of gay began showing up in San Francisco.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Those who'd come in the 70s had just arrived, no job, no place to live, they just wanted to be part of the storied mix, to see what was happening, to join in the fun. And what they created merely by being a part of that mix, was unique in all the world. The new y2k-era gays came for job interviews first and moved only when certain that a safe, secure world awaited them. Then, a few thousand miles from home, they would come out of the closet screaming about discrimination and marginalization, and about how brave they are now, living as an openly gay man right here in San Francisco. These gays brought a new kind of virus with them, it was called gentrification but that term, implying something well-bred and genteel, was mere social trapping for what it was doing to San Francisco.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">By 1996 most of the Folsom Street places were gone and an earlier attempt by the city planners to rebrand the area as SOMA now succeeded. The city planners caught the first wave of a dot-com economy and proclaimed ``Multimedia Gulch'' as a great live/ work place for young computer graphics artists and software engineers in an industry about to explode in this new Internet thing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Fifteen years later Multimedia Gulch was the Edsel of the San Francisco Planning Department and they quietly changed tactics, pushing the area as a glamorous Transbay District. Same people, same ideas but couched now in the New Urbanist clichés and catch phrases used by city planners everywhere. Maybe it was just San Francisco but it seemed like gays lacking the creativity and aesthetic sensibility necessary for the traditional theater and music and arts careers found City Planning as a college major amenable to their true talent: moving into an entrenched beauracracy, identifying those in power and kissing up to them. Rarely did their plans produce any of the wonderful outcomes promised in their fancy reports and presentations but they always moved on before the failure was obvious.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">efore he got in the car Jack scanned Folsom Street once more in the daylight, trying to see where they'd been the night before. Long brick warehouses, faded signs, unmarked doorways, dark casement windows and cracked chicken wire glass, could have been any of these. He remembers guys sitting naked on stools along one bar as if it was the most natural thing in the world. A barber chair was racked flat at the far end where a naked customer was spread out and being coated with lather. The barber wore a leather face mask and skull cap while giving a complete body shave, the straight razor gliding over the skin, then raised and the gobs of lather slopped into a bucket. The scrotal area was saved for last, a show made with the long blade, slow titillation around those most precious of body parts.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Afterwards the guy would join the others at the bar to get that free drink and show off his sleek new look.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Back on the sidewalk where a half block away a burly doorman allowed them through another unmarked entrance and Jack almost immediately got separated from Joe and Wade. Every inch of the interior was painted flat black and every opening and stairwell seemed to have someone leaning beside it like security, apparently allowing only certain people through. Jack had to brush past one hefty guy with arms crossed who eyed him with disdain and found he was in a urine stenched bathroom, tall ceramic urinals and guys having sex. Joe and Wade weren't there and as Jack quickly left he bumped by the guy again. He said, ``You looking for something?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack just nodded, ``Yeah,'' over his shoulder and kept going. From behind him as he moved away he heard the guy's answer, it seemed to sum up everything about San Francisco in this era, the guy said with confidence, ``Well I have it.''</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">B</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">urroughs again: ``<i>Bureaus cannot live without a host, being true parasitic organisms. . . . A bureau operates on the principle of </i> inventing needs<i> to justify its existence . . . a turning away from the human evolutionary direction of infinite potentials and differentiation and independent spontaneous action, to the complete parasitism of a virus. . . . Bureaus die when the structure of the state collapses. They are as helpless and unfit for independent existences as a displaced tapeworm, or a virus that has killed the host.</i>''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">
In San Francisco, in y2k, as this new gentrification virus stalked the city, there on the end of every fork, as it was lifted from the little can, slippery and glistening with brine, one saw a pale and flaccid cocktail wiener.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">__________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-71792279618260474682013-11-09T17:56:00.001-08:002014-08-04T18:45:50.180-07:00invitation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-10qyy6q4b5E/Unr1MRQJN6I/AAAAAAAABaQ/4yvOHs_omAU/s1600/no-future_-56_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="390" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-10qyy6q4b5E/Unr1MRQJN6I/AAAAAAAABaQ/4yvOHs_omAU/s640/no-future_-56_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">W</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ith the wisdom of hindsight the year 1981 was pivotal. Ronald Reagan took office as 40th President of the United States and 52 American hostages were released after 15 months of captivity in Iran. In New York the Mudd Club closed and the Saint disco opened. And little noted at time, the June 5 issue of the CDC's <i>Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report</i> included in a brief article entitled ``<i>Pneumocystis</i> Pneumonia—Los Angeles'' which described five cases of previously healthy men about age 30 found to have biopsy-confirmed infection with this rare microbe.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The Centers for Disease Control's <i>MMWR</i> publishes data on notifiable diseases from national surveillance programs as well as observations of special interest to its readers, public health workers, those that see the big picture. Doctors deal with individual cases and only when enough are reported to the CDC does it warrant a mention in the <i>MMWR</i> . A short editorial addendum to that article explained that the ``fact that these patients were all homosexuals suggests an association between some aspect of a homosexual lifestyle or disease acquired through sexual contact.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">While this was the first public recognition of the syndrome people in the gay communities of LA, New York and San Francisco had already begun noticing something weird going on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Three weeks after the article appeared San Francisco hosted the largest gathering of gays in the world at that year's International Lesbian & Gay Freedom Day Parade.</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">hey sat cross-legged on the oriental carpet, four young men in Ricco's living room in Chelsea all intently watching Larry lean over the mirror holding a rolled hundred dollar bill to his nose. His head swept along one of the lines of white powder on the glass, the line disappeared, Larry raised up, inhaled deeply and passed the mirror along.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2mf1ud7SDN0/Un7aoZjQFhI/AAAAAAAABag/AV31Oof9cCk/s1600/saint-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="169" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2mf1ud7SDN0/Un7aoZjQFhI/AAAAAAAABag/AV31Oof9cCk/s200/saint-1.jpg" width="200" /></a>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Joey, waiting his turn, idly picked up a small booklet from the coffee table with a medical illustration of an uncircumcised penis on the outside. A forcep pulled at the shaft opening. The packet unfolded like a map, the next page had a similar drawing but with the foreskin pulled open and held by three foreceps.</span></div>
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He continued and now had the paper lain out on the rug and ignored his turn as the mirror came by. Drawings on the third and fourth pages continued the theme. Joey looked up, ``What is this?'' Watching from the couch Ricco said, ``Find that interesting do you?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Joey unfolded again to where the skin covering the shaft was sewn back in place and he shook his head, mesmerized, ``But what <i>is it</i> ?'' he said.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Keep going, you'll see.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Joey turned the final fold so that the complete series lay flat on the carpet and the last square showed that it was an invitation.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-80VuDXe-Tu8/Un7aqOYSjiI/AAAAAAAABao/I7Vgj6m_FSk/s1600/saint-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="166" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-80VuDXe-Tu8/Un7aqOYSjiI/AAAAAAAABao/I7Vgj6m_FSk/s200/saint-2.jpg" width="200" /></a>
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Joey looked up, ``Another one of those overpriced places for the disco queens, prissy little guys with glitter and feather boas, right?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Ricco leaned back into the cushions and closed his eyes, ``Maybe if you didn't spend all your time at the trucks or out on a pier and socialized a little more you'd know about these things.''</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he Saint was the most expensive disco in history, New York intensity melded with Hollywood special effects. In 1980 there was no reason to think this human tsunami of gay freedom would ever retreat, a cavernous domed room with an enormous high-tech planetarium projector dominating the center like some alien spacecraft just landed, a sound system with over 500 hundred speakers. Total immersion, the place could pack in 4000 men dancing together on a busy night with no reference to time or location anywhere in the universe except this space. This was the future. The future was now.</span></div>
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x8XDcfitfAw/Un7avd4vaQI/AAAAAAAABaw/jiQN0AT9q00/s1600/saint-3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="175" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-x8XDcfitfAw/Un7avd4vaQI/AAAAAAAABaw/jiQN0AT9q00/s200/saint-3.jpg" width="200" /></a>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A private club that targeted the young and hot, males only, Pans only, those that could afford it, those that understood how the sex and the drugs and the music were so tightly intertwined. Theme parties, especially at the solstices and equinoxes, the Age of Aquarius had dawned, sympathy and trust abounding. Dancing shirtless for hours with only enough room to sweat between you and the shirtless men on all sides, thousands of men moving as one, as a flock, handing an amyl to the hunk who just appeared across from you, eyes locked, smiles, crushing one for yourself, feeling the thin glass shell shatter into the gauze mesh, holding it to your nose, a vapor chill, the sudden crisp clarification as a bracing Winter breath fills the lungs, then the soaring rush as a heart-pounding Spring drives vitality into the bloodstream, into the brain. And down into the crotch. </span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fk-FLqanGOE/Un7azVbfdQI/AAAAAAAABbA/FBaR9wiEl8c/s1600/saint-4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="188" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fk-FLqanGOE/Un7azVbfdQI/AAAAAAAABbA/FBaR9wiEl8c/s200/saint-4.jpg" width="200" /></a>
</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The music never, never stops, not once in however many hours you've been out on the floor, under this light show of a universe, you and that hunk now wrapped around one another, both shirtless, moving, heading for the stairs, knowing without words, up to the balcony. Here everyone else has the same idea, you try to find an empty space among the moans.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Twenty minutes later you're back down on the floor again jammed in with all the others, dancing furiously and reaching into your shirt pocket.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LiJ7xgUXAFY/Un7ayc_3fBI/AAAAAAAABa4/PrztpdX2YwY/s1600/saint-5-6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="134" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LiJ7xgUXAFY/Un7ayc_3fBI/AAAAAAAABa4/PrztpdX2YwY/s200/saint-5-6.jpg" width="200" /></a>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">O</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">pening night at the September equinox, lines of men around the block and then packed inside this futuristic dome, waiting, the anticipation, could this possibly live up to the hype. The house music stopped, the lights flared briefly and then the room went completely dark. After some seconds the minor triad that opens a Chopin prelude sounded as the full planetarium display illuminated and filled the space with stars, a night sky as the ancients must have seen it: wondorous and alive. Someone there that night told how a unison gasp came from three thousand men who then stared in awed silence until the voice of Donna Summers began a breathy, sexy moan ``Oh baby . . . '' which became an imploring ``I want you to come . . . come, Come, <i>COME!</i> ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Is this real or could this be magic?</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">When the drums kicked in it seemed that the brief prelude music had been the funeral march for the pre-Stonewall world, their heroic struggle was ended and a dawning, a celebration had begun. The volume level exploded and the thousands of young men there broke into a long, sustained cheer because of what they were witnessing, what they were a part of, this new world they were making.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Six months later, at the March 1981 equinox, the whole known universe spans the enormous dome, a billion stars, constellations, galaxies, the great wheeling zodiac turns to Spring, locks in place, the fiery ram roars into the cosmos from his winter cage, horns gouge the firmament, unleashed now he cannot be returned, the fish, wet cold winter, is banished forever. The stars have aligned, there will be no return. Those thousands dancing looked up to the heavens, to a bright promise in the explosion of stars but their fate was marked in the darkness of their blood by a tiny strand of nucleic acid. In a far corner Prince Prospero whispered a line from Psalms, ``the pestilence that walketh in darkness, . . .'' which went unheard. It was time to party, it was innocent fun, it was already too late. The ceremony of innocence is drowned.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The future seemed so bright, how could it not be, it was written on the stars.</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">J</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">oey is still staring at the invitation spread out before him on the rug as Ricco explains, ``There's to be a ritual circumcision, an altar in the middle of the floor, an Aztec sacrifice, you know, one of those pagan things.''</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iTTL76_0Yyc/UnrwY75jblI/AAAAAAAABZ4/yiTmlQWOEN8/s1600/saint-7-8b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-iTTL76_0Yyc/UnrwY75jblI/AAAAAAAABZ4/yiTmlQWOEN8/s320/saint-7-8b.jpg" width="285" /></a>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I want to go to this,'' Joey says, ``This looks like my kind of place.''</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">L</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ess than two years after The Saint opened those expensive invitation packets began to be returned, stamped ``No Forwarding Address.'' Initially they couldn't understand why someone would spend so much money on membership fees and then not leave a forwarding address. And as more and more of the invites began being returned they saw a parallel with the increasing numbers cited in the newspaper stories and they began to understand why.</span></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">E</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ach October the Centers for Disease Control publishes an Annual Summary of ``Significant Public Health Events'' compiled from data and reports for the previous year. The 1982 issue began, ``<i>For 1981, one of the most significant public health events in the United was not an epidemic or the appearance of a new disease, but the marked decrease in the occurrence of a well-known illness. The reported cases of measles for 1981 reached their lowest level since 1925, the year that communicable disease reporting on a weekly basis was instituted in the United States.</i>''</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iT_2OjR7Hz8/UnrzLlHwbQI/AAAAAAAABaE/WYWibz6k7bo/s1600/saint-9x.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iT_2OjR7Hz8/UnrzLlHwbQI/AAAAAAAABaE/WYWibz6k7bo/s320/saint-9x.jpg" width="315" /></a>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The future is written.</span></div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-83388987741739919872013-10-20T16:32:00.000-07:002013-11-21T14:37:01.662-08:00fran lebowitz<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Ic5SUZF6Ki4/UmRkcTb1JjI/AAAAAAAABYA/96lfDYI4Zec/s1600/tribe-1b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Ic5SUZF6Ki4/UmRkcTb1JjI/AAAAAAAABYA/96lfDYI4Zec/s640/tribe-1b.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><i>In late September of 1987 as they prepared for DC the following appeared in the Sunday paper:</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 18pt;"><b>The Impact of AIDS On the Artistic Community</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><b>BY FRAN LEBOWITZ</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;">
<i>Fran Lebowitz, the author of ``Metropolitan Life'' and ``Social Studies,'' offers a dozen short reports from a world attempting to cope with pain and loss.</i>
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;">1. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that when a 36-year-old writer is asked on a network news show about the Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community, particularly in regard to the Well-Known Preponderance of Homosexuals in the Arts, she replies that if you removed all of the homosexuals and homosexual influence from what is generally regarded as American culture you would be left with "Let's Make a Deal."<br>
The interviewer's lack of response compels her to conclude that he has no idea what she is talking about, and she realizes that soon many of those who do know what she is talking about will be what is generally regarded as dead.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 2. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that on New Year's Eve Day, a 36-year-old writer takes a 31-year-old photographer to get a chest X-ray and listens to him say with what can only be described as a certain guarded hope, "Maybe I just have lung cancer."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 3. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-year-old writer has a telephone conversation with a dying 41-year-old book editor whom even the most practiced verbal assassin has called the last of the Southern gentlemen and hears him say in a hoarse whisper, "I'm sorry, but I just hate old people. I look at them and think, 'Why don't <i>you </i> die?' "</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 4. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that an aspiring little avant-garde movie director approaches a fairly famous actor in a restaurant and attempts to make social hay out of the fact that they met at Antonio's and will undoubtedly see each other at Charles', and Antonio's and Charles' are not parties and Antonio's and Charles' are not bars and Antonio's and Charles' are not summer houses in chic Tuscan towns—Antonio's and Charles' are funerals.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 5. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-year-old writer is on the telephone with a 38-year-old art director making arrangements to go together the following morning to the funeral of a 27-year-old architect and the art director says to the writer, "If you get there first sit near the front where we usually sit and save me the seat on the aisle."</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 6. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 24-year-old-ballet dancer is in the hospital for 10 days following an emergency appendectomy and nobody goes to visit him because everyone is really busy and after all he's not dying or anything.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 7. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-yer-old writer takes time out at a memorial service for the world's pre-eminent makeup artist and a man worth any number of interesting new painters to get angry because the makeup artist's best friend and eulogist uses a story she has for years been hoarding for her book which she can't write anymore anyway unless she writes it as a historical novel because it's about a world that in the last few years has disappeared almost entirely.</span></div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 8. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-year-old writer runs into a 34-year-old painter at a party and the painter says to the writer that he is just back from Los Angeles and he says with some surprise that he had a really good time there and he asks why does she think that happened and she says it's because New York is so boring now that Los Angeles is fun in comparison and that's true and it's one reason but the real reason is that they don't know the people who are dying there.</span></div>
<br />
<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;"> 9. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-year-old writer has dinner every night for eleven nights in a row with the same 32-year-old musician while he waits for his biopsy to come back because luckily for her she is the only one he trusts enough to tell.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;">10. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that a 36-year old writer trying to make plans to go out of town flips through her appointment book and hears herself say, "Well, I have a funeral on Tuesday, lunch with my editor on Wednesday, a memorial service on Thursday, so I guess I could come on Friday, unless of course Robert dies."</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;">11. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that when the world's most famous artist dies of complications following surgery at the age of 61 it doesn't seem like he really died at all—it just seems like he got off easy.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 22.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, Georgia, serif; font-size: 13pt;">12. The Impact of AIDS on the Artistic Community is that at a rather grand dinner held at a venerable New York cultural institution and catered by a company famous for the beauty of its waiters a 39-year-old-painter remarks to a 36-year-old writer that the company in question doesn't seem to employ as many really handsome boys as it used to and the writer replies, "Well, it doesn't always pay to be popular."</span></div>
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<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-72879487792081763762013-08-06T18:01:00.000-07:002013-11-21T14:35:21.773-08:00DC 87 - preparation<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aZLaWK4kshQ/Uf7ZAiVUHvI/AAAAAAAABW8/lbfkc8miOQI/s1600/neimans-12_0%252B30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aZLaWK4kshQ/Uf7ZAiVUHvI/AAAAAAAABW8/lbfkc8miOQI/s640/neimans-12_0%252B30.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span>
