Spring Second Quarter Journal 1989 April-June

 

JUNE

 

1 June 1989 Thursday

 

Today is the last full day of school. I spent most of the time cleaning my classroom. Even with all this winding down, it’s hard for me to imagine that school is almost over. I’m glad Susan has had to leave early all this week for her second job at Weinstocks, so I’ve been able to get home to get some work done there.

 

            I have to make a salad for tomorrow’s faculty’s goodbye pot luck and finish the Award Certificates for the Sixth Grade graduation assembly tomorrow. On top of everything else I have to be at the Gay and Lesbian Community Council tonight to take minutes.

 

            At Gay and Lesbian Community Council of Utah there was a pretty good turn out, where Jessica Pittman spoke regarding the results of the AIDS survey that the Gay community took last fall.  Jim Hunsaker was being nit-picky about misspellings in the minutes and I slammed him so he let up. He has a lot of fucking nerve. His minutes from last year were only about a third as much in detail and weren’t printed out half the time.

 

            Anyhow after the council meeting, I went right back home to finish the award certificate before going to bed. Everyone has to get an award.

 

 

 

2 June 1989 Friday

 

It’s my last day at Sunset elementary. It’s going to be a glad lonesome for sure. The kids were so hyper today. Thank Gawd we cut them loose at 11:45 this morning. At 12:15 we had faculty pot luck to say goodbye to the teachers like Susan McCoy and I who are living. I was given an electric pencil sharpener as a going away present.

 

            I turned in my classroom keys, loaded up Susan’s truck with my own classroom files and stuff, and I was gone by two this afternoon, completely exhausted.  So goes the first year of teaching. I was told once that during the first year I would learn more than my students and I think that is true. I still can’t believe it’s over.

 

            My apartment is a wreck! Boxes of books and school supplies are everywhere in my tiny apartment. I am too exhausted to even think about cleaning anything as that everything has been left where I dropped them or opened them to see what was inside. Yuck.

 

            I went down to the Central Library where this guy and I had great sex in the privacy of the third floor men’s room. I needed to release some pent up tension.

 

            In the evening I called Jim Rieger to see if he still wanted to go to this going away party that I was invited to but he said he was swamped with work and so he declined. I needed to get out of the house so I walked up to 12th Avenue and I Street. Dan Fahndrich was throwing a going away party for James Conrad at his place.

 

I had a wine cooler there and was visiting with David Sharpton when I noticed that Billy Butthead showed up. I really did not expect him to come since Dan can’t  stand him but Frank Fatah True must have invited him.

 

I lost my composure, made my excuses, and left the party. David Sharpton followed me out and walked down the hill with me. I told him I will not attend parties with Billy. I just won’t, and what an asshole Frank is for inviting the both of us.

 

Maybe seeing Billy was also just an excuse to leave; as most of the people at the party were not my type anyway. They were mainly Affirmation and Salt Lake Men’s Choir types.  David understood.

 

            I was home and in bed by 9:30 tonight. I cried a little but not so much over Billy as much as being a lone with no one to watch over me. Perhaps I was processing the ending of the school year also. One door closes and another opens.

 

 

 

3 June 1989 Saturday

 

Today is my mom’s 60th birthday. I wonder if I will ever get that old?  I called her this morning and we visited for a while. We talked about some Gay issues and it was a good visit.

 

            Tom Abizu from the Triangle didn’t show up for the interview; so I’ll have to get a hold of him later. I got over my being peeved about Jim Hunsaker and went to Memory Grove to play volleyball from two until five thirty this afternoon. I got a little sunburn from wearing a tank top and shorts.

 

            Mike Casey is moving to Wyoming for the summer so tonight we are going out to the In-Between to visit before he leaves. I brought a bottle of Alexander Brandy to celebrate being out of school and to say goodbye for the summer to Mike. I was really tired from playing Volleyball and almost didn’t want to go out but I am glad I did.

 

            It was unseasonably cold out but we sat on the patio anyway and we drank and visited. I found out that he was raised Reorganized LDS and his family had been for generations. So I told him about my involvement with the Restoration Church from three years ago. He seemed interested in sharing our spiritual journeys.    We stayed out until one in the morning but it was good to have this long conversation about spiritual matters over the usual material blather one hears. Mike is a good man indeed.

 

 

 

4 June 1989 Sunday

 

            I didn’t attend Quaker Meeting this morning because it was drizzling and I didn’t want to walk or ride in the rain. However after it cleared up I rode my bike to the University of Utah to sit in the Sauna. It was a very cool day.