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">N the Workshop </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> the machines drum round the clock now as the deadline for DC approaches, the sounds rise and fall in overlapping waves as eight people hunch over the tables and sew. They had made a promise that quilt panels received by the deadline would make it to Washington. No matter what hour people are pulling cloth under a pulsing needle, talking or concentrating or singing mindlessly. At three a.m. all the shops on the commercial strip outside are dark, the sidewalks and streets empty, stools are upended on the bar tops awaiting the swamper. At the wide intersection where Market and Castro intersect the bank of stoplights appear abandoned as they rotate through a purposeless cycle. In the distance downtown San Francisco dims away to smudges under the fog cover of August but from in here light pours out the glass front wall, music pounds, people move and laugh, in here there is life.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The deadline date was arbitrary, they just assumed that giving themselves a one month lead they'd have time to get panels received by mid-September sewn into the quilt to be part of the March for Lesbian and Gay Rights. They didn't know. In early August they barely had one hundred, were hoping for 1000 and and the idle comment was made that it would hardly be noticed on that enormous length of grass mall that stretches from Capital Hill to the Washington Monument.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The Neiman Marcus at Union Square let them display quilt in its main windows, by 1987 the store had already lost too many young employees to the epidemic. Some days a few volunteers would trek down from the workshop just to watch how people responded, none of it had ever been publicly shown and they'd never even seen it outside of the workshop. Cafe Flore hosted a small opening which generated some local interest but not what they'd hoped. The whole quilt, the panels sewn into 12x12s, could at this time fit in the bed of a small pickup and was stacked in a closet space at the rear of the workshop. Some afternoons Cindy would go back there and lay on it for a short nap. But volunteers showed up, each day someone new found the workshop, they'd stand just inside the doorway with that distant stare of one who had cared for a lover alone in those last months as that person decayed and now has nowhere else in life to go. They want to help, they're willing to do anything for however many years or weeks or days they themselves have left. This space would become their home, the people here their family, loss is a great unifier.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Still, packages would arrive postmarked from out in the hinterlands and someone on their way to the workshop would check most afternoons at the Castro branch Post Office on 18th. The parcels would be hand carried the few blocks to Market Street. Throbbing machine sounds trail off as people stop sewing and gather to watch them opened. ``Kansas, this one's from Kansas!'' marveling that anyone in Kansas or Ohio or Georgia had even heard about their effort.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Each new panel would be unfolded and held out for view and the accompanying letters read aloud. The people became real, a name, a little something about their life, about how they had touched other humans. Letters would explain why various design elements were chosen—why a bag of foam rubber french fries (his restaurant in Amsterdam had been famous for them) or why dozens of brightly colored birds strung alone wires (his favorite hobby) or why a yellow rose (he'd arranged for one to be sent to each of his coworkers upon his death). Letters described talents of the individual, letters were written by siblings, sons and daughters, nieces and nephews, letters were from coworkers, neighbors, too many letters told of the enormous suffering at the end and most gave a date of birth and death so that simple math told how young they were when they died.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">One letter, after describing the final days, ended simply, ''At last there was peace.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">These were the people, the ones whose names were on these bolts of cloth, that they'd promised to carry to DC.</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2qalhXJkIyw/Uf7aOdB7UWI/AAAAAAAABXI/hO5dORwG0nI/s1600/castro-st-fair-87c.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2qalhXJkIyw/Uf7aOdB7UWI/AAAAAAAABXI/hO5dORwG0nI/s640/castro-st-fair-87c.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">nitially the work load seemed manageable with the small group they had, with almost two months until the march people could do their day jobs and still find time to put in a few hours at a machine stitching eight panels together into twelve foot by twelve foot sections and handing them off to volunteers who would fold and pin long strips of heavy canvas around the perimeter. This edging would be sewn on and the 12-by-12 would get a number and the names and panel maker data would be filed. This gave a master list so that anyone wanting to see a specific panel could find it. During the day other volunteers would pound metal sail grommets into the edging so that on the mall four 12x12s could be mated and layed flat between a walkway allowing 32 panels to be viewed at a time.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They'd given little thought to a procedure to open it for display or even how it would transported across America, they had enough to do just sewing. If no other option appeared they'd rent a large truck or put it on a train or form a car caravan.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack had come up with the idea of folding the corners of four mated 12x12s to the middle and then repeating from the resulting corners until they had flat bundles about four feet square. These could then be packed for transportation and the process reversed as an opening ceremony. Once they figured out how to get it to Washington, DC.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They had planned to have the full quilt sewn by the Castro Street Fair, the first Sunday in October, and use the fair as draw for help in getting 7000 pounds of cloth itemized and folded and boxed. And then packed onto a rented truck or put on a train or carried in a car caravan. Or something.</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9YJe_RtdBp8/Ugwu-45hB4I/AAAAAAAABXY/tG5QvMe1t-o/s1600/castro-fair-buck2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9YJe_RtdBp8/Ugwu-45hB4I/AAAAAAAABXY/tG5QvMe1t-o/s320/castro-fair-buck2.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">uilt that had not made the deadline was hung as a backdrop to the stage of the Fair, it was behind Buck Naked and the Bare Bottom Boys when they played their set that Sunday. Singer/ guitarist Buck, his drummer brother and another guitarist had recently moved from Omaha, they felt that in quirky San Francisco they might find an audience for their Cramps-style rockabilly, that ``Teenage Pussy from Outer Space'' and ``Bend Over Baby and Let Me Drive'' might find an audience, unaware that this quirky San Francisco had been dying for about five years.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In 1992 Buck was a bartender at the Paradise Lounge (he arrived in SF too late to have ever been in FeBe's) and he'd walk his dog in the Panhandle by his apartment in the wee hours after closing the club. This eight block tree filled stretch bordered by high Victorians was a City Parks Department designated pigeon-feeding area where tourists find quaint photo-ops and where the Health Department fined the neighbors because their yards and homes and drives and sidewalks are covered in pigeon shit. Typical San Francisco, one department says come feed our pigeons, another makes money off residents because of it. Seems that a little Pigeon Man would bring ten-gallon pails of seed and toss it to the now enormous flocks that waited daily. He would threaten to shoot people and dogs if they bothered his birds. He was out there at 3 a.m. when Buck's dog took out after some so Pigeon Man shot and killed Buck.</span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-l0pjhn8eZ0M/Ug0SqavEEvI/AAAAAAAABXo/qswPVlamhxI/s1600/castro-fair-buck3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="197" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-l0pjhn8eZ0M/Ug0SqavEEvI/AAAAAAAABXo/qswPVlamhxI/s320/castro-fair-buck3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">M</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">iracle of miracles, through friends, the kindness of strangers, the Flying Tigers air freight service would ship the whole thing to DC and back for free. Only everything had to be packed and ready a week earlier than they had allocated for. As if they didn't have enough to do. Now with one less week to sew than scheduled things became even more hectic.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Those already working overtime put in overtime, Cindy and Evelyn and others used day job vacation time, young men on disability who should have been pampering their immune system stayed all night, the quilt had to be sewn and packed and gone now <i>before</i> the upcoming Castro Street Fair.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They had hoped to have at least 1000 panels to take to DC but with three weeks until the deadline had received only about 400. Most were single panels sent in by individuals but gay groups in some cities organized sewing events and collected them to mail all at once, they wanted to keep their friends as long as possible. Houston did that and sent 240 as a batch, waiting until the very last.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The Monday of that deadline week, swamped with work now, with unsewn panels piled and waiting by each machine someone walked from the workshop to the P.O. like always to ask if there was any mail. He stood by the little metering scale as the postal worker looked up and said, ``Lemme check.'' The postal worker turned to the doorway that lead to the sorting room and called, ``Any packages for the Names Project?'' Another worker came to the opening and peered out, ``Yes I do believe we have some packages here for the Names Project.'' He then looked straight at the guy at the counter and grinned real big, ``You didn't by any chance happen to bring with you a <i>very large truck?</i>''</span></div>
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<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n the workshop the machines drum round the clock now as the deadline for DC approaches. They had made a promise.</span></div>
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<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-14514172930206095052013-04-09T13:12:00.001-07:002014-01-23T18:00:17.974-08:005A<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ZoldChbF03k/UU5zyRerEPI/AAAAAAAABVE/w3yp3DcEDfc/s1600/exit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="388" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ZoldChbF03k/UU5zyRerEPI/AAAAAAAABVE/w3yp3DcEDfc/s640/exit.jpg" width="640" /></a>
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<i>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">D</span>
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">an can't tell if he's breathing. </span>
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">It doesn't matter, ability even to ponder the question means he must be breathing. It is a bother to open his eyes even a small bit, that must require more effort than breathing. He can raise his eyelids slowly raise a few millimeters and then they slowly shut, vague outline of a curtained window, a dark room. There is cool fresh air entering his nostrils without him even breathing. Nice. Pleasant. Relaxing. A nice, pleasant, relaxing room. He could stay in this place a while, a little nice, pleasant, relaxing vacation.</i></span>
</div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>Funny how breathing is barely necessary if you don't move at all. Dark shapes float against what little light seeps around the curtain edges. His eyes must not have completely shut. Too much effort. The first shape has stopped and moves aside like a guide presenting, ``Here you will note how the members of this ancient culture used deep mediation to lower their metabolic rate and survive the long, long winters.'' One of the other shapes leans over, a closeness Dan associates with familiarity. ``Danny, it's your mom and dad. How are you feeling?'' Dan takes a breath through his mouth and exhales, his way of saying, ``Hi mom, hi dad.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Can he hear me doctor? Does he know we're here?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Most likely, though he needs to be kept sedated. He had a seizure and was in a lot of pain when they brought him in. And the CMV has destroyed most of his vision.''</span></div>
</i>
</br>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n the earliest days of the epidemic political gays opposed a separate AIDS ward fearing it would be a quarantine area, an inhouse leper colony, maybe even with a separate elevator. But it quickly became obvious that consolidation of resources was medically sound. The initial AIDS ward on the 5B quickly became swamped and was moved over to the larger 5A unit where the chalkboard behind the nurses station displayed first names only for privacy. The less severely afflicted were placed on the other fifth floor wards in rooms with the traditional hospital patients. And had their full name displayed.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">That was how one afternoon while passing a doorway a visitor heard, ``Lee, get in here and congratulate me! I made it to the big time this trip—5A!''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The visitors lounge was called the Liz Taylor room, because the actress would show up unannounced, with no publicity, and chat with patients. She'd donated a piano and others brought in stereos and VHS players and televisions and record collections, expensive top quality items, the best, possessions the owners no longer would need. The room was decorated for the various holidays, Rita Rockett gave Sunday brunches and visitors and the mobile patients communed there.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Others were just bitter and became even more so in late December hearing piano and singing from the lounge, ``. . . home for Christmas . . . if only in my dreams.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The second wave of the epidemic brought a new type of patient, the IV drug users from the Tenderloin, and their visitors had different priorities from those of the first wave. They might look in at the patient but their interests were focused on other things. Visitors were allowed onto the ward round the clock, 24 hour access with little oversight, hmmm, an IV drip bag of morphine connected to a comatose AIDS patient? No problem. Soon everything of value in the Elizabeth Taylor room had disappeared. After that the TVs and radios and video players were all locked down with thick metal cables.</span></div>
</br>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;"><i>S</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">eizure, Dan heard the doctor say, such a pleasant sounding word. Sei-zure. Sea-azure, an azure sea. To float in a nice warm blue ocean, pleasant, relaxing. Sea-azure, a warm azure sea. He was four years old, he wanted to play in the yard but his mother said no. ``And you can't go outside barefoot, it's too cold and I'm not going to put your shoes on for you.'' He stood there holding his little red sneakers and glared at her, frustrated, chocking tears. He moved to in a chair in the den and placed the little canvas shoes by his feet and looked down. He took a laces of one in each hand, crossed them, pulled, looped, four year old Dan figured it out. ``Alright you can go,'' she said when he returned to the kitchen to show her, ''but stay in the back yard where I can see you.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``What son? Say that again, I couldn't hear you.'' Leaning over the bed, her ear tilted towards his face, ``Shoes? You want your shoes? Is that what you said? You want your shoes? You have to stay here darling, you can't leave the hospital until you're better.''</span></div>
</i>
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<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">
ess awoke frightened. He couldn't find his glasses, he didn't know where he was and he became even more frightened once he realized. He did not want to be alone when he died. He didn't want to die of course but that part he had little control over, the being alone part, well, now he saw that Larry was there, Tess had just missed him. ``It will be alright,'' Larry said, ``if I can't be here I'll have one of our friends fill in. Promise.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Pinky swear.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">That was why there are three guys in chairs in the hallway by the room door, soda cans and white Chinese take out boxes at their feet, and two others in the room. Someone there at all times. Tess would not be alone.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">When he had awoken in panic that first day Larry had found his glasses and said, ``Always put them on the same spot on the bedside table so you'll always know where to find them.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Tess gazed at him, myopic eyes through the thick lenses imploring, ``Always? You mean I'm always going to be here?''</span></div>
</br>
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<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;"><i>W</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">arm water. The first time Dan vacationed in Hawaii that's what he remembers the most. The warm water. And the cute guy he saw each afternoon lying in the sand at Queen's surf that stared at him. On morning Dan awoke with a rash across his back and down his thighs that sent him to the ER, with no immune system you never know, there the guy was at the main desk. ``Go in that room,'' pointing, ``remove your clothes and put this on,'' handing Dan a folded pale green gown.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The air conditioned room was chilly as he waited, barely covered by the thin fabric of the open back robe. The guy came in and shut the door and told Dan to lay on his chest so he could examine the rash.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After the inspection the guy said, ``OK, I'll go get the doctor.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan raised up, ``You're not the doctor?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``No, I'm admissions, but I've been staring at that cute ass of yours at the beach all week and just had to know what it looked like.''</i></span></div>
</br>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">R</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">andy told his lover to bring the address book and he sat up in the hospital bed as they went through the names to find those still alive that he wanted to come visit, all on the same afternoon. Seven met in the Liz Taylor room and discussed what this request must mean before they walked the hallway together to find Randy asleep. They debated, then Terry gently shook him awake, ``We're all here Randy. We're all here.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Randy pushed the button that winched him upright and looked at his friends crowded into his little world. ``I'm so glad you came.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Randy smiled looking to the one nearest, ``Terry,'' he said, ``remember that time we . . .'' He chuckled at a memory, smiling even more before fading. ``I'm so glad you all are here.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Terry took hold of his hand, ``It will be all right Randy, we're here.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Randy shut his eyes and relaxed, still smiling. ``Go to the light Randy,'' someone in the room said and it was echoed by others, ``Go to the light Randy, go to the light.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Randy opened his eyes wide and sat up when he understood what they were doing. Everyone was now in a circle around him and seemed to be performing some ritual, ``Go to the light.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Hey! I'm not dying just now! Is that what you thought?'' He shook his head, ``I just wanted all of you together so I could tell you how much your friendships have meant over these years, how much I've loved all of you, how much fun it has been just knowing each of you.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Randy shook his head again as he lay back, ``I may have AIDS but you're not getting rid of me that easily.''</span></div>
</br>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;"><i>D</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">an floated back from his Hawaii vacation to hear his mother, ``He's smiling doctor, he must know we're here.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``It's difficult to say, most of his eyesight is gone and he's not responding to the pentamidine so there's really no way to tell what he's aware of.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``You mean there's nothing more you can do?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I don't want to get your hopes up, some people do recover briefly, but he only weighs about eighty pounds and he'll never walk again or see again and the pain will probably just keep increasing.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She looked at gaunt form, barely recognizable as a human, lying there in a nest of tubes: breathing tubes and feeding tubes and infusion tubes, and she tried to match what she was seeing with the lifetime of images of her son. ``There's really nothing more you can do?'' she asked.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan tried to laugh when he heard the word ``stopcock,'' the infantile snicker in high school science lab, as the doctor, before leaving them alone there, explained its function, how it regulates flow. ``You turn the valve to here and he will be out of pain for a while, you turn it to here,'' he paused, ``and he will be out of pain forever.''</span></div>
</i>
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<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">F</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ranz checked in at the nurses station when he came on for the evening shift and then made first rounds, the floor quiet, a hospital settling in for a hopefully uneventful night. That's how most of them go, quietly, uneventfully, a graceful transition from one world to another. Forms to fill, discharge papers, but rarely urgency or crisis. The ordinary sameness of one day routinely following the next, this methodical efficiency of the epidemic. Sometimes a patient might rally and appear in the dark hall pulling his drip bag pole, moving towards the light, ready to go home. And sometimes Franz will come on to see a nurse stand to face the chalkboard, reach to smear out a name and write in a new one.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The flat green chalkboard every schoolkid spent years staring at, first names and room numbers over the palimpsest smudges of previous patients, dead or recovered enough to go home to die. AIDS roulette, pick a number, the house always wins.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It's the Filipino nurses that get him, you volunteer to be here, they could be on any other ward, house staff is never forced to work 5A. Franz knows these patients, these women don't. They sit quietly conversing in Tagalog, above them the endless supply of names San Francisco provides, first names only just like the chalkboards you used to see on entering the baths.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The wheel never stops, barely past childhood, these innocents rushed to the circus that was San Francisco <i>before</i> , the glorious midway, all in fun, place your bets folks. ``We were too young for this,'' Franz wants to scream down into the empty hallway. The house always wins.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He turns the corner to see a lanky blond woman midway facing the wall with her head bowed. He's seen her up here before. Gert had stopped by to visit a friend and while looking in the rooms found that she knew two other people on the ward. Now she's gently banging her head against the concrete in a slow methodical rhythm.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As Franz passes behind her holding the clipboard with this night's list of names he mutters, ``Feels good doesn't it.''</span></div>
</br>
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JV5DlnSzmBU/UU50JSlBjOI/AAAAAAAABVM/BJr5WdmHAPc/s1600/faces.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="390" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JV5DlnSzmBU/UU50JSlBjOI/AAAAAAAABVM/BJr5WdmHAPc/s640/faces.jpg" width="640" /></a>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-50614709274907798972013-01-04T17:24:00.000-08:002014-01-05T14:11:06.147-08:00workshop<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TruVc4jJbfw/UO96LucQ-FI/AAAAAAAAAjg/oKOVGd2SIpI/s1600/pride-87-012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TruVc4jJbfw/UO96LucQ-FI/AAAAAAAAAjg/oKOVGd2SIpI/s640/pride-87-012.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span>
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">ypical June day </span>
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">for the Pride Parade, luminous fog overhead, jacket weather chill, basic summer in San Francisco. On Market Street the parade continued but she wanted to beat the crowd to the underground so was cutting across wide Civic Center plaza when she saw it. At the far end of the enormous open space surrounded by granite buildings a smudge of color leaked over the City Hall facade. Hung from the outdoor balcony was quilt and there was David, her David.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy hadn't heard anything more from these people after that first meeting. She stared above the tall doorways where large cloth squares billowed and flattened with the gusts. Eight panels in each square—so this is how they would do it.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Someone told her they'd seen Roger at a booth back across the plaza and she headed there. A wood frame braced panels mounted behind a table. The guy she'd sat next to at the meeting, Jack, was standing there staring as well. ``Sure we remember you two,'' the person at the table probably thinking they were a couple. ``We just signed a lease on a storefront on Market Street so have a place to sew to get ready for the march in Washington. Stop by, we can use all the help we can get.'' Handing a flier headed with a phrase she'd never seen, ``The Names Project.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">By Pride day in 1987 the epidemic was a permanent fixture, the playful insouciant <i>joie de vivre</i> that was everywhere a decade before was gone, as irretrievable as the people whose names now hung from the balcony. You were aware of it not just in the twenty or more obituaries, small headshots of young men in prime of life, that ran each week in the <i>BAR</i> or in the framed photos of faces displayed in shop windows on Castro Street, employees everyone had known, or in the increasing number of memorials but in every little aspect of daily life. You were surrounded by the epidemic.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It was there in snippets of casual conversation you might overhear, ``He moved back home, someplace like Indiana.'' Or ``I should have known something was wrong, if there was a choice he always bought the cheapest; this time he didn't bother.'' Or simply, ``He was diagnosed.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It was there in the exchange of friends upon running into one another, ``Tom, love your new look, you've trimmed down, lost weight, that shirt looks <i>fabulous</i>  on you.'' Tom all but shouting, ``I Have Not Lost Any Weight!''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It was there on the sidewalk as you move aside for the scrawny guy coming towards you, baggy wrinkled clothes, matted hair, who halts as head turns and deep-set eyes lock in a long stare that follows as you pass. You hear a weak rasp that almost sounds like your name. A few more steps before you stop, <i>Larry</i> ? That can't be Larry—I just saw him a few weeks ago. That's when you realize the guy must still be behind you gawking. By the time you turn he has continued down the sidewalk leaning a bit unsteadily on a cane.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The Castro Street Doubletake.</span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GRp-fgiDWJU/UPizQnu4ZVI/AAAAAAAAAj0/nqZFI6Ifu-I/s1600/pride-87-043.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="398" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GRp-fgiDWJU/UPizQnu4ZVI/AAAAAAAAAj0/nqZFI6Ifu-I/s640/pride-87-043.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She had a day off the following Wednesday, standing there in front of this booth where Roger was displayed she and the guy Jack made a date to check out this new place on Market Street.</span></div>
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<br />
<span style="display: block; float: left; color: tomato; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n 1979 a contingent representing San Francisco charted Amtrak to carry them to that year's March on Washington that commemorated the tenth anniversary of Stonewall. A piano was installed in the bar car and essentially they planned to take the San Francisco party through the hinterlands, singing and drinking as America slid by outside the windows. The train had barely crossed out of Nevada into Utah before they completely ran out of booze. Fully stocked at departure and now nothing, not a drop. Then true divine intervention, in Ogden a fundamentalist lay on the tracks to block their passage.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``The Lord works in mysterious ways,'' was yelled as they piled out running to the grocery across the tracks, guys in leather chaps raced guys with mascara smeared eyes, feather boas elbowed ahead of lumberjacks, all with a single destination: the liquor aisle.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Thank you Baby Jesus!''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Clark was one of the first in line, honey blond curls nestling on his shoulders, rainbow tie-dye tee, a quart of vodka in each hand and he heard the woman in front of him say to the cashier, ``MayBelle, you should have seen what just got off of that train out there!''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Maybelle paused her ring to lean over, ``Don't look now but they're <i>all </i> in line right behind you.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">These were the Baby Boomers, children of people who had lived through the Depression and then the War and wanted little more than an uneventful life, a peaceful Leave It To Beaver existence. Job, house, family, the little black and white images on the set that dominated the living room was all the excitement the parents needed. Stability, if June said, after vacuuming the already spotless rug in her heels and pearls, ``Ward, I'm worried about the Beaver,'' you knew it wasn't going to be anything like, ``How so, dear?'' laying down his paper to look up.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``He's been trying on my lipstick and jewelry.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``It's just a phase honey, went through it myself, he'll outgrow it.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">These Boomers didn't outgrow it, their war, the one that tore America apart, Vietnam, had finally ended, and they were in the extended liberated celebration. Growing up with only three TV network stations almost all of them had the exact same experience most nights no matter where in the country they lived. Most could remember when color came into the living room and all could remember where they were when they heard Kennedy had been shot.</span></div>
</br>
<span style="display: block; float: left; color: tomato; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">C</span><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">indy met Jack at a bar down the street and after a drink they walked to 2362 Market. They stood in the glass doorway and peered into the empty room, a wide area with a floating staircase at the far end leading up to a mezzanine level. The space had been an apartment furnishings store, a business that couldn't compete now with so many Everything Must Go sidewalk sales. The walls and carpet were gray (the color taupe if you were gay), track lights crossed the ceiling and the mezzanine ran around the left side above them. ``Well, what do you think?'' Jack said. ``Sure seems big,'' she answered.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> In the weeks that followed, as word got out and panels began coming in for the display in Washington the room filled, with sewing machines, with piles of cloth, with volunteers working at almost all hours. People just showed up, John Anthony appeared one afternoon, he'd left his home at the River forever with no place to stay, nothing but his plaid shirt, construction boots and jeans, waving about twenty Post-Its, ``Anybody want to help me make panels? These are names of all my friends, they're all dead.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He wasn't the only one. Outside this room the epidemic had circled and settled, a harsh gray world, four or five young men died each day, the realization that everyone was infected and had next to no hope. Inside there was laughter (``We who are about to die. . .''), color, enthusiasm; where death was so present here was life, for how ever little of it they had left. Just to be able to do something, anything, in the face of this enormity was enough. For many who would sew there this place would be their last real home, it became a warroom, here they were mounting a campaign and this place was the Alamo.</span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LD3fGyVMmz8/URG_8BlOFCI/AAAAAAAAAkI/VZxxlavJrns/s1600/projects-12%252B80%252B60.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="380" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-LD3fGyVMmz8/URG_8BlOFCI/AAAAAAAAAkI/VZxxlavJrns/s640/projects-12%252B80%252B60.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-65506146739074896442012-12-13T21:31:00.001-08:002014-06-21T17:05:58.592-07:00first meeting<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aTyvNqln27Y/UGd3A-Ksu8I/AAAAAAAAAhw/WTtgUKSWcf4/s1600/porpoise-6-50-20.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="372" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aTyvNqln27Y/UGd3A-Ksu8I/AAAAAAAAAhw/WTtgUKSWcf4/s640/porpoise-6-50-20.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<div>
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">E</span>
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">ARLY EVENING IN MAY, </span>
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">so pleasant one could almost forget how chilly summer would soon be, so quiet one would almost forget how vibrant these streets once were. Two young men walked down 18th on their way to the Women's Building. Approaching Moby Dick's one realized, ``We got time for a drink.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A friend sat at the nearly empty bar and they went over. ``We're getting a group together to make a quilt to memorialize AIDS victims,'' partially unfolding a cloth bundle he carried and holding it out, ``Why don't you come with us?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``A what?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Each one of these will depict someone who's died, then we'll sew them all together into a quilt.'' A pause, ``And take it to Washington, D.C. this October.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">How do you explain something that had never been done before?</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guy looked at the cloth and then back to his drink and shook his head, ``Well good luck, hope you're not wasting your time.''</span></div>
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<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">A </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> flyer had caught Cindy's eye as she waited for the bus over the hill after work, the chill of winter still in the air. There are flyers on poles all around the Castro Muni station, why did she pause to read this one? It announced a meeting to make a memorial for the people who had died of AIDS, cloth quilt panels with the name and some details of the person's life, each to be three feet by six feet. The flier gave a date six weeks away, a time, a place–the Women's Building on 18th. She mouthed the words to herself, memorizing them.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She borrowed a sewing machine, set it up in the living room of her apartment and began. By May she had two of these cloth panels finished, one for Roger, his name in large pink and black angular funhouse letters and another for a coworker with whom she'd watch morning reruns of the ``I Love Lucy'' show, sitting together on his bed on their days off giggling and bouncing. As she hunched over the machine she would smile, something she'd almost forgotten how to do, hearing an exasperated Desi exclaim, ``Lu-<i>ooo</i>-cy!'' The panel showed the show's opening logo, a large heart with the ``I Love'' in cursive letters but <i>Lucy</i>  replaced by <i>David</i>.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As the May meeting date approached she began to worry about things, how maybe hundreds of people would bring panels and they would all be fabulous (this was, after all, the Castro) and how hers might just get lost in the mix. She wrote her name and address on both so that after they were taken to DC she might be able to get them back, they had become Roger and David for her.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he Women's Building began life as one of those ``sound body, sound mind'' exercise clubs, this one built by the local German community after the 1906 earthquake; at four stories it was taller and bulkier than other buildings on the street and seemed to dominate its block. In 1935 the Sons and Daughters of Norway purchased the building, renamed it Dovre Hall and converted the gymnasium into an auditorium.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">There had been a substantial number of Scandanavians living in Eureka Valley and even with the gay gentrification of the 1970s one could still run across that only in San Francisco catholic school mix of a half Mexican, half Norwegian who grew up there. Or still be entertained by an eighty year old Norwegian play accordian on a weekday afternoon at the du Nord downstairs from the Swedish American Hall a few blocks away.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A women's group bought the building in 1978 and gave it the current name but allowed a small bar with a separate entrance to remain at one corner. The Dovre Club was run by an Irishman so that most people thought the word Dovre had something to do with the Emerald Isle unaware that it was a mountain range in Norway.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The bar became hangout both for the remnants of the Mission Irish and for a new group that sought the asylum of the city's sanctuary policy. Over the doorway a sign, ``Let's drink to the final defeat of the British army in Northern Ireland.'' Money donated at the bar would find its way across the Atlantic to the IRA. After the 1983 Maze Prison break four of the inmates made their way to the Bay Area and late in the evening you might hear about some of how, Pogues on the jukebox, MacGowan's Jameson and cigarette rasp the perfect background to the story of how three guys drove from Frisco to Mexico to smuggle one of those escapees into the US.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He had taken the commercial Aeroflot Moscow flight that refuels in Shannon on its way to Havana. From Cuba into Mexico and Tijuana where the three picked him up. Just another trio Americans with hang-overs coming back from a weekend of frolic South of the Border, Riley could best hide his Paddy accent so he drove them through the customs toll booth.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guard holds Riley's fake license and uses one of the old tricks, ``Oh, you're from San Francisco,'' he says real affable like he knows the City well, a faraway look as if fond memories are returning. ``Where'd you go to high school?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Riley has a sudden panic, in the UK tube stations the Wanted posters with the face of the guy they have under a blanket in the trunk read: ``IRA Terrorist.'' Looking up through the car window, hot wind on his shoulder, the guard's face now with an intent stare, no more smile, Riley remembers the locals back at the Dovre, standing at the bar, how they'd bitch, brag about school days at, ``S.I.'' he says quickly, ``Went to S.I., Saint Ignatius.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guard returns the card and waves them on.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he night of the meeting she took the two panels and hung them side-by-side on the wood fence in front of her apartment building so that a friend could make a photograph. She wasn't certain she'd ever see them again. This was the first time any sections of what would become the Quilt were ever displayed together.
</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After being photographed she took them back into her apartment, paused to look at each one more time and then carefully folded the two panels.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The auditorium in the Women's building seemed so large when she entered with her package, imagine what it would take to fill up a space like this. A folding table was mid-room where two men sat facing the long wall. The first to arrive had placed themselves along the wall directly across from the table, as others came in they had sat next to the previous person so that the line stretched away from table in one direction only. The eight young guys seated along the wall when she got there turned to stare at the lanky blond, sheepish, still in her workday makeup. She sat at the folding chair at the end and after a bit it became apparent no one else was coming.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The two at the table displayed the cloth panel they had brought and one told of their hope to have hundreds of these produced and stitched together for the gay rights March on Washington come October. The silent prayer was that if the rest of the country could see the enormity of what was obvious every day in the Castro it might ignite a groundswell demand for the government to mobilize its resources. Six years into the epidemic and all they'd produced was AZT. And a lot of obituaries.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Then they asked if anyone had brought a panel. After no one answered Cindy replied and went over to the table. She held Roger open and told how he had already been in DC, in 1983, testifying in front of Congress about the disease. Then she showed them David, explaining the Lucy part and humming a snippit of the theme song. She and another coworker had visited David in his hospital room the week before Halloween, pulling clusters of orange and black helium balloons they tied to the bedrails. The ward was quiet, essentially deserted even though this highest of gay holidays approached. David lay in the bed smiling at the thoughtfulness and thanked them but added, ``Did you need to bring the black?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They talked about work, catching him up on the gossip, trying to make him feel a part of the world outside, telling how some woman had stood across the counter and just talked, ``You know the type, she wasn't going to buy anything but just wouldn't shut up, she must of talked to me for half an hour.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">David had propped himself up now and his face got a far-away look as he listened. When she finished he said, so quietly they almost didn't hear, ``I wish someone would talk to me for half an hour.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Before the meeting adjourned a clipboard was passed down the row and everyone wrote their name and address for further contact, hers went on last, just below a guy named Jack who had been sitting last until she arrived. When she got home the apartment seemed more empty than usual, the sewing machine had little use now and would need to be returned, the living room floor needed to be cleaned of the squiggles of thread, end pieces of cloth and scattered shirt pins. But tomorrow.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ull night now as the two men walked back to the Castro, the darkness greater than just an absence of light, the quiet was murmurs from the thousands who had crowded here just five years before. They stopped in Moby Dick's again, the friend was still at the bar and he swiveled on the barstool, ``So how'd your sewing bee go?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Nice crowd, maybe a dozen or so. It wasn't a sewing bee, it was an organizational meeting to make a memorial quilt for AIDS victims.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``So how did your little quilting bee organizational meeting go? Did anybody bring sections for it?''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Two. Some strange blond woman brought two quilt panels.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``A woman brought quilt?'' The guy on the barstool chuckled before turning back to his drink, ``A woman—now you guys are really going to have to do this thing.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-23137193725337505792012-09-16T20:52:00.003-07:002013-11-28T18:07:48.425-08:00jack day one<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">J</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">ack got his first view</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> of San Francisco where I-80 finally ceased its westward thrust to curve south past Berkeley. Four days earlier he had given his mother a goodbye hug on the porch of the Craftsman bungalow where he grew up, walked the strip of concrete that divided the front lawn early on an already muggy August morning and drove away from Kokomo on a dim promise from Wade, almost a rumor too unbelievable to be true. A bit after 2 p.m. his Oldsmobile and the U-Haul that had trailed it those four days curved west one final time to merge with the freeway arteries that led onto the Bay Bridge and into the City.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In the distance before him across the quicksilver shimmer of the bay the image of a tight cluster of office buildings backed by low hills rose into a bright haze. The connection took no leap of imagination, exactly like the movie, up ahead was Oz. Jack paid at the toll booth, slid his foot from brake to gas pedal and as the car moved onto the bridge proper he became a cliché, yet another new arrival.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">From the bridge he merely had to follow the directions given over the phone and he would arrive at his new home. ``It's on 16th just across Market from the main block of Castro Street,'' Wade's voice coming thin and tinny out of the Bakelite receiver, ``Jack, you'll be amazed.'' Then Wade laughed, ``And get a haircut, the sixties are over, it's a new decade out here.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The apartment key was under the mat, a welcome note was propped on the entry hall table, ``I get off work a bit after six, wait and we'll get a drink to celebrate your arrival.'' Jack couldn't wait, couldn't bother unloading, he had to get out into it, had to see what Wade meant by ``you'll be amazed.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The wide traffic lanes of Market Street were a last boundary in his journey. The light became green, the stream of cars parted and Jack crossed the intersection. As he stepped onto the far curb a group of pigeons hesitated, shuffled and then flared into the air a few feet to settle back to the sidewalk under the plate glass windows of the Twin Peaks bar. Inside old guys sat sideways on the barstools to stare out. Shit they must all be at least forty, thought Jack, old queens. A bit further and Jack became aware that all around him now were young men, smiling and gawking at one another, young and vibrant, reminded of his first Indiana State Fair, the excitement from disorientation at trying to take in too much too quickly. Without the smell of sawdust, damp straw and cow manure. All these guys out and this just a random weekday afternoon—doesn't anyone in San Francisco have to work?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He paused in the pleasant gloom under the theater marque to read the Now Playing poster, his own image, stringy hair, baggy pants, reflected pale over the frozen embrace, Audrey gazed up at Gary Cooper. Odor of buttered popcorn, a siren pull he had to resist, there was too much out here to see, he had to continue on. Humming ``It Was Fascination I Know. . .'' as he moved away from <i>Love In the Afternoon</i>. Wade had been right, Jack needed a haircut, not even half a block and already he could tell there was a prevailing style, short cropped hair, moustaches, tight faded jeans, trim and healthy. Making him feel even more obvious, out of place, more aware of his current status: <i>new in town sailor?</i></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Up ahead at the street corner he could see Hibernia Bank, remnant of the Irish influx, now Hibernia Beach, a row of shirtless guys preening against the granite wall, getting some sun while showing off. Every shop window he passed was a carefully decorated enticement, even the hardware store. At 18th St. he stopped, which direction? A deep steady bass sounded from his left like the approach of a parade. He turned that direction and stood outside a doorway covered by two heavy black leather curtains. Seemed a little early for a drink but it was three hours later back home, so . . . OK, a drink. The bass throb increased as two guys came out through the curtains, laughing, looking at Jack one said, ``Step right on in, always room for one more,'' as he held back the curtain.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Inside blaring disco pounded as he squinted while his eyes adjusted to the darkness. Human forms coalesced, slowly he could see that the long narrow barroom was jammed with bodies, they looked like the same young men he'd just seen on the street. Every barstool was occupied and people stood two and three deep behind. Those attempting to talk over the music were tilted towards one another, mouth close to ear.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Two guys who faced the door with their backs against the bar moved aside enough for Jack to squeeze in. When the bartender finally noticed, Jack stretched across the bartop and shouted, ``Gin-tonic.'' He watched the drink being mixed: ice, gin, more gin, and finally a little a splash of tonic. Jack pushed some bills across and shouted that he'd just moved here, confiding, ``This is my very first drink in San Francisco.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The bartender shut off the stereo, faces turning his direction as the amplified music faded away. ``This is on me,'' he said to Jack placing the drink and then he announced to the room, pointing, ``Another New One Here!'' And to Jack, ``Where you from?'' then loudly again to the crowd just before turning the music back up, ``Representing the Great State of Indiana.''</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Someone was patting Jack on the back as he reached for his glass and before he got one sip it seemed that people were trying to elevate him as if to show him off. The music was blaring again, he was being grabbed under his shoulders and then from behind his knees and suddenly he became airborn, spun in a whirlwind of hands, tilted on his back into a cushion of raised arms. The noise level alone seemed enough to bouy him aloft as he began to be passed feet first in celebration down the length of the bar.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Bewildered, hovering above these strangers, this was not the kind of attention he sought, then he relaxed and flowed with it. Everyone was laughing, arms rose automatically in an undulating wave to support him as he body surfed this curl of hands. He saw himself full in the mirror as he was borne floating amidst cigarette smoke and odors of cologne.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Around midbar the uplifted hands began tugging at his clothing, people giggling at his helplessness, he felt a shirttail slide out, a shoe went, a button popped. Fingers groped his flesh as he slid past, someone was tugging at his belt buckle, <i>Wait a minute here!</i> When the last hands let Jack down on a concrete floor in the rear of the barroom in a garish red, yellow and violet glow from pinball machines he was laughing giddily and completely naked.</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">What the hell was this place he'd come to?</span></div>
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<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>San Francisco, 1977</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-89805085946497649872012-08-23T21:49:00.007-07:002013-03-20T16:41:41.269-07:00wash that man<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rFzpzZiWEZg/T_91pfZ0f5I/AAAAAAAAAg0/yXJNXSu1iyc/s1600/marching1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rFzpzZiWEZg/T_91pfZ0f5I/AAAAAAAAAg0/yXJNXSu1iyc/s640/marching1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">D</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">an parked his car </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">in the lot where the road ended near the top of Mount Tam to meet a rocky trail that circled to the peak. This is what Jerry wanted, the kind of thing some New Age tourist would want done, but Dan had promised. He looked towards the summit and saw a red tail hawk float in a lazy circle against the blue as he hiked up into a dusty odor of wild fennel in the Indian summer heat. Two people on their way down nodded pleasantly when he stood aside for them to pass. As he made the top a breeze came up and Dan saw that he was alone, perfect. He undid the band at the back of his neck and bent slightly to let the wind shake his pony tail loose and protect his neck from the sun. Jerry had hated that long hair, ``The Summer of Love was twenty years ago, get over it.''</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A 360 degree view, off to the west a haze that would be the Pacific ocean, to the north the country ran clear up to the redwoods, south was the City and east was the Central Valley and all the rest of America. Dan stood there and gauged the wind as he pulled a plastic bag carried in a brown paper one and held it above his head and away, trying to think of something to say that might add meaning to the act, to make it something more than mere littering.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``So long Jerry,'' as he shook the contents into the air. Gray ash dropped and sifted and rose to stream away in a rapidly disappearing cloud.</span></div><br />
<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.0in;"><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">n retrospect </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> the China trip was a mistake, it had the opposite effect from that of bringing them closer. The long flights, stuck, squirming in their seats, the time changes, the round the clock companion became an ordeal as emotionally exhausting as the evening a year before when Jerry told Dan he was positive and had to tell him why. They sat up all night talking, just talking; they had been so careful for so long. Or at least one of them had.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan could remember their first night together. They met at the River, Dan should have realized at check-in when he glanced across the lobby through the sliding glass to the pool deck where burly men with trimmed beards wearing Speedos and construction boots stood around holding drinks, hairy bellies protruding from unbuttoned leather vests, that he might want to spend the next two days at some other resort. A Bear weekend, having to listen to their nauseating word plays in a Folsom Street bar was bad enough but you could easily leave a bar; here Dan would be stuck.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> He overheard ``Looks like someone could use a hug,'' before he was able to order a drink, caught the snide observation from men down the bar that ``There are other animals in this zoo,'' and nearly gagged when one grizzled guy growled, ``Come to pappa,'' because Dan mentally inserted the word 'bear' into each sentence.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">If he had a gun Dan thought gazing around, he'd make himself a bearskin rug.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jerry was not the kind Dan ever would've imagined he'd become involved with, but for a weekend fling sure why not. Fate put them next to one another out by the pool, Jerry making catty remarks about everyone that passed by, ``Jeeze, does that queen really believe anyone would believe she's a top?'' Introductions were unnecessary.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan couldn't tell exactly when he began warming to the guy but the next afternoon sitting in the sun again they ordered drinks, ``My treat,'' Jerry grinned as he looked over to wink, ``Honey.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The obviously new waiter, swamped, visibly flustered, took forever to bring the two drinks and, after asking for three dollars and seeing the twenty Jerry held out, apologized, ``I'll have to go back inside to get your change.'' Jerry raised his head from the deck chair to peer up at the kid. ``Keep it,'' he said as he rolled away, ``Maybe you'll be a little quicker next time.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Reclined there on the wet concrete surrounded by sounds of splashing and carousing Dan saw the cub behind that gruff burly exterior.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">So a weekend turned into weeks and then it made no sense to keep two apartments, Jerry enjoying the redecorating (``A place to hibernate, you know.'') and Dan plotting trips for him and the homebody.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">But in time the playful curmudgeonly quips that had once made Jerry seem so personable and quick witted, that made you forgive him even when he overstepped bounds, became caustic and crude; eventually Dan moved out. ``I'll make you regret this!'' Jerry snarled. So when Dan got the phone call that Jerry was in 5A at SF General he joked to friends, ``I didn't realize the lengths Jerry would go through to make those words true.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After that first crisis Dan stayed at Jerry's overnight, listening to him come awake from some terror; Jerry was so afraid to be alone, some tough guy. But as the trips to General became more common, the priest coming in the room, the last rites, holy water and solemn incantations, <i>maligna discordia,</i> then Jerry pulling out of it and being released. Dan would try to go back to his own place, ``Jerry the doctors said you're stabilized, they can't do anything more for you, I want to go home and get a good night's sleep for work.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He'd take personal leave during the day to drive Jerry to the various appointments, the aerosal pentamidine, exams, counseling, the waiting rooms, he'd clean the fridge, toss out the foil containers, their white cardboard tops penciled with the contents, unopened, uneaten, delivered each day by Open Hand.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan remembered that last night with Jerry, once again last rites, the priest gone, after they discharged him, after they'd gotten back from the hospital. Dan helped Jerry get into bed and then went to the doorway and turned. ``I'm going home, I've got to work tomorrow, the doctors said you're OK.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jerry was adamant about Dan staying, begging, ``I'll do anything, just stay here with me this one night.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Do anything? Anything, Jerry?'' Dan was overwhelmed by what he felt, exhausted mentally, physically, how many years now had they both been part of this? ``Anything? You're never going to get better. If you'll do anything for me then you'll just die.'' Jerry's face contorted into a fierce scowl and then he realized how Dan meant those words. Dan watched as the glaring face softened, as Jerry let go of his fear and lay back relaxed, at peace. Jerry smiled at Dan as he closed his eyes and settled in for a long winter's nap.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2NuHX0we7ks/T_915-XxRQI/AAAAAAAAAhE/26APiYNB4j8/s1600/marching5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2NuHX0we7ks/T_915-XxRQI/AAAAAAAAAhE/26APiYNB4j8/s640/marching5.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">A</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.0in;"><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">s Dan </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">watched the remains spread off into the blue above Mt. Tamalpias it seemed like Jerry got back at him one last time. The wind shifted, whipped around to reverse its flow as the ash suddenly buoyed with spirit. Dan screamed ``You fucking asshole!'' into the enormous sky overhead as a hard grit blew across his face and eyes, scattered into his hair and covered his clothing. He drove back across the bridge working his mouth to clear the dry gravel irritant. When he got home Dan stood in the shower looking down at his bare feet on the enamel of the tub, the water flowing sleek over the back of his neck and splatter to a swirl of shampoo suds pooling into the drain. ``Right out'a my hair,'' he sang, ``Gonna wash that man right . . . right . . . right.''</span></div><br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖     ❖     ❖</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan was left to clean Jerry's apartment, toss out the last dinner boxes in the fridge, pack up personal mementos to send to his mother; he kept all the amber bottles of pills because you never know. On the floor of a closet shoved to the back he found a box of porn videos, most showing a blond surfer type on the cover and thought, ``Thank god I dyed my hair before going to the River that weekend.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">You hold the yard sale, watch the posessions go to strangers because friends don't want to take advantage, what doesn't sell goes to Community Thrift, then you carefully pull the door on the empty room. That's it, that's a life, end of story. Next to nothing to show that this one person had ever existed on the planet.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dan kept the apartment key for few months more, he just liked the feel of it in his pocket. He made a quilt panel using a borrowed sewing machine and when he previewed the three foot by six foot blanket of cloth spread out on the living room floor Dan felt something was missing. He got a pair of scissors, reached behind his head and cut off the pony tail that Jerry always hated. Then he pulled a corner of the cloth back up to the machine, folded an edge over that length of hair and sewed it into the lining.</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">__________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-52987801878621106852012-07-05T15:52:00.009-07:002012-11-11T19:55:02.127-08:00tourist town<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f3UepvxO9DM/T9aak6R6dMI/AAAAAAAAAbg/ypcrG2ECTp8/s1600/alcatraz1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f3UepvxO9DM/T9aak6R6dMI/AAAAAAAAAbg/ypcrG2ECTp8/s640/alcatraz1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">C</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">alifornia as a destination began to insert itself in the minds of the post-WWII baby boomers with the weekly <i>Disneyland/ Walt Disney Presents</i>  television program which first aired in October, 1954. The theme song, ``When You Wish Upon a Star'' and the programming mix of fantasy, adventure, the American frontier and the American future made it seem that Tomorrowland was just around the corner. Besides displaying Donald Duck and Davy Crockett, other Disney episodes imprinted the young brains with ``Man in Space'' and ``Our Friend, the Atom,'' shows indicated the future was in Anaheim, California. this hourlong weekly ad for the Magic Kingdom caused untold numbers of families piled into automobiles and hit Route 66 as choruses of ``When are we going to get there? When are we gonna get there?'' chimed from the wide back seats.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">This vocal anxiety was entirely understandable, their destination was the Happiest Place on Earth.</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">This West Coast tourist industry made possible by the automobile and enhanced by cross country air travel did not go unnoticed in San Francisco. The shipping based economy had been in decline with loss of stevedore and longshoreman jobs to the container freight-handling capabilities of the Port of Oakland across the bay. Because of the mild weather San Francisco had a year-round tourist season to provide permanent jobs unlike say a Cape Cod summer or Key West winter.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The City began advertising this ``come anytime'' aspect in East Coast papers, something that went like, ``In February when it's a bitter snowy 23 degrees in New York City, it's 68 in San Francisco. And in August when it's a sweltering 97 degrees in New York, it's 68 in San Francisco.'' To which some wag added, ``And when there are one thousand intelligent conversations in New York, there are 68 in San Francisco.''</span></div><br />
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<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖ ❖ ❖</span></div><br />
<span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 90px; line-height: 90px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">A</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;"> large tour bus</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 32px;"> crawls down Castro Street past the movie theater marque. Eerie silhouettes in the obsidian windows seem to glower down toward the sidewalk crowded with a bustle of young men. This swing through the Castro has only recently been added to the route and soon will be banned as gays gain political clout in 1975: <i>We're not a zoo display!</i></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-yrlk6BbEYrw/TngPGMN7tdI/AAAAAAAAAOE/O1b_vU2igb4/s1600/old-gals2-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="183" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-yrlk6BbEYrw/TngPGMN7tdI/AAAAAAAAAOE/O1b_vU2igb4/s320/old-gals2-24.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Inside the bus, in a pleasant gloom insulated from the sun glare and chill wind out on the street, tour guide George stands just behind driver Al's partition holding a microphone as he describes sights the bus cruises past. SF history for the out of town folk, this blue hair crowd, each face turned to a window. If it's a couple the man will sit on the aisle and usually try to appear disinterested.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The routine is a glib easy banter between George the pudgy loveable teddy bear, all enthusiasm and big smile, and Al the driver, the grounded, no nonsense curmudgeon, greying hair pulled into a tight pony tail. Today already they've been across the Golden Gate Bridge, to the top of Twin Peaks, a stop at the Cliff House, everybody out, smell that salt air, George asking as they park, ``Al, I bet you'd like to have a drink at the bar in there.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I sure would George, but can't while I'm driving.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Well I guess I'll just have to have one extra for you.''</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Pickup was Union Square and they swung through Chinatown, then approaching Columbus and Broadway George points out City Lights bookstore, explains, ``The beatnik era in San Francisco was a mad gay party; the women were mad because the men were gay.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Waiting at the light across from the Condor Al keeps hands on wheel,eyes straight ahead as he leans to the mike, ``George, I got a question for you. The northern part of the City is at least a mile from here over by Aquatic Park, right.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Yes Al, that's right.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``And do you see any beach around here?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">George stoops down and peers out, ``No Al I don't, what's your point?''</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LYCPTGC9Cfg/T_TIjO-xchI/AAAAAAAAAfA/RVNXMDN_2Ns/s1600/gg-bridge-004.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="191" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LYCPTGC9Cfg/T_TIjO-xchI/AAAAAAAAAfA/RVNXMDN_2Ns/s320/gg-bridge-004.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Then why is it called North Beach?''</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At the Condor under the three story vertical sign of topless Carol Doda, red light bulb nipples, George bends sideways to gaze up at this monument to silicone. ``The corner where topless was born. One night after barhopping Al went topless along Broadway and earned the distinction of being the only person ever arrested in San Francisco for indecent exposure.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">And passing Fisherman's Wharf on the way to the Bridge, ``Al claims they saw an actual fisherman here in 1971.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After the Cliff House they cruise through the Park and down Haight Street. As they cross Ashbury, ``Al spent all his time hanging out here while his parents thought they were paying for him to be in college, you can probably understand why he's driving a bus now.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Still on Haight Street Al leans over to his mike, ``George, how many hippies does it take to screw in a light bulb?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I don't know Al, how many hippies does it take to screw in a light bulb?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Hippies don't screw in light bulbs George, hippies screw in dirty sleeping bags.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Always a silence as the old gals try to decipher the punch line, eventually there's a a groan or a nervous cackle and some uneasy laughter, this is what they came to Frisco for, a little bit of the naughty, we're not in Kansas. OK, now we get it as one leans to whisper to the other: <i>Hippies screw in dirty sleeping bags</i>.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A few blocks later they are moving slowly along Castro viewing storefronts from lintel height, the parade of young men. Al leans over to his mike while eyes stay on the road, ``George, do you know anybody that's gay?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">George gives it a second as he watches the faces turn from the windows, then he does a little sashay in the aisle with wrist flip to answer, ``Well, Al, you know <i>I'm gay! </i>'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Never fails to crack them up.</span></div><br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖ ❖ ❖</span></div><br />
<div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">I</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n summer 1964 a woman dancing on a piano topless, a Republican convention and a <i>Life</i>  magazine spread that showed brooding Brando/James Dean gay men all collided for a perfect media storm to make San Francisco seem <i>the</i> risqué spot to be in America, a Disneyland with bars, something for absolutely everyone; the burgeoning tourist industry could not have wanted for better publicity (``You looking for something?'' the guy said to Jack, ``Well I have it.'') Every newspaper in the world had mention of the Barbary Coast. Marshall McLuhan, served lunch by a young woman with bare breasts at a table full of journalists observed, ``They're wearing us.'' The <i>discothéques</i>  of North Beach seemed so sauve, so Continental, you could almost hear someone at the bar say, as that E-minor guitar chord is strummed, ``Name is Bond, . . . James Bond.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">San Francisco in 1964, shaken not stirred.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ffPDBaC1xs0/T_TJEW9YZ7I/AAAAAAAAAfY/zourxY5uEAE/s1600/gg-bridge-010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="187" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ffPDBaC1xs0/T_TJEW9YZ7I/AAAAAAAAAfY/zourxY5uEAE/s320/gg-bridge-010.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">An influx of new arrivals (the first wave of Baby Boomers had just finished high school), checking out the scene, picking up those easy service industry jobs. At the end of one summer the owners of a restaurant in Sausalito held a TGTG party for the staff, Thank Goodness They're Gone, now just us locals, us true residents, we can relax and enjoy this wonderland that is California. A week after that two-thirds of them were layed off because now that Those Tourists Were Gone most of the staff was unnecessary.</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A young man in Hong Kong announced to his family that he was moving to San Francisco to seek his fortune. The father gave a blessing of sorts, he said, ``Son, if you can't make it in a tourist town you won't be able to make it anywhere.''</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-33536822895534428182012-05-29T20:58:00.010-07:002014-07-13T19:39:42.766-07:00more different stuff<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lu-rzdc8LW0/TptNc0BysQI/AAAAAAAAAUo/liX8AQEVcBw/s1600/halloween3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="396" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lu-rzdc8LW0/TptNc0BysQI/AAAAAAAAAUo/liX8AQEVcBw/s640/halloween3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin-bottom: -18px; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 8px; margin-top: -4px;">A</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">fter he had called in sick to work Ralph sat on the couch and flipped through the <i>TV Guide</i>. Let's see, <i>Good Morning America.</i> Seemed about right as a start to this day: Good Morning, America—how's everybody doing this fine day? Later he'd have to make decisions, which channel. His finger slid down the grid underneath the twelve noon slot: <i>Days of Our Lives,</i> sounds OK. <i>Guiding Light,</i> exactly what I need. <i>General Hospital,</i> seen that a bit too much. <i>One Life to Live.</i> Felt as if his own life had merged with these daytime soaps.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">What to watch this fine morning—decisions, decisions.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Earlier while getting ready for work he had passed by the open doorway to Bobby's room and paused. Bobby usually kept the door closed because of his horrid grating cough. Today the door stood open. Ralph heard a slow cadenced counting, ``eleven, . . . twelve, . . . thirteen.'' Looking in, window shades were up, morning light filled the room. Bobby was sitting with back against the headboard, a water glass in one hand and a bright yellow capsule in the other. He was methodically swallowing pills from a pile scattered on the nightstand, a little pot of gold at the end of his rainbow. He'd pick up pill, place in mouth, sip of water, tilt head, swallow, pick up pill, mouth, sip, swallow and repeat. Announcing each one with a number, drama queen to the end.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Today's the day?'' Ralph asked.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Bobby raised a finger, <i>Wait just a second</i>, took a sip, swallowed and looked over smiling, ``Fourteen—didn't want to lose count.'' Then, ``Right, today is the day.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">As Bobby picked up another Nembutal Ralph asked, ``Anything I should do? Guess you won't be wanting any coffee.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Peace and quiet. You go on to work. Just another day, OK.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">That's when Ralph called in sick, he didn't know why, he just figured he should stick around. He went into the kitchen and started a pot of coffee then went back to the living room and sat down in front of the TV and picked up the <i>Guide</i> to plan out his own day.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Around noon Ralph checked in on Bobby and found him sleeping quietly, completely at peace, his breathing smooth and untroubled with none of the spasmodic cough and violent eruptions of the past months. This was not right, the pills should have done their work by now. Ralph dialed the number for Emergency Services at SF General and explained, ``My roommate has AIDS and took a bunch of barbiturates to kill himself but he hasn't died—he's not going to become a vegetable or anything?'' Ralph knew he probably wasn't making a whole lot of sense but when the person got excited, almost yelling, Give us your address, we'll get an ambulance over immediately!, he hung up.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At five that afternoon, after the soap operas ended, as the evening commute home had begun, Ralph checked again. He stood in the doorway and scanned the silent room, everything clean and in order in the fading light, that's Bobby, the empty bedside table, the water glass, hesitant to enter, wondering if he should feel something more than he does: drained. The body lay motionless under the sheet, the distant voices of a television commercial now more present and alive than his roommate. From a birth 32 years ago to this room wrapped up neatly. Bobby had been successful in his last endeavor, maybe Ralph should feel proud.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><i>One life to live.</i></span></div><br />
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<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖     ❖     ❖</span></div><br />
<span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin-bottom: -18px; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 8px; margin-top: -4px;">O</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n Thursday, July 1, 1993 about 3 p.m., pudgy, moustache sporting Gian Luigi Ferri, age 55, wheeled a sample case strapped to a dolly into an elevator of the 101 California Street building in downtown San Francisco and rode to the 34th floor. He appeared to be just another salesman making his last call of the workday. He pressed the red <i>Emergency</i> button to hold the elevator, stepped into the empty hallway and located the door to the conference room of the Pettit & Martin law offices. He paused outside the door to insert ear protectors and then he pushed it open.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Before settling down to business that afternoon the people in the room would have talked of their plans for the long weekend, kids, barbeques, fireworks displays. Not one would have known Gian Luidi Ferri as he entered, the only dealings the firm ever had with him had taken place over ten years before. Somehow Ferri got the demented idea that all his current problems had begun compounding from that single encounter.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The case he towed contained hundreds of rounds of ammunition for the two Intratec DC9 semi-automatic assault pistols with Hell-Fire trigger systems and the .45 caliber Colt holstered under his suitcoat. He sprayed the room with one of the TEC-9s and then moved to two lower floors firing at anyone he saw on each. Eight of the 14 random people he shot that afternoon died. He then used the .45 on himself when trapped in the raw concrete stairwell as over one hundred SFPD stormed the highrise. Ferri had been in the 101 California building about 15 minutes total.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After police verified the building was secure (a time consuming procedure during which people bled to death that otherwise could have been saved) paramedics moved most of the victims to the place best suited to handle emergencies, San Francisco General Hospital. The ER there has had a lot of experience with gunshot wounds.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A nurse on duty the afternoon of the 101 California shootings related how the next day a team of trauma counselors went through that building to assist those who worked there and later came over to the hospital to provide the same service to those on the floor that day.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The nurse remembered another afternoon when things were slow and she and a coworker were able to take a break to eat the sandwiches they'd brought for lunch. They sat across from the glass doors of the entrance ramp at the rear of the building in a pleasant, warm area lulled by the sleepy drone of routine hospital sounds. They watched as a large Lincoln with dark windows swerved into the parking lot and slammed to a halt near the delivery area. A black kid jumped out of the car, grabbed a gurney from beside the doorway and pushed it to the sedan where two other young blacks hauled a body onto the palette. All three then wheeled the gurney up the incline to the doorway, rammed the doors open and gave the gurney a hard shove inside as they turned and raced back to the car.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The gurney rolled across the floor and hit the wall next to where the two nurses sat eating. The body of a black kid rolled off and landed in an awkward crumple at their feet, wide eyes gazed at nothing. He'd been shot in the head and much of what had been inside was now oozing out from the blood caked hair and misshapened skull as they stared down holding their sandwiches.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The nurses didn't get to finish their lunch and later no one came to give them any trauma counseling either.</span></div><br />
<br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖     ❖     ❖</span></div><br />
<span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin-bottom: -18px; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 8px; margin-top: -4px;">S</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">weat crawled from his forehead and funneled into his eyes where he tried to blink away the sting. Tommie was standing guard duty in the heat 50 yards beyond the edge of the tarmac. He could see the dark treeline shimmer across a wide stretch of dried vegetation and he felt about as useless as a scarecrow in December. His C.O. had ordered him out here, out where no one ever stood guard, exposed to any VC sniper, listening to the dull whine of insects that sought the moisture on his face. From the airbase far to his back Tommie first heard and then felt the thump of the rotors and watched a Cobra swing around the perimeter and turn in his direction to settle into a lazy hover and slowly advance, scattering a circle of dust and grit that speckled his face. He squeezed his eyes shut and when he could open them he saw the grin of the forward copilot/gunner as the turret minigun swept back and forth across his position.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Tommie had joined the Marines at age seventeen at the height of the Vietnam war, his parents gave consent and all concerned were glad for him to be out of the house. He had been in-country nine months when he was caught having sex with a sailor. The Company Commander was livid, ``Son, if it was up to me we'd put you in front of a firing squad, toss the body into a paddie and be done with it.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Standing at attention in front of the desk Tommie watched the man in starched fatigues barely able to control his rage, ''But the Marine Corps doesn't see it my way, the Colonel just wants to give you a bad conduct discharge and get you out of here soon as possible so us soldiers can get on with this war.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At first confined to quarters, then billeted alone and separate in a tent with no sandbags and now given this special guard duty, to stand all day alone, almost off-base while two Marines in an attack helicopter hover and glare at him. The expedited discharge came through and when the C.O. realized it meant Tommie was going home he tried to rescind the orders, wanted to keep Tommie there a little longer, send the little queer home in a body bag.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">But he was unsuccessful and on Tommie's last day with the outfit he stood again in front of the desk with two MPs waiting outside the door. Even now the C.O. was trying, on the phone, ``Yes Colonel I'm aware of that but the situation here has changed and we'd like to keep him a bit longer.'' A silence as he listens and then, before hanging up, a dejected, ``Yes sir.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The man signs along the bottom of the sheet of paper on his desk, pushes it in Tommie's direction and finally looks up, ``Get out! Get out of my sight!''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Tommie made it back to the world and at some point moved to San Francisco with the great influx of the late 1970s. There, a bit over a decade later, what the VC and the NVA and the USMC had been unable to do HIV accomplished.</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">____________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-3096872653309061082012-04-15T16:08:00.004-07:002013-02-02T20:20:08.530-08:00cabbie<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0ucujp9E8Ik/To0hoFuaP4I/AAAAAAAAARA/pP1plXzAObk/s1600/house2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="382" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0ucujp9E8Ik/To0hoFuaP4I/AAAAAAAAARA/pP1plXzAObk/s640/house2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;"><i>K</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">elly had borrowed one of Cindy's purses the previous weekend to match a drag outfit and she realized that it would go perfectly with what she was planning to wear this evening. She went downstairs to his apartment, told him she needed the purse for a party. Kelly thanked her and in handing it over mentioned how it had been a big hit with all the girls. Cindy started up the stairs then remembered the roommate Greg had borrowed her toilet plunger so again knocked and explained she needed that as well. She waited as Kelly walked down the hall and returned to hand her the plunger. He began to close the door and then, looking at her standing there holding a purse in one hand and a toilet plunger in the other, asked, ``Just what kind of party is this you're going to?''</i></span></div><br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖ ❖ ❖</span></div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 90px; line-height: 90px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0px;">L</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 18px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">ouis pulled to the curb </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">and stopped the cab under a tree between the street lamps that had just illuminated. A few late clouds scattered pink off the last light of a sun somewhere beyond Twin Peaks and the coast, far out over the Pacific. Sitting here where Castro peaks at 22nd he can see when a vehicle approaches from either direction. He dug a small vial from his jacket pocket, unscrewed the plastic cap and lifted the tiny attached spoon to his left nostril, twisting his mouth to close off the right nostril. Just a quick little toot or two to help him forget this shift, this day. He leaned back and exhaled, eyes closed, breathing slowly through his mouth, needed to calm down after that Opera drop. What a world, need a sedative to perk up, a stimulant to calm down. His next fare can wait a few minutes.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">First call of the shift this afternoon, hours ago, he should have just kept going, three black women need a ride over to Marin City, the Sausalito ghetto. LBJ War On Poverty money of the previous decade, the Model Cities generals erected a revetment to stem the encroachment of affluence. They found a spot with no sweeping views of the Bay or proximity to quaint shops, just a glimpse of mud flats and distant lights of the mansions of Belvedere, shoved above 101 with cars streaming along the freeway below.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Still daylight and these three women are already drunk, gabbing and jiving, two the backseat and one in front, across the Golden Gate. No way all three of these large gals would fit in back. Louis shouldn't have picked them up, liberal guilt overruling common cabbie sense. Maybe someday he'll learn.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He swings around the curved drive to stop in front of a five story pillbox apartment house squatting in a hollow and these gals don't have any money. Not one of them has any money.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"You come on in, my sister's got cash," the first out says as they walk toward a salmon pink building.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Well yeah, he's going to trot into a housing project, even in daylight, this white boy will trot right up into that housing project. Sure. Louis stands by the open cab door watching her. No half a league onward for this soldier.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"Come in have a drink," she yells back from the open doorway.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"Can't, gotta work."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"I'll make ya' a K-K-K." Standing there with a big grin, "You know what that is don't you?" She emphasizes each word as she tells him what that is, "That's a Korbel, Korbel and Korbel."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At least he got paid.</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he tree leaves above the idling cab quiver in a slight breeze, splotches of streetlight wash across the dashboard. Louis is breathing easy now, methodically, starting to relax. Really ought to get out and check the front bumper, see if a swash of paint from a Rolls Royce improves the appearance. Fuck, lucky I'm not in jail for that one. Two Castro dandies in tuxes somehow scored tickets to opening night at the opera, they're in the backseat squealing, excited, one of them even attempts to sing. Sounds horrid but it's opera so how can you tell?</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Louis probably passed this same pair last night on Natoma, bringing in a couple from SFO, trunk full of luggage, staying at one of those Union Square hotels. It's a bit past 10p.m. so he gives them the real tour, comes off 280 at 7th and instead of going on across Market he does a little jog through the dark alleys.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">From the back seat he hears the man say, "Must be a rock concert, all these people waiting in line." Louis hits the brights so they get a better look. "All these people" are guys lined up along the alley with backs leaned against a wall. But they're hearing a different music, they've got their pants unbuckled and there are just as many guys crouched on knees in front of them. When the beams hit some pop up and turn away, others glare as the cab slides past, but most just keep going at it, white thighs above bunched Levi's and heads moving in sinusoidal motion, the pump house gang.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">From the back seat he hears the women exclaim, "<i>Oh . . . My . . . God!</i> " as the cab clears the alley past a group of men standing around a telephone pole to which another is tied.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Welcome to San Francisco folks, Fruit and Nut Capital of the world.</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">C</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ops are directing traffic along Van Ness, the opening night gala began in the City Hall rotunda across the avenue from the Opera House, a seated dinner for the million dollar donors and now they're all jaywalking as if they own the street to where a line of young men in white tux coats, black pants and black bow ties await them before the magnificent entryway.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Women in dresses that have names, Oscar and Ralph and Rucci ("so who will you be wearing?" Silence of the Lambs), the men in sleek black and he can't get through to drop these two off. A real zoo is floating across Van Ness front of the cab, penguins with peacocks. Someone has parked a 1934 Rolls Royce (the small California tag above the long European tag reads "34ROLZ"), cherry, open cab for the driver, steering wheel on the right, shining maroon and black, chrome headlights the size of pumpkins, it's set a bit out beyond the curb lane on display to add a bit more elegance to this little shindig.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">These people here seem more intent in looking about, being seen, than in getting inside, the arrival is more important than the ultimate destination. Some woman about to cross in front of him turns and waves and that's enough of a gap to get the cab through, make a little sashay, smooth sailing to the free curb space up ahead.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Except for that dammed Rolls, a bit too wide for America and the edge of his bumper makes a little slash along the front side as he slides past. In the mirror he sees his passengers turn, staring out the rear window, one is bleating, "Look what he did to that beautiful car! How could you do that!" Louis accelerates, rounds the corner out of sight along the side of the building. He pulls over, the cab settles to a stop and gets very quiet.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"Listen you two fucks!" yelling as he swings around to them staring like two wide-eyed lemurs in the back, "I know where you live, if this ever gets back to the company it's going to be your fucking asses, <i>capiche?</i>" </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">They toss him a twenty for the $5.70 fare and quickly exit.</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">A</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">t the crest of the hill Louis takes a deep breath, time to get back to work, shifts into drive, the cab descends into Noe Valley. Outside the address he sees the front window lights go out on the second floor and a porch light come on. <i>Holy shit!</i> as the door opens and this amazing blond, short skirt, thin hips, heels, great legs, emerges slinging a handbag across her shoulder and comes down the stairway. This can't be real, god, not another fucking drag queen. Louis twists around to watch as she turns to slide into the back seat, trying to catch the Adam's apple, the hands. She tosses her head and as she gives him an address on Buena Vista he sees just enough. <i>Yes!</i> exactly how the proud father must feel: "<i>It's a girl!</i> "</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Louis now retraces his route back over the hump from Noe Valley and down into the Golden Ghetto of the Castro. A little rolling stop at 19th just as two guys enter the crosswalk so that he has to brake hard. "Goddam faggots!" He glances in the mirror at his passenger. A half block on, as he nears 18th, another guy jaywalks unconcerned right in front of him and Louis has to brake again, yells over the squeal, "Fuck! These fucking queers think they own the street. What'd'ya have to do, kill a couple before they get the message?"</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He glances in the mirror, her head is turned, profile, blond hair, gazing off to the left.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Louis is still shaking his head as they sit the long light at Market but somehow gets to BV Park without plowing into any pedestrians. He pulls up at the address, an enormous Victorian with steps up to a wrap-around porch and bright light coming through the beveled leaded glass of the double doorway.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">His passenger exits quickly from behind him and stands next to window digging into her purse. He rolls the window down to hear her count out loud each dollar bill and then each of the coins until she has the exact amount on the meter. She hands the money across while staring directly at him. Louis looks at it then gives her the old <i>what, no tip?</i> expression.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The blond hair flips as she nods her head towards the house, ``I'm going to a party in that place there,'' she tells him, ``and it's going to be just full of fags.''</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-76229327760306782662012-03-16T20:46:00.014-07:002014-07-19T13:05:58.042-07:00some 70s stuff<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-I3D5tdcS91E/T07Nr2CmYdI/AAAAAAAAAaI/7AzmL9k9v5Y/s1600/gals-gun1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-I3D5tdcS91E/T07Nr2CmYdI/AAAAAAAAAaI/7AzmL9k9v5Y/s640/gals-gun1.jpg" height="386" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> little girl snuggled close to her mother at a display counter in the cosmetics section of Saks Union Square suddenly begins tugging at the blouse, wide eyed, pointing down the aisle. ``Mommie,'' she squeals, astonished, ``<i>Look!</i> ''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Preening in the wide main aisle two counters over is a pair of black men in tawdry drag, short leather skirts, ripped magenta fishnets, leopard spike heels, enormous false eyelashes, one daubing makeup on the other from the floor samples, arching back the long painted nails of fingers that hold the brush. ''I think you need a little more right <i>HERE!</i>''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The newly annointed leans to inspect the result in a countertop mirror and the other steps back to proclaim as heads turn, ''Da<i>hl</i> ing, you look <i>fab</i> ulous!''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The mother has already looked and takes the daughter's hand, ``Yes honey, I see, now let's just go over to this other counter right over here.'' They walk away through the odor of perfumes and powders as the little girl continues to swivel and gawk, her face still turned as they round a corner. Then she looks up and confides, ''Mommie, I'm not sure I'd like to live in San Francisco.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">wo young men with their arms around one another wait for the light to change at the corner of Powell and Geary by Union Square. The red bandanas in opposing back pockets of their jeans flutter and twist in the gusting August wind. One leans closer to the other with a nudge to indicate another couple also waiting, a black man holding hands with a white girl. He lisps to his partner, ''I don't care what you're supposed to think, I'll just never get used to that.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n the hallway space on the fourth floor of Macy's between the doors marked ``Men'' and ``Women'' a woman pulls a resisting twelve-year old boy by the arm toward the door marked ``Women.'' He keeps announcing loudly, ``I don't like this, I don't like this one bit.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I don't care,'' the woman snaps as she pushes open the door. ``As long as you're my son you are not going into a men's bathroom alone in San Francisco.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖ ❖ ❖</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he Pacific squall that shook the window frames and slapped rain hard against the panes during the night had passed through and now in the morning the wet streets gleam in the sunlight and are littered with twigs and small branches that show the new green of spring. Jack has the car window down to breath the cleansed air as he drives to Irving Street to check out the junk shop Auntie Mame. He needs an armoire as there is no closet in the room he's been relegated. The radio warns that a small craft advisory was still in effect on the Bay until noon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guy at the register nods as Jack enters the shop and turns back to conversing with his friend. Tables, low dressers, random chairs formed a maze he has to traverse to reach the far wall where the tall lacquered wood cabinets are lined. He passes an open doorway to a second room with a "No Admittance" sign strung across the opening. The person standing just beyond asks if he needs any help and then says let me know if you do.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack opens a few doors and looks inside but the interior space seems so tiny for their large form factor. Before backing out he scans the framed pictures and beveled mirrors lining the wall and then wends his way to the front. All three guys are standing at the counter now and Jack smiles as he nears the door.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``That was some rainstorm we had last night.'' one says. Jack nods in agreement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guy at the register turns to look directly at Jack and adds, ``Yeah, there sure was a lot of <i>blowing</i> going on.''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ne summer the medical library at SF General was allowed to hire a teen from the minority community and they got Lisa, a sweet, shy, studious black girl about 14 or 15 years old who lived in the Bayview. She quickly learned to properly reshelve books and put out the new journals each day and fell easily into the casual pace of library work, humming softly as she pushed the cart around the stacks. Every week the staff went to lunch as a group to one of the inexpensive restaurants around the hospital and on this occasion they ate at a Chinese place. Lisa stared at the menu and told them that this was the first time in her life she'd ever had Chinese food. Then, as more of an admission, that this was the first time in her life she'd ever had a meal in a restaurant of any kind. The Bayview was a reality quite removed from that of the glossy tourist brochure San Francisco. Lisa fumbled with the chopsticks, giggling embarrassed as she dropped one before she used a fork, she was bemused by the fortune cookie, was it serious? and the experience would've been pleasant if she hadn't had an adverse reaction to the MSG.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A few weeks into the summer Lisa came in to work on Monday with one arm slung in a cast, face scraped and scarred and a dark purple bruise on her brown skin around an eye. Taking Muni home there was always a long wait at Evans to transfer to the 15 so standard procedure was to hitch-hike, if you got a ride before the bus showed you were that much ahead. The guy that stopped last Friday was going to Bayview and she thought she'd be home early until he turned back toward the freeway heading away from Third Street. Lisa sat there in the front seat and knew she was about to be raped.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At the end of the school term the San Francisco Department of Public Health had given a lecture with a film on the dangers of venereal disease to these kids as they entered their sexually active years and the talk had made an impression on Lisa. So as the guy accelerated up the on ramp she pushed open the door and dove out of the car.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It wasn't the probability of being raped that scared Lisa, she could've handled that, it was the fear that the guy might have one of those diseases she'd been warned about and she didn't want none of that VD.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-59202209196808057902012-01-31T21:22:00.003-08:002012-03-17T14:33:59.468-07:00being tested<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f8GuSrDHeiU/TyHsmICbvkI/AAAAAAAAAY8/rXLHBQR4Irs/s1600/parade-float3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="386" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f8GuSrDHeiU/TyHsmICbvkI/AAAAAAAAAY8/rXLHBQR4Irs/s640/parade-float3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">E</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">arly evening he sat at the bar in the Elephant Walk and the guy next to him starts the conversation with a question, ``Where is everybody? I lived here seven years ago, in '79 and you couldn't get in this place it was so packed. I moved up to Oregon, this is the first time I've been back. Where'd everybody go?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He knew what the guy meant and it wasn't just people that were gone, something else was gone as well, a palpable joy among the customers at that time, the feeling that this was the best party ever. And it wasn't only gays in the Castro, back then the singles crowd, the breeders, had filled fern bars on Union St. and the Bermuda Triangle and the bars in North Beach. A guy dressed as W. C. Fields would move through those places some nights, tails and top hat, little cane, white gloves and white spats over his shoes, looked exactly like Fields, smiling at the gals, ``Hello, my Little Chickadee,'' the accent perfect, it really was W.C. right there in the bar. Story was he'd even had silicon injected into his nose to make it more bulbous. Richard Brautigan in a North Beach bar chatting up two girls and when they didn't know who he was he ran over to City Lights and bought them copies of his books with his picture on the back.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Now even in those straight bars that insouciance and exuberance which had filtered over from the Castro was damped down. How else could he answer the guy in the Elephant Walk, he looked down at his drink and muttered, ``Don't think about it too much.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``I know <i>that</i>,'' the visitor replied, ``I know what you're saying, but still, it can't be that bad.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In a way the visitor sitting in this quiet, half empty bar at the corner of Castro and 18th in 1986 was right, it wasn't that bad, at least for those who weren't living in the midst of it. For those who were, it was much, much . . .</span></div><br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖     ❖     ❖</span></div><br />
<div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">G</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">etting tested, the new form of commitment. Larry and Doug had their blood drawn two weeks before and now sat in the waiting room of the Health Center on 17th Street. Each would be called individually by number into a small office room and each would close the door and be told the results of the test. Many would exit that door into a much different world than the one from which they'd entered.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Lore was that if you came out quickly you were negative, the ones that stayed in the room were being counseled, told what they should do in the face of this new information. There were stories that some people had worried for so long that they were actually relieved on learning they were positive, no more uncertaintly about how their future was written.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Larry was called first and Doug gave his hand a little squeeze. Larry knew what kind of life he'd led, knew where he'd been and what he'd done and he thoroughly expected the worst. Friends had actually remarked with playful black humor that they were amazed he was still alive. Doug stared at the closed door in hopes there was a prize behind it.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Minutes passed and the door remained shut. Five minutes became seven and Doug finally couldn't stand it, he went to the door, knocked lightly and opened it. Larry was in the chair facing the desk sobbing and the counseler was standing bent next to him holding his shoulders. Larry craned his face around, his checks glistened with tears and blubbered, ``I'm negative! <i>I'm negative!</i>''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The counseler had been trained for grief, not elation, and was at a loss as to what to do.</span></div><br />
<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">❖     ❖     ❖</span></div><br />
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<div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 70px; line-height: 70px; margin: -4px 8px -18px 0pt;">Y</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">ou phoned to make an appointment, were given a date and time to show up and a six digit number, the only way you would be known. The testing and the results were completely anonymous.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">On blood draw day you went into a room where a nurse wearing rubber gloves would tie off your arm, slide a needle into the bulged vein and withdraw about ten cc of dark venous blood into a plastic tube which is capped, labeled with your number and placed in a rack with similar tubes of fresh blood.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">You returned to the same place to hear the results. The waiting room had chairs along the wall, old magazines, random people sitting apart, a few couples, male couples mostly, sometimes a female couple, no one really talking. The impersonal feel of a place where humans only passed through, where no one belonged or had reason to linger.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The door to an office opened and two men left quickly and he heard the woman holding the door call his number. She went back to her chair behind the desk as he entered, closed the door and sat down across from her. She ran her finger down the list in front of her and then slid it across the page, looked up and said blandly, ``You're negative.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">There was a moment while the information settled in and then he spoke quietly, more to himself than to her, ``I guess that means I get to watch it all.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Her face took on a quizzical expression, <i>I just gave you the best news of your life!</i> She had heard him but his words didn't register and then after a bit she realized what he'd meant.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Yeah,'' she said as he rose to leave, ``yeah, there are times when I think that might even be worse.''</span></div><br />
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<div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-64507275713697187912012-01-12T18:41:00.012-08:002013-09-02T10:26:51.666-07:00candles<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Cp0tV3-EVw8/TporcN6GntI/AAAAAAAAAXY/XfJWgp5fFek/s1600/candles.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="379" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Cp0tV3-EVw8/TporcN6GntI/AAAAAAAAAXY/XfJWgp5fFek/s640/candles.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="color: tomato; display: inline-block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 90px; line-height: 90px; margin-bottom: -18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 8px; margin-top: -4px;">W</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">ednesday evening</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> before Thanksgiving Cindy came up out of the Muni station at Castro and Market to catch the bus home from work and found the plaza full of young men milling about. Small groups huddled together trying to light candles that protruded through the bottom of paper cups and random people held small whiteboard signs on sticks as if it was a political rally. She asked what was going on and was told this was the annual candlelight march for Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk who had been slain on this date in 1978. Seven years ago.</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">''And the signs?'' The number of AIDS deaths in San Francisco, a disease that was all but unknown when everyone in America sat down three turkey dinners before, had passed one thousand and people here had written the name of someone they knew who had died. Most of the dead had lived within a few blocks of this intersection and tonight those people would be carried in the march to the Civic Center. Cindy got a blank board and put Roger's name on it and then wandered around in the light mist with her sign at a casual right shoulder arms.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She'd met Roger a bit over two years before when an old friend excitedly introduced her to his new lover. Early thirties, tall, trim, big grin, dark hair and moustache, David could not believe how fortunate he was, or, as he confided to Cindy when Roger went to the kitchen, that anything bad could come of Roger having just been diagnosed with this gay disease everyone seemed to be talking about.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"I mean, just look at him!" David exclaimed.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy froze, this slow dread filling her as she stared at the friend sitting there so happy. David made light of too many things, once joked with a gleeful reminisce that the gay VD clinic was the best pickup joint in town because whoever you met there wouldn't have gonorrhea that night at least. Sure Roger looked fine but nobody knew, that was the scariest part, absolutely no one knew anything. Except that young gay men were dying in very strange ways. There was the feeling that day-to-day reality was slowly dissolving, taking the quality of a dark and claustrophobic dream. A party was winding down, the record player is skipping and most guests have coupled up and departed while your trapped in the almost deserted room with someone very, very creepy.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A young man had just walked out of the room and AIDS had moved into her life.</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A few months later, in August, 1983, David told Cindy how Roger had gone to Washington, DC with the San Francisco contingent to lobby Congress for funding. Roger was chosen to be one of the three that testified before a House Government Operations subcommittee about the disease. Three young men in suits and ties stood with their right hand raised, solemnly swore, and then sat. Each told his story in turn and answered questions from the officials. They still had faith in the American system they'd all grown up under.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">David's biggest thrill, ``Roger got his name in the paper!''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy found the newspaper article and read the quote from Roger: <i>``I came here today in the hope that my epitaph would not read that I died of red tape.''</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Two months later Roger helped organize an AIDS vigil in the Castro where the names of people in the Bay Area known to have died of the disease were read. The small crowd gathered there heard one-hundred and eighteen names that Saturday night. Across town in the bathhouses people were burning the safe sex posters and pamphlets given out by the Health Department, ranting about the self-loathing and latent internalized homophobia of those gays pushing for closure of these establishments. They had not moved all this way to be confronted with the same middle-class morality they came here to escape.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The following year, as Roger's health deteriorated and the frequency of his medical appointments increased Cindy began helping care for him. In just a few months he dropped twenty pounds, one of the first to engage in what would become a San Francisco tradition for gay men: punching another notch to tighten the belt. <br />
</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he cab honked and she ran down the stairs from the second floor apartment and told the driver they'd be right out. She left the rear passenger side door open and went back in building. Roger was at the top of the stairs with a cane. ``Go on back,'' he called down, ``I don't need any help.'' She waited by the cab and then went to the door and looked up. Roger was only halfway down the staircase. ``I'm fine! Just need a little time.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">When his turn was called at General she walked him to the exam room and then returned to the waiting area. A little old lady in a chair along a facing wall smiled at her and asked, ``Is that your husband?'' and continued, not waiting for confirmation, ``You've got to start feeding him better young lady. He's awfully skinny.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Roger signed a waiver allowing his colonoscopy to be videotaped. Sarcoma lesions on the interior colon wall might be worthy of a journal article and the information may be of help to surgeons who would be seeing things like this in the future. Roger eventually became weary of the whole routine, the hope and optimism he'd had a year before had essentially evaporated. Cindy was next to him on the hospital bed as support to sit up so the doctor could examine him. He did a quick scan of Roger's mouth with a little flashlight and casually mentioned, ``Got a bit of KS in there.'' She was watching this from an angle, ``Those don't look like lesions, they look like <i>holes</i>.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The doctor brought the flashlight back up. ``You're right, those are holes.'' Some fungus had found a nice warm, moist place grow without an immune system to disturb it and was feeding on the roof of Roger's palate.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Around this time Roger decided he'd had enough, he was tired of being poked and prodded, he just wanted to be in his home.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sOYeomTEHLE/TporiX6yzoI/AAAAAAAAAXc/pIiTZCi75HA/s1600/candle-guys.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="396" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sOYeomTEHLE/TporiX6yzoI/AAAAAAAAAXc/pIiTZCi75HA/s640/candle-guys.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he gray mist muted the colors of the shop lights along Castro Street. At some point, as if an hourglass had reversed, people began slowly flowing away down Market, the candlelights separating and stretching into a ragged wavering line. Others would fall in behind, each seemed to know his place. Later, in the darkness at the Civic Center, after the speeches and impromptu memorials and the sobs from grown men they would put the placards with the names in a patchwork up on the wall of the Federal Building.<br />
</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Just before Cindy was swept into the stream one more young man came over and looked at the name she carried. Things had changed so much in just two years. ``I was in the group with Roger in Washington in 1983,'' he said, ``All the rest are dead. I didn't think anybody remembered us.''</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-66436273209629512562012-01-09T18:01:00.000-08:002013-12-14T14:37:07.054-08:00mala leche<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-686Ex56mn0A/Tj3W0nE4bJI/AAAAAAAAAFg/FR5Qg705iyY/s1600/black-kids2-48_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-686Ex56mn0A/Tj3W0nE4bJI/AAAAAAAAAFg/FR5Qg705iyY/s640/black-kids2-48_0_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0.07em; margin-top: 0.08em;">F</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">or a decade or more</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> there was a KFC at the corner of Valencia St. and Hill St. near 22nd. Within a few months of its opening a hand-lettered sign on white butcher paper went up on the window announcing that rice and refried beans had been added as menu options along side the corn, mashed potatoes and cole slaw. Valencia Street was still part of the Mission then and during the day you would see people that lived and worked in the neighborhood and in the night hear some great Latin jazz at the intimate club Bajones next door to the KFC.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Through the 1980s Valencia Street had a number of women's establishments, the Artemis Cafe at 23rd, Old Wives' Tales bookstore, Amelia's bar near 17th but so dispersed along the six block strip that the area did not have the cohesive feel as a lesbian district that the Castro had for gay men. One by one these places closed as the gals moved south across Army St. to Cortland Avenue on Bernal hill.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The last night of Amelia's in November, 1991 there was a line of women down the block, saying things like, ``How can you close, this is such an important part of our community?'' To which the answer was, ``We were open every night of the week, where were you?'' Rikki Streicher remodeled the space into the Elbo Room with the prescience to target a mixed clientele.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">That block was dominated by the shuttered Pepsi bottling plant across the street. Surrounded by a chain link fence at night it gave the stretch a dark, forlorn look, a place to pass through quickly. The gang members probably thought the Elbo Room was a gay bar when they sent the initiate in to verify that he had the guts to be one of them. The guy slid through the door into the crowd, walked to the rear and then returned, picking up speed as he neared the front and he savagely pumped a knife into the back of the person who sat nearest the exit. That person should have died instantly but his girlfriend had her hand inside his jacket caressing the base of his neck. The blade went through her hand before entering him and that distance kept the tip from puncturing his heart. At the ER the doctors said he'd probably heal completely while she'd never have use of her hand again.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The area perked up when the Mission Police Station moved to that lot and soon valet parking was available at a restaurant down the block, so that some locals ranted, ``Valet parking on Valencia Street—it's time to leave!'' The Kentucky Fried Chicken began getting complaints about the odor, about drug dealers hanging out in the parking lot and eventually was picketed by a vegetarian group protesting the torture of chickens.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Someone told a story of how in the early 1970s they'd sat across the aisle from Colonel Sanders on a plane flight. He was their travelling ambassador, the little eccentric in white suit, white hair, white goatee, string tie and he never once broke character, he was The Kentucky Colonel. His southern drawl was so infectious you almost wanted to join in, ``<i>Why K'unnell Suh, Ah Do Dee'clare.</i>'' He was able to deflect any question or topic change that might evince an opinion but they tried, they asked, ``Colonel, what do you think of these hippies?'' He looked over at them across that short space with his impish smile, ``Dey eats chicken don't dey?''</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">When the KFC finally closed the owners put a small sign by the doorway thanking their customers for the support all those years and wishing them well in their futures. The owners didn't have to put that sign, it was just a little courtesy from people who had interacted with those in the neighborhood.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A bit later other signs began being plastered on the plate glass of the empty store front, mostly election posters but also one large graphic of some hens flocked together and the words "Mala Leche" underneath. Implication being that the person who did it was a hip, politically savvy Mission District artist who speaks for everyone: <i>We don't want you here, Colonel</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Apparently the meaning of ``Mala Leche'' was lost on those the artist wanted most to impress (it translates literally to "bad milk" or "soured milk" and colloquially to "tough shit") because the sign was soon replaced by a similar graphic but now with the words "Bad Chicken" in English underneath. Across the street a restaurant had opened that serves "white folks" Mexican food, a bit overpriced, not quite authentic—tofu enchiladas, things like that. On weekends there is always a gaggle of young people waiting outside and they could be the people outside a restaurant in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn or 6th St in Austin or around Astor Place near NYU, that generic post-campus suburban look.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">At the KFC, the now gone Mission District KFC, because its customers used a different criteria for how their food dollar was spent, the only people you ever saw eating there were blacks and Hispanics.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-42845792668909989402011-11-26T18:19:00.001-08:002012-11-28T11:03:27.481-08:00media training<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SnpTCi2eL6g/Tj8D2NI63mI/AAAAAAAAAGw/oKac0tqyKXI/s1600/tv-news2-24_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="396" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SnpTCi2eL6g/Tj8D2NI63mI/AAAAAAAAAGw/oKac0tqyKXI/s640/tv-news2-24_0_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">B</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">efore they went on tour</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> in Spring of 1988 they were given a brief media training session to see how each looked if interviewed by TV news. In turn each sat before a camera under the glare of the key light and responded to hypothetical questions about their purpose. Scott and Joey came across fine, casual and natural, Gert was told to defer to one of the others because if she didn't like the question or the person questioning her condescension came across like a hatchet; she wasn't going to play puppydog for the camera. Jack became flustered and then flamboyant in explanation, his arms waving around as if capturing imaginary moths. He was told to sit on his hands if interviewed: Jack, just sit on those hands.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In the San Francisco they would be leaving for the four month tour AIDS was a constant, a daily given that affected their every action but the rest of America was a huge unknown. They had no idea how they would be met as they went from city to city taking a message about a communicable incurable disease. Thus there was no identification on the box sides of Stella, the truck that carried the Quilt, no large graphic announcement, only a little brass plaque on the front: ``Friends of Dorothy.'' They remembered the country as it was in the 1960s, the thought that they might be singled out to speak on a newscast seemed totally foreign. It was their action, the tour and what they displaying out in the open in front of the whole world, that would do their talking.</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he September 2004 issue of the women's fashion magazine <i>Harper's Bazaar</i>  ran a story on the mayor of San Francisco with photo of him and his wife in elegant recline across an oriental rug in a Beacon Hill-style mansion. In the background an enormous open window framed a marble balustrade and blue water bay outside as they were dubbed "The New Kennedys," implying the Camelot of the 1960s was in their future. The story included the price of the clothes they were wearing and a quote from his hairdresser.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EjjKA2ZEt0s/Tq82MHfbzAI/AAAAAAAAAX8/WL29AcpkkAM/s1600/81480022-bw.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EjjKA2ZEt0s/Tq82MHfbzAI/AAAAAAAAAX8/WL29AcpkkAM/s400/81480022-bw.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The young mayor seemed to have taken the article as prophetic (women's fashion magazines usually are) and began preparing himself for the larger political arena. The power of television had been well known since the 1960 Kennedy/Nixon debates and Newsom embarked on a training regime that included in his own YouTube channel. What were once photo-ops became city-funded practice sessions, not just the press conferences and State of the City reports but almost any little ribbon cut would find him facing a camera with a team of handlers and no need of a live audience.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The YouTube video touting the wonders of his Pavement To Parks program and Guerrero Park doesn't mention that the program was abandoned almost immediately afterwards, leaving the space he stood in during that filming an unused eyesore benefiting no one. A few blocks north and a few blocks east were two legacy city parks falling apart for lack of maintenance but you don't get YouTube videos for maintenance. San Francisco in the 21st Century: Rise of the Creepy Class—a different kind of people, these kind would never have made the Quilt.<br />
</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aB51MLjF-vs/Tj8D4PAvwaI/AAAAAAAAAG0/1pXdYg_aT3M/s1600/tv-news1-24_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="392" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aB51MLjF-vs/Tj8D4PAvwaI/AAAAAAAAAG0/1pXdYg_aT3M/s640/tv-news1-24_0_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">he twenty-city tour they embarked on in 1988 took them south from San Francisco for displays in LA and San Diego then through the southwest to Atlanta and up to Boston where they turned back west. In every city gay groups welcomed them like royalty, held dinners for them, showed them the best of their city. In someplace like Detroit the group had been dined and entertained in yet another fabulously decorated home and they now sat on the sofa in the living room and heard yet again about how wonderful it must be to live in San Francisco, how their hosts visited there and loved it, how there was just no other place in the world like San Francisco. The same things they always heard. Jack was on drink three by now and unusually quiet, he should have been animated and loud with those hands of his flutterng toward the chandelier. Gert leaned over and asked if anything was wrong, this was not like him.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jack was from the midwest, Indiana, his mother still lived there and they were close. ``These guys,'' he said quietly, nodding towards the room. ``They're obviously gay, they're not hiding anything, yet they're living here, near their families, near where they grew up. It was easy to be gay in San Francisco, it didn't take any courage at all.'' He looked around at their hosts, seated or up quickly, let-me-get-that-for-you, ''These guys,'' he said, ''they're the one's with guts.''</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-39242843524654597222011-10-20T17:24:00.000-07:002013-11-10T14:19:06.222-08:00glory days<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ws0EVNZyaTw/TptNV3ds_mI/AAAAAAAAAUg/BqJLG92yOBE/s1600/fellas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ws0EVNZyaTw/TptNV3ds_mI/AAAAAAAAAUg/BqJLG92yOBE/s640/fellas.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 0pt; margin-right: 0.07em; margin-top: 0.08em;">T</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">he Miracle Mile</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> of Folsom Street was anchored on the west at 12th St. by Hamburger Mary's and extended east to around 5th St. and included the parallel streets and alleys in the South of Market. In the 1970s the area was mostly dark empty industrial warehouses no longer necessary after container shipping moved the industry over to Oakland and made the dockworkers, the stevedores and longshoreman no longer necessary. The shot-and-a-beer bars that seemed to be at every street corner no longer had customers. Bars that could be bought cheaply with no neighborhood residents around to complain about anything. Anything at all. At night the little pink neon FeBe's sign above its doorway at the corner of 11th shined dimly, a last outpost before the pitch black expanse of a wide, desolate Folsom Street that stretched down the decreasing number streets toward the bay.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Hamburger Mary's was on the corner of 12th and the Stud was mid-block on the other side of the street. On any given night an eclectic and inebriated mix of tall drag queens wobbling in heels, swarthy men in metal-spiked leathers, disco divas waving boas and moustached Castro clones would pass each other crossing Folsom between the two establishments. Mary's initially had a disco, Cissy's, in the larger space adjacent to the restaurant area but the food became so popular that disco died and was replaced with tables. Dancing moved exclusively across to the Stud, a mutually beneficial separation. One night there a dancer leaped up under the uv light, twirled in the air and when he came down went completely through the rotting floorboards into the basement. Folsom St. in the '70's, no rules.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cfUge39wxys/TngOtAxWHxI/AAAAAAAAAOA/Iv81Ynjoi9I/s1600/leathers-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cfUge39wxys/TngOtAxWHxI/AAAAAAAAAOA/Iv81Ynjoi9I/s400/leathers-2.jpg" width="236" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">There was a short burly guy who drank at Mary's during the daytime that stood out even there because he always wore the same custom leather outfit: chaps, vest, jacket, fingerless gloves and little cap. The hides had been bleached and then dyed a pale yellow which gave the look that a banana popsicle was squating on a barstool. He was president of the Golden Showers Association, the kind who keeps buying a guy beers and tells the guy not to go the the bathroom because he wants to get him home with a full bladder.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The bar at Mary's was in the second back room and as it was a hassle to get to the bathrooms in the adjacent section on busy nights the bartenders would stand just inside of a curtained supply area at the end of the bar and surreptitiously pee into an empty gallon wine jug. Whenever the jug filled the guy in the yellow leather outfit would take it for whatever they did at golden shower meetings.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The further east down Folsom that one ventured the more black leather and macho posturing became <i>de rigueur</i>. Names of the bars and sex clubs evinced a musky ethos of maculinity: Boot Camp, Barracks, Ramrod, Brig, Caldron, Catacombs. A place could have a clawfoot bathtub in the middle of a room, plywood partitions with mouth-sized holes cut out at waist-level, rooms with slings and padded tables, men in uniform, men in jeans shirtless, men in nothing. A thick metal collar around the neck of a bartender attached to a heavy chrome chain tethered him to the back wall. A bartender is taking random swigs from a mayonnaise jar by the register during his shift and when asked replies that it's his lover's urine, keeps him hydrated in this stuffy, airless room.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">And the bathhouses. Some people stopped in for a little warmup sex before going out to cruise for the night, other people stopped in for the whole weekend, breezing by home on Friday to pick up clean clothes for work Monday, checking in at the baths and spending the next three nights there, ordering food delivered, pizza, Chinese, maybe a towel as modest attire.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">There was a green chalkboard next to the main desk where people could write a name and room number on entering plus some additional information, physical attributes, etc., e.g. Doug, twelve inches, or blond surfer, or a Cowboy Butt, sometimes the always popular ``have drugs,'' but more often ``request drugs.'' Passing the chalkboard on their way in Joey and friends would reach up, change a 'u' to an 'e' and add a 'y' so that everyone entering after them would see that in such-and-such room they'd find ``Cowboy Betty.''</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-siJo-yDTBcs/Tponlq4KA7I/AAAAAAAAARw/ecklpTHk70s/s1600/jack-eagle-12_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="250" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-siJo-yDTBcs/Tponlq4KA7I/AAAAAAAAARw/ecklpTHk70s/s400/jack-eagle-12_0_0.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The baths were a regular routine for Alex, many weekends he never saw the outdoors, and in late 1982, when gay cancer had become GRID and when five people he knew of had died Alex went to see a doctor. He was healthy but felt like something was stalking him, no 32-year old should know that many people who had died in that short of a time. Not in America in a peacetime. After checking him over the doctor said there was no sign of KS and said that there was not a lot known and said maybe he could get Alex into a study at UCSF. The main epidemiologic correlation at that time seemed to be number of sexual partners and the doctor asked Alex about that, how many he thought he'd had. Alex was sitting in his underwear on the paper strip that covered the exam table in the little room staring down at his sock feet. He raised his head and moved his eyes toward the ceiling as one does when counting. After a bit he looked at the doctor and answered, ``You mean today?''</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">D</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">uring Sunday brunch lull at Hamburger Mary's the bartender went out back by the dumpster to take a couple puffs off a joint with some of the kitchen crew and when he returned a waiter came up with a glass of white wine and set it on the bar.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"Customer says this tastes funny."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Bartender looks at the glass, "Where'd you get this? . . . I didn't serve this to you."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, Veranda, sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">"You weren't here so I went behind the bar and poured it from that jug by the curtain back there."</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-53551433032773360782011-10-02T16:28:00.004-07:002014-07-05T19:49:05.748-07:00the mission<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8N8qcmKk5wU/TkSdeRe0RTI/AAAAAAAAAKM/0iMCkqvlHlY/s1600/rar1-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="378" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8N8qcmKk5wU/TkSdeRe0RTI/AAAAAAAAAKM/0iMCkqvlHlY/s640/rar1-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="color: darkseagreen; text-align: center;">Rock Against Reagan, Dolores Park, October, 1983</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">A</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">s he crossed the 16</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: lowercase;">th</span> <span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">Street</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> BART Plaza one mid-afternoon a couple glided past him from behind, both a bit pudgy, pasty, with unkempt hair, the guy in faded coveralls, the girl in sweatshirt and jeans. So nondescript that if Joey hadn't overheard a snippet of their conversation they would have registered about as much as the shadow of a small cloud passing high overhead. Two people that were purposely invisible, that did not want to draw attention to themselves.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The guy asked, ``So how long were you in for?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Three months.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">His voice took on a snide edge, ``Guess you cleaned up, huh?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Man,'' she said, ``King Kong didn't hit that hard.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The BART plaza: people selling drugs, people buying drugs, people selling sex for the money to buy drugs, always at the periphary of your vision, you just had to not look to see it. In the early evening Oakland hookers would be coming up out of the BART terminal to join the locals on Capp St. where all night long cars would circle the five or six blocks of The Track, most of the trade being done out of the vehicles.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">When smokable free base cocaine began vying with heroin for the drug dollar in the 1980s the dealers at the Valencia Gardens projects at 15th stenciled ``Buy Crack Here'' in large letters on the concrete sides of the buildings so you would know. Frisco Choppers was across the street, ``In the Ghetto,'' as the logo on their T-shirts said. And ``Thank You for Pot Smoking'' as the sign over their cash register said. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">In the late 70s/early 80s some punk venues sprouted around Valencia, a West Coast mirror of the Bowery/East Village in NYC: the Deaf Club, the Tool & Die, Target Video; in 1980 a synthesizer band The Units even put out a song, ``The Mission Is Bitchin.'' The swell that had begun with hippies moving into the Haight more than a decade before and then carried into the Castro as gays arrived was now flowing into this western edge of the Mission District. That wave receded when the scythe of the epidemic came down (imagine being able to see over a dozen 'For Rent' signs in windows during a casual 30 minute stroll around the intersection of Castro and 18th) and it was almost twenty years, as Y2K approached, before the tide rolled back.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-w94i0qgOF6I/TkSd9HBPrwI/AAAAAAAAAKg/A3zpP0Wa9ec/s1600/rar6-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="396" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-w94i0qgOF6I/TkSd9HBPrwI/AAAAAAAAAKg/A3zpP0Wa9ec/s640/rar6-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">J</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">oey lived behind 4 Wheel Brake at 17th and Mission in this era and one sun filled afternoon when passing Clarion he had idly stared a bit too long at four guys huddled a ways into the alley. One of the four moved away from the group and stopped in a doorway to stare down at a little packet he'd obviously just purchased. A guy saw Joey watching, turned fully to face him and advanced, ``You looking for something man?'' It took Joey a second to realize the guy wasn't challenging him, the guy was sincere, that if there was anything Joey wanted this guy was going to do his best to provide it.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Some years later, in August, 1990 a 29-year old Irish SFSU student, Paul O'Meara, had his cab pull over to the Wells ATM at the northwest edge of the 16th St. BART plaza to get cash. It was just dusk, about 9 p.m. and four men loitering there put him in a chock hold with a baseball bat and pulled him around the corner and beat him to death. At least six people witnessed this.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Because of the high crime rate around Mission/16th and because of the number of customer robberies at that ATM the bank had months before begun inactivating the machine each evening at 8 p.m. Thus Paul O'Meara had next to no money on him when he was killed.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Area merchants had long clamored for a greater police presence so the SFPD set up a kiosk in the plaza apparently meant to frighten off criminals. It sat there for many months about the same size and about as imposing as a State Fair corndog stand, it never seemed to be staffed and eventually it became grimy and collected wind blown trash around its base and at some point the police kiosk disappeared. Six witnesses, no one was ever arrested or charged with the crime. An Irish bar in Noe Valley had a benefit one Saturday afternoon to collect money so that Paul's body could be returned to his family in the Old Sod.</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-L0pM5XUDMf4/TkSeeR-a9uI/AAAAAAAAAKs/9S6sCCwIxZ0/s1600/rar8-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="388" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-L0pM5XUDMf4/TkSeeR-a9uI/AAAAAAAAAKs/9S6sCCwIxZ0/s640/rar8-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">n the early 1990s bodies of Capp St. hookers began showing up in vacant lots by the water in China Basin. Not unsurprisingly this spread a pall over the street workers but hey, a gal's gotta earn a living. The increased police presence after those murders moved a sizable portion of the business to the other side of South Van Ness Avenue. Eventually they arrested a guy already out on bail for sexual assault of Capp St. hookers because a 19-year old girl Jack Bokin thought was dead when he dumped her in the Bay had survived and identified him.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Lisa worked at the Rite Spot on Folsom when this all was going on and she was walking there in the dying light of early evening. She was outfitted in the short skirt and combat boots style girls wore at that time which seemed to emphasize her cherubic cuteness, her big smile. A friend happened to drive by and he honked and pulled over, bending to reach across the front seat and roll down the window. Lisa went to the passenger side and leaned in and they chatted a bit but she had to get to work so said bye, her friend drove off and she continued walking. Before she got to Folsom this black gal popped out of a doorway, tight pants, spike heels, very red lips and said, ``You was right not to go with him! I been round here a long time and they's plenty of weirdos—I can spot 'em! That there guy was sure one! You done the right thing not to go with him.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Then the black woman stepped back a bit to bat her false eyelashes and assess Lisa, ``You new here, I ain't seen ya' before.'' After she looked Lisa up and down the woman smiled and gave her approval of the street: ``You gonna do O.K.''</span></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">D</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">uring daylight hours hookers made the stretch of 17th around Thrift Town into their little cloister. They would stand on one of the street corners between Capp and Hoff and announce themselves by making a flamboyant show of lighting a cigarette, taking a drag and then swinging their arm in an extravagant arch while exhaling a long smoke stream up into the air. A censer to ward away the evil spirits: ``No officer I'm just here waiting for my boyfriend, ain't no crime in that is there?'' These were the ones that needed money early, dayshift here was end of the line, the decrepit seeking the desperate no matter which way you looked at it.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Joey was on his way home one afternoon and notices this young girl walking ahead of him stop on the sidewalk and hunch over briefly to light up. She didn't have that girl next door look, not for the girls in this neighborhood, she looked like some nerdy innocent kid maybe come over to check out the bargains at Thrift Town. Joey considered saying something, a little word to the wise, if one of the gruff Mexicans propositioned her she'd probably collapse in fright, but what was he going to say? As he passed by she looked over at him and smiled as if she could sense his concern. The innocent looking nerdy girl said, ``Hi, . . . want a date?''</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-78427062722331913372011-09-10T20:25:00.003-07:002012-07-28T11:14:54.777-07:00great wall<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NaL911w3XXk/TlLzx29lLLI/AAAAAAAAAMs/E0Qtytiz2_0/s1600/guy-sitting-48_48_32.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="374" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NaL911w3XXk/TlLzx29lLLI/AAAAAAAAAMs/E0Qtytiz2_0/s640/guy-sitting-48_48_32.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">J</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">erry phoned Dan</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> at work when he got the results of his blood work, ``Good news, T-cells are still up, don't have to start AZT.'' So that evening Dan brought a gift home: ``We're going to China,'' waving a glossy color brochure. Even knowing that Jerry was your basic homebody Dan had placed the deposit to join a group tour, it was early 1989 and mainland China had only recently begun allowing Americans into the country. This was an opportunity he felt they should not miss. Left unsaid was, ``While you can still travel.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Can't we just go to Grant Street for an afternoon? Take a ride on the 30 Stockton? We'd be home in time for dinner.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Jerry, I can't believe you're this parochial, you know how many people would love to make a trip like this?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Jerry did not know how many people would love a trip like this but he knew of one who would not. He also knew when he was trapped. Finally he grumbles ``Alright, but I'm taking a fork.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Their group meets with a tour liaison at the Air China terminal of SFO International, they were easily the youngest members and the only male couple. Jerry leans to Dan, ``Don't look over just yet but two old dykes are staring this way, I think they're gonna want us to be tour buddies.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``You always think people are staring at you,'' Dan mutters as he bends to fumble with a carry on so he can scan the women. Jerry continues, ``<i>And </i> they're wearing Birkenstocks! I simply refuse to be associated with anyone that wears Birkenstocks.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">On the flight Dan flips through the brochures once again, hoping to pique some interest, reading out loud, ``Tien An Men Square, Peking Duck, the Gate of Heavenly Peace, the Great Wall—come on, you're going to love it, look,'' shoving the brochure over, pointing to the picture: ``Guilin, we're stopping there, we'll see this, look!''<br />
</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A large part of their stay was in Beijing (Jerry: ``When do we get to see Peking?'') and they noticed some peculiarities beyond the total mindwarp just of the mass of human beings. If they stood on a street corner for more than a few minutes people began congregating around them, men in black pajamas that would stand in some proximity and just stare, to these people fair skin, blond hair was the spectacle. (Jerry: ``If I flap my arms do you think they'd scatter like pigeons?'')</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">More than a few times as they visited various ancient and oriental sights (or as described by Jerry, ``Yet another place older than Jesus.'') a native Chinese would approach them and begin asking a sequence of questions in English that would tend towards the awkwardly personal. The pattern was something like this, <i>Are you from America? What city are you from? What do you do for a living? How much money do you make? Are you married? How many children do you have?</i> With a pause between each question.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Others in their tour group had similar experiences and eventually their guide said that these Chinese were practicing their English, these were standard question and answer routines used in a language class (Jerry: ``I wonder what they ask the lesbians— '<i>Can't you afford better shoes?</i>' ''). At any point they only needed to say to the Chinese person, ``You speak English very well,'' and that person would thank them and leave happy.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The day they visited the Great Wall and were standing with other tour groups in a curved open stretch near a rampart Jerry nudged Dan and nodded towards two young, elegantly dressed Japanese males that were crossing from one parapet to the other. ``You think they're gay?'' and on noting that the two Japanese had looked over at them while talking to one another he added, ``Wouldn't it be funny if they were asking the same thing about us right now?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">About then a Chinese man intruded, standing in front of them with a big grin and he started the routine, <i>``Are you from America?</i> (pause) <i>What city are you from?''</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The two young Japanese males had moved close enough to overhear the interchange and when Dan answered, ``San Francisco,'' he saw them look at one another knowingly and smile.</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-33627983671072464572011-09-08T16:12:00.000-07:002012-02-20T20:21:29.730-08:00snoopy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-XMcqtevvj_A/TjSHsH1br8I/AAAAAAAAACc/5EnIvUCBk8I/s1600/condor1-24_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="382" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-XMcqtevvj_A/TjSHsH1br8I/AAAAAAAAACc/5EnIvUCBk8I/s640/condor1-24_0_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">C</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">indy is hurrying</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> down the sidewalk from the Savoy Tivoli on upper Grant where she's had a quick drink before opening the box office. As she waits to cross Broadway under the tall sign of Carol Doda Topless she hears the barker on front of Big Al's next door giving his spiel to people passing by, couples that giggle, young sailors over from Alameda, rocking a bit with his jive, ``See it right in here folks, Topless, Bottomless, LIVE! NAKED! SEX! On Our Stage, we got it all." A pause as he glances over at her, ``Hey Cindy, how's it going?" then he continues, ``That's Right Folks, Completely LIVE, Completely NAKED, Completely SEX we got it right here on our stage.'' </span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She's heading down to the Little Fox Theater on Pacific to prep the box office for the 8 o'clock show, ``legitimate'' theater, different from the ``live naked'' theater Cindy just passed. The marquee over the entranceway informs that ``Snoopy, the Musical'' is now playing.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She unlocks the main doors and then the door to the ticket area, her little kingdom. A thick glass window with a low opening faces the street, a large calendar hung on the wall with scribbles in almost every numbered boxed, a wood rack slotted for each performance holding the tickets sold for that night, three-ring binders holding the accounting tallies for past nights, and shoved in the corner a small refrigerator. She sat on the stool and unwraps the salami and cheese from the Molinari's. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Stage hands and cast drifted in, most stopping to say hi and inquire about any phone messages, fan letters (dream on), job offers. Cindy had eaten about a third of her sandwich when the house phone rings, it the producer in the main office upstairs and he asks her to run down the block and get his suit from the dry cleaners.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Sure, no problem. Maybe you need your car waxed too? I got plenty of free time,'' muttering ``<i>Asshole</i>" as she hangs up.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">To make sure her sandwich would still be there when she returned she covered it with a paper napkin on which she'd scribbled, ``Don't eat this, I spit on it.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She returns from the errand, hangs the plastic shrouded suit behind the door, pulls her stool back to the ticket window and reaches to the sandwich. Under her words on the napkin someone had added, ``So did I.'' </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eQjz69cdEH0/Tl_3RI6t0zI/AAAAAAAAANc/GMsUtEoN7yc/s1600/nude-girls2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="226" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eQjz69cdEH0/Tl_3RI6t0zI/AAAAAAAAANc/GMsUtEoN7yc/s400/nude-girls2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Bit later she sees Tim down the street coming in to work, his gangly saunter, hands and feet too large, waiting for the rest of his body to grow into them. Just a big puppy, no wonder he was cast as Snoopy. He exaggerates the movements for her as he bounces up to the customer window, leans into round metal voice slot and whines: ``Is this show any good? I don't want to spend my money if it's one of those shows that's full of really crappy acting.'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Well, most of the acting is great, but there's this one, the guy that plays Snoopy, who's a real drip. We think he must be having an affair with one of the producers.'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Not what I hear! I hear he's just dreamy! <i>And</i> did you know that today is his birthday? The young thing is currently accepting gifts---cashmere, cash, drugs, any and all of the above.'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy grins at Tim across the glass partition, ``If Miss Birthday Thing is one year closer to being the old queen everyone says she is, she sure shouldn't be announcing that fact.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Tim heads backstage as she punches the house phone, "He just got here but he'll be in the dressing room for an hour. We'll need the gift at least twenty minutes before curtain.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Over the next hour people come to the window to pick up their tickets before going off, out to make an evening of North Beach, drinks, dinner and a show, maybe more drinks. She didn't notice when the streetlights came on, only vaguely aware it had become evening. Somewhere up above there must be stars, the easy peace at day's end, but down here her workday was just beginning. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Excuse me,'' a voice interrrupts. She looks up at a handsome tanned face and a confident grin on the other side of the glass, heavy starch blue button down shirt, a groomed successful look, preppie, maybe young stockbroker. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Hi, I'm Carl, here for the birthday. I'm not late am I?'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bwkEkVck51o/Tji2hlH-gBI/AAAAAAAAADA/t-m-fWun2rI/s1600/condor3-2400-.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="232" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bwkEkVck51o/Tji2hlH-gBI/AAAAAAAAADA/t-m-fWun2rI/s400/condor3-2400-.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">It came out automatic, the oldest line in the book, ``I don't know, what time were you planning on getting here?'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She phones upstairs, ``Your gift is here.'' Dana comes down, smiles approvingly as she and Carl are introduced and as the two move into the lobby Dana looks back flashes a little thumbs up. Cindy shakes her head watching the young man and mutters, ``Why is it that all the good looking ones—it's just not fair.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The typical rush just before curtain, a line of eight or ten, people starting to get anxious, but no mistakes, no missing reservations. Tonight the evening report would have to wait, she wrapped the cash and charge receipts and put them in the safe uncounted then locked up the little room to join the others on the back row of the theater. It was, after all, Tim's birthday. </span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> <i>[Act One]:</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The curtain opens to an enormous doghouse stage center, chin high to the cast emphasizing that they are children and the audience is viewing a cartoon panel. There's Snoopy reclining across the top. Members of the Peanuts gang drift in and perform song routines that Cindy usually hears as background music each night while she finishes her report. At some point Snoopy clambers down and crawls inside his house while the others continue the cartoon bickering and the singing. </span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> <i>[Act Two]:</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The cast performs a few more rollicking numbers that lead to Snoopy's next cue, something like ``Oh no! It's the Red Baron!'' A pause while the onstage group looks to the doghouse. The pause extends and the Peanuts gang turns towards one another quizzically. So again, louder, ``The Red Baron!'' </span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">From her last row seat Cindy could see audience heads leaning to one another as it became obvious something was amiss. Once more, ``It's the Red Baron!'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Snoopy finally snakes from the doghouse, with a distant grin and a gaze to the back row where he knows his gang will be sitting. The cast onstage keeps from making eye contact so that there won't be a communal break down into convulsive laughter.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy slips out, back to the box office to finish her report. At intermission Carl the birthday gift pokes his head in the door on his way out, ``I thought I'd had weird requests before, bondage, dungeons, Nazi uniforms, Cub Scout uniforms, licking boots, but after this they'll all seem pretty lame."</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-24870718812482917182011-09-08T16:10:00.001-07:002012-03-29T15:09:58.421-07:00polk street<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3B6f2dFCj-0/TkCwE6mqj8I/AAAAAAAAAI0/-kGPP44iCw8/s1600/sisters-24_0_0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="372" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3B6f2dFCj-0/TkCwE6mqj8I/AAAAAAAAAI0/-kGPP44iCw8/s640/sisters-24_0_0.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">T</span><br />
<span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">he Tenderloin/Polk Gulch area</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;">was the traditional gay section of San Francisco, the bus station, YMCA, nocturnal types you'd find in seedy pockets of most urban areas where the old apartments still had Murphy beds and places rented by the week. Teenaged runaways selling sex, serious drug abusers, full time transvestites. These were not those suburban clones that had begun showing up in the Castro in the mid-1970s, pampered baby-boomers with their day jobs and pretense of being so butch, everybody a top. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">You'd see young males leaning nonchalantly against fire hydrants on Polk in the early evening, facing the cars that slowly cruised past, thumb notched into top of their jeans, finger pointing down at the crotch. Old queens buying dinners for a new arrival, who's your daddy. In a quiet restaurant five men in their 50s, white haired business types casually dressed around the large table in the center of the dining room talking and toasting with one sullen young boy seated among them staring down at his plate. After they finish eating and pay the five get up and leave while the boy stays in his chair alone in view of the entire room. No busboy comes to clear the table and the boy does not move. After about enough time for a cigarette the restaurant doorway opens slightly, a forearm intrudes and gives a little wave and the boy gets up and walks out.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A little B&D never humiliated anyone, right?</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The street styles changed during that decade from hippie to disco to punk but the overarching look always had that gritty inner city edge, trashy and tawdry. Even as late as 1975 it was Polk Street, not Castro Street, that was blocked off on Halloween with a stage and drag queen MCs.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QT_OMtVeRP4/TlLzZIW6E-I/AAAAAAAAAMk/KtiXFFaOz9M/s1600/polk1-clip-64_0_-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="268" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QT_OMtVeRP4/TlLzZIW6E-I/AAAAAAAAAMk/KtiXFFaOz9M/s400/polk1-clip-64_0_-24.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">S</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">cott</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> was the night bartender at the Mule in this era. He came on at 6 p.m. shift change and arriving first evening on the job George the day bartender laid out the law as only an old queen can: ``You be on time every fucking day, honey. I got a second gig I can't be late to, you're not here at six I'm gone, anything that happens it's your fucking ass, OK."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Over the months the job settled in a predictable work routine, last call at 2 a.m., lights up at 2:20, usually to a packed house, stunned looks in the sudden glare as the music is cut, ``<i>Drink Up Girls! Hotel/ Motel Time!</i>" At 2:30 a.m. close the door to all but a few friends. Same minor skirmishes each night to get the Last Call Connie's out, they just whine to stay a bit longer. ``<i>Good Fucking Night!</i>" And same major battle each night with Trixxi, with two X's she's quick to tell you, trannie who arrives around ten, dumps her handbag out across the bar and for the next few hours frantically arranges the scattered contents, staring down as she babbles constantly, saying to no one in particular things like, ``You can't call me Miss Potato unless you know me." Sure Trixxi, sure. Time to go home or wherever it is you go. Tweak somewhere else.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">All finally gone.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Scott keeps his never empty glass of scotch & soda set to chill down in the ice bin while he finishes up, always knows where to find it. Once the bills are separated, each denomination counted, banded in packets, recorded and locked in the wall safe his workday was truly over. Now he can party, the real Happy Hour begins here at three in the morning. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AGLWK582wvk/Tj8Bej7-XGI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/wNgpd9TILqQ/s1600/punks-24-001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="242" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AGLWK582wvk/Tj8Bej7-XGI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/wNgpd9TILqQ/s400/punks-24-001.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He arrived one day to have George mention that when he'd opened he found the previous night's take neatly bundled and set down in the ice bin and found an almost empty highball glass securely locked inside the wall safe. ``Careful you gonna be you're own best customer," George smirked as he marched out with a haughty toss of his nose.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After a few months it was all Scott could do to be showered, shaved and dressed, usually in the clothes piled on the floor, and get in by six. He developed an ability to shut off the alarm about twenty seconds before it began to clang and then dream that he was fully clothed, brushing his teeth, almost ready to head off to work, smiling, happy because he would be a bit early for a change.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Then eyes pop open, heart pounds up to inside eardrums, stomach gorges up into throat as that dreamy smile contorts into <i>Oh Shit</i>! Scott rushes around the apartment, pants right where he left them, saves time, proud of this bit of forethought. In a cab he'll be heading to work as the 9-to-5 crowd is heading home. Suckers!</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">So once again on this day Scott awakes to see the daylight seeping from the edges of the window shade, rolls over, looks at a silent clock through a half open eye--it reads 6:03! Fuck, fuck, fuck as he bolts upright!</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He's got head tilted to hold the phone between shoulder and ear sitting edge of the bed, bare feet on the cold floor as he lights his first cigarette, hears the distant continuous ring, imagining the scene in the bar: George has just given each member of the day crew a free shot as he clears out and now the room is full of drunks and there is no one behind the bar, no one in charge; <i>it's his ass!</i> Immediate next call is to the cab company, shaking his head, fucking answer the phone!</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Scott waits on the steps of his building with another cigarette, tastes like a vacuum cleaner bag has been dumped in his mouth. The cab pulls up and Scott skews the half finished butt into the curb as he climbs in, telling the driver that he'll double what's on the meter if the guy races. He lights his third and leans back, exhales, feeling like he's run a marathon already today. This has got to stop, he needs to begin going home right after work, get up earlier, during the daytime, maybe hit the gym, check out the museums, maybe visit the library and actually read instead of cruise . . . well yeah, since he probably won't have a job after tonight there will be plenty of time for all those things.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">The driver is doing a great job, accelerating at yellows, rolling before a red turns green, switching lanes abruptly to advance. Lucky, there sure doesn't seem to be a lot of traffic out, the cabbie crosses the center line to pass a slow moving, road hogging street sweeper, the burr sound as it stirs around the grime. Then the same maneuver again a block later, a garbage truck in front of an apartment building. The realization comes slowly: Street sweeper? Garbage truck? They're not out at six in the evening, they only operate at . . . Oh God! How could he, it's still morning!</span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Scott closes his eyes, opens them again, yep that's still a garbage truck out there. Hung over <i>and</i> stupid, why can't he just be one or the other? He's too embarrassed to tell driver to turn around so they pull up to the padlocked bar where he pays the man double the meter as promised. The sidewalks are all but deserted at this hour as he crosses to the door and unsnaps the padlock. Odor of stale beer and drying mop water greets him, the strangeness of an empty, quiet barroom. He flips on the lights and goes to make a pot of coffee. Of all the dumb things he's done in his life this has got to be the hands down winner. Congratulations moron: folks, we got a winner!</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-IiD54vzM8KY/TkCuHhc50VI/AAAAAAAAAIA/hLw_spJNSLM/s1600/top-hat-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-IiD54vzM8KY/TkCuHhc50VI/AAAAAAAAAIA/hLw_spJNSLM/s640/top-hat-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He sits at a bar stool on the customer side, sipping the coffee and holding yet another cigarette as the adrenaline shakiness drains away leaving a profound fatigue. Trying to think of who he knows that might have a little meth. He'll need it if he can't sleep when he gets back home and has to be back here for real in eleven hours. He empties the pot into the sink and cleans so when George arrives in a few hours nothing will seem amiss. Then he phones for a cab to get him and his aching head back to his apartment, watching through the curtain until the yellow savior arrives. The driver half turns to glance over his shoulder briefly as Scott slides to the center of the seat and gives the address. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17pt; text-indent: 0.15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Just before they begin moving Scott sees the guy's eyes in the rearview mirror watching him and realizes he's got the same cabbie that brought him. Scott leans his head onto the seatback and shuts his eyes as he reaches for his cigarettes and he hears the driver say, ``Fucked up didn't you."</span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6926294539260277114.post-85103406935460814562011-09-03T13:47:00.000-07:002013-02-28T11:13:57.530-08:00carnations<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-E5mxL-fsJ-8/TkCt4UdnXBI/AAAAAAAAAH0/apeEj523DEg/s1600/nb-parade2-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="370" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-E5mxL-fsJ-8/TkCt4UdnXBI/AAAAAAAAAH0/apeEj523DEg/s640/nb-parade2-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="color: tomato; display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">I</span><span style="color: tomato; font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">n the late 1970</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;color: tomato;">s</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> Cindy managed the box office for a small local theater production at the Hippodrome Theater on Broadway across from that Filipino restaurant where bands would play at night after the restaurant closed. On Sunday there is an afternoon matinee in addition to the regular evening performance, so much for the day of rest, she has to be up, out of the house and at work by 2 p.m. instead of the normal 5 p.m. But it is always slow, relaxing, with a few hours break in between performances. Undisturbed time to tighten up the loose ends of the week. </span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Which is what Cindy is doing now when she becomes aware of Allen standing in the box office doorway behind her. She glances over when he says, "Use a little makeup and curl that hair you wouldn't be bad looking at all. Might even have a shot a me some night."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She turns back to her work, I doubt that I'll ever be that drunk so you can quit dreaming."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Think about it."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">`` If I thought about it I'd probably be sick."</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Allen asks if there's any mail, any messages as if he's expecting something, told no he leaves to get ready for the show.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Half hour later her assistant Dana arrives, announcing as she enters, ``Today's the day.'' She flourishes a square pink greeting card envelope, ``The <i>coup de grâce.</i>"</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy extends an arm, ``Hand that over,'' takes the envelope and pulls out a folded note. Slides it under her nose, ``Mmmm, gardenia, nice touch.'' Opens note, letters in broad ink pen with wide feminine flourish read:</span></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> <i>I watched the show twice this</i></span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> week and as usual you were wonderful.</span></i></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> And as usual the whole time I couldn't take my eyes</span></i></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> off you. We need to stop playing</span></i></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> games, we need to meet. Tonight I will</span></i></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> wait for you on the patio at Enrico's after the show.</span><br />
</i></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><i><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;"> You'll recognize me, I'll be the girl sitting with the red carnation.</span></i></div><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy shakes her head, ``So Mr-Gods-Gift-To-Women will be told this little love note was left during intermission tonight?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``That's the idea.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``How many is this?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Dana thinks, ``Not sure, we mailed the first two so he picked them up here, then Larry left a couple in the dressing room, saying they were given to him by some attractive girl. And then this one that he'll get tonight.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">That evening just before showtime Allen pops into the box office in character, this is a big no-no to be in the front of the house but he has to check one last time, ``Any messages?''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Cindy turns, casually laying her arm over the pink envelope and tells him no, then after he's out of hearing says, ``We'll be seeing you later.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">She can hear the onstage patter while in the box office, it's a bit before final curtain; she's finished her report and is closing when Dana and Larry come down from the producers office, ``Let's get going, it's about time for Allen's big performance.''</span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkSZjUa8-p4/TkCuARBJILI/AAAAAAAAAH4/L9j0snJBMXE/s1600/nb-parade3-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="370" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkSZjUa8-p4/TkCuARBJILI/AAAAAAAAAH4/L9j0snJBMXE/s640/nb-parade3-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia,Palatino,serif; font-size: 6.6em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">B</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 3px; line-height: 32px; text-transform: uppercase;">rian is washing glasses</span><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 24pt;"> behind the bar at Enrico's during a lull and idly scanning the action out on the table section of the covered terrace. Only a few regulars and the cocktail waitress ever come back into this area, the hip people watching is all out front. He grabs clean glasses that have dried and turns to stack them along the shelf. Behind him he hears Cheryl mutter ``Ordering.'' He frees his hands and turns.</span><br />
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``One white wine, one Pernod and Coke.''</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">About to turn he stops and stares at her, mouthing back those last three words as a question. ``They're French,'' she says as way of explanation. He shakes his head and pours the drinks. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">A waft of anise as Cheryl hoists the tray, he watches as she marches off, tray in the air, exclaiming "Viva la France!" It's bad enough that she's so hot and has a boyfriend but she embellishes everything she does with such a sexy flair.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Outside every table is occupied and a clot of people stand along the sidewalk waiting for a free spot. Cheryl set the drinks down in front of a couple, white wine goes to the guy while Pernod/coke sits sideways in a tight pullover, horizontal navy and white stripes emphasize her breasts. Shakes her head to adjust a great pouf of that Bardot sex kitten hair.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Maybe he could forgive that gal for her beverage choice. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">An awkward bustle is occurring at the entranceway as three people push through the sidewalk cluster and onto the terrace. It should be obvious there is nowhere for them to sit.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Ordering.'' Cheryl standing there with her tray.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Next time he looks up the three have fanned out and are moving among the tables, the way the Hari Krishna do. The way gypsy children did in Spain. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Last summer in Seville he sat at an outdoor cafe and watched this enormous gypsy woman in billowing layers of tented purple and orange skirt undulate along the plaza surrounded by a swarm of kids, a moveable playground. <i>Look at me!</i> the spectacle said, a street spectacle, a vacation story. Cameras flew up at every table. The children chased one another in a swirl among the chairs, giggling, jostling one another through the seated tourists, begging money, distracting their marks. The youngest always lagging behind, playing catchup, a Disney movie played out in real life. One kid careened off a table and Brian pulled him up by his forearm, laughing, ``Watch out there tiger.'' The gamers would flock back in a circle past mom where they secreted whatever they cadged among the folds of her skirts. </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">After the colorful whirlwind flowed away down the Rambla Brian went to light a cigarette and couldn't find his Zippo.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fl3szbGMmwg/TkCuEUrC5eI/AAAAAAAAAH8/mUgKenyljyI/s1600/nb-parade4-24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="370" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fl3szbGMmwg/TkCuEUrC5eI/AAAAAAAAAH8/mUgKenyljyI/s640/nb-parade4-24.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="display: block; float: left; font-family: Georgia, Palatino, serif; font-size: 2.2em; font-style: normal; line-height: 0.67em; margin: 0.08em 0.07em 0pt 0pt;">F</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 17.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">rom his viewpoint in the back bar area the movements of the group on the patio appeared to be a choreographed pantomime, a backlit set piece framed by columns and potted palms. The customers sat silhouetted with the three newcomers drifting lazily among the tables. He goes back to washing glassware.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``Ordering.'' Brian looks up, wet soapy hands holding a glass, shifts attention to Cheryl setting her tray on the bar, ``Vodka/tonic, White Russian.'' </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">He pours the drinks, quick squeeze on the lime to drop the green lump into the highball glass, then half-and-half flowing in tiny avalanches over the ice cubes and the dark Kahlua, makes change, and watches Cheryl saunter back outside, tray hoisted steady, that great ass slowly rocking. The group of three has now settled into the first table of his empty bar area and have shifted the chairs so they all sit with their backs to him to face the patio. Cheryl pauses by their table, bends and listens, then returns to the station.</span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">Before she can speak Brian nods toward that table and asks, ``What were those people doing out there on the patio?" </span></div><div style="line-height: 17.0pt; text-indent: .15in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">``They gave a flower to all the girls," she says, then beams that chipper smile of hers, ``See I got one too." Cheryl tosses an arm up into the air with a flamenco finger snap as her other hand lays the red carnation into her hair, like the Andalusian girls. </span></div><div style="color: tomato; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Calibri,Veranda,sans-serif; font-size: 13pt;">___________________________________________________________</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com