 

            In the evening, I went to Affirmation to make an announcement about the National Day of Mourning about the Supreme Court’s decision that Sodomy is not a protected by privacy rights, and about upcoming Beyond Stonewall. It was a very small turn out but Dave Omer was there so we visited and had fun, being silly whenever we are together. We can be such goofballs. But the rest of them there were as silent as a tomb. They might have thought they were in church poor things.

 

 I guess Affirmation financially is in really bad shape and may have to stop meeting at the Unitarian Church because they can’t pay the rent or they may just go to a monthly meeting. Well Chuck Thomas’ lack of vision has come home to roost. Affirmation is more of a holding pen for Mormon Sheep rather than a recovery group anymore.

 

            At the meeting, I told Marilyn Johnson, the lone woman there, about the Restoration Church. Funny thing I’m more of a Missionary for the Restoration Church than any of them are and I’m not even a member any more. I guess last Wednesday’s talk I gave at the historical Society has revived a lot of those old memories when I was a true believer.

 

            Billy Butthead showed up briefly but as no one was giving him any attention he left. I just shrugged him off with only a brief tinge of remorse but it quickly passed and I just thought of how cruel he was to me.

 

After the meeting was over, Russ Lane, Jon Butler, Willy Marshall, and I got to talking about old times. Three years ago, now does seem like old times. Who knew they were the “good ol’ days”? I said to them “It’s only been three years since we all met and since making all this all happen but it now seems like it might as well have been thirty.”

 

Horrible news in China, as that the Chinese army has massacred hundreds of student protestors, and have topped the Chinese Goddess of Liberty statue. I have just been sick over the news.

 

 

 

5 June 1989 Monday

 

I  had lunch with Craig Miller, who does the Utah Traditions program at KRCL that airs right after Concerning Gays and Lesbians. We went to this Middle Eastern vegetarian deli called Roberts in the 9th and 9th area. I didn’t much care for it.

 

Then the front tire of my bike went flat so I took it to a nearby bike shop and that cost $11 to fix.  Back at the Juel Apartment while talking to my manager, I found out my manager has been fired by the Bradshaws for renting to too many Gays. He said the owners had been saying that I have AIDS and were upset by the amount of Gays in the building. Homophobic bastards.

 

In the evening, I went to the Lesbian and Gay Student Union for their closing social. It was pathetic. I keep saying to myself I’m not going back to LGSU, but I keep doing so. Crazy. Dale Sorenson said something rather rude to me that made me realize what a real ass he is. Blinded by beauty.

 

Anyhow, Jim Rieger who had finished his class showed up at LGSU and took me out to dinner along with Becky Moss and a friend of his named Kent who’s up from California. Jim’s leaving to go back to California this Thursday now that the term is over at the U. I probably won’t see him again until I come back from Boston in July. I asked him if he’d help me do a program for this Wednesday at KRCL. He said he’d be happy to help.

 

The Chinese massacre of the student protestors is making headlines with China on the brink of Civil War. What times we live in.

 

 

 

6 June 1989 Tuesday

 

It’s finally feeling like I am out of school and not just for a weekend break.  It was kind of a busy day. I mailed out thirty Beyond Stonewall applications to last year’s participants and sent post cards out to Beyond Stonewall committee chairs reminding them of a mandatory meeting next Monday.

 

            Coming home from the post office, I ran across Rocky O’Donovan who’s been researching information about an 1886 Gay Mormon Bishop from Cedar City. I went with him to the Mormon genealogy Library to help him do some research for him. It was the first time I have set foot in that place in over a year. Yuck! Talk about dedication. What I do for love of Gay History.

 

            Right before going to the family library, I stopped at Crossroads Mall and had my left ear pierced. I was finally brave enough. Ouch! It did hurt. Well I said I would do it and I did.

 

            I attended Unconditional Support tonight. It was another small turnout with Allan Peterson leading the meeting. But to be fair, attendance always drops in the summer. Jess Pittman from the Department of Health basically gave the same presentation she did at GLCCU. So I was bored. With such a small crowd, we only raised $8.47 in donations from those who came. We use the same principle of putting back what you get out of a meeting so I guess people got very little out of it.

 

            Allan Peterson is talking about having only a meeting once a month during the summer. Changing meeting times is the quickest way I know to kill off an organization when new people come and no one is there. I don’t care anymore, really. The energy is gone and so are so many of my friends.  I was released finally as Secretary/ Treasurer tonight. It was only a temporary position to fill Darrell Webber’s vacancy.

 

            After the meeting, I met with Tom Abizu and Becky Moorman at Dee’s Restaurant. I gave Becky an article I wrote on the Stonewall Riots, while Tom interviewed me for a feature article of Beyond Stonewall to run in the July Issue of the Triangle. We talked for nearly two hours.

 

My young friend James Connelly came by my place when I came home. He was one of the founders and supporters of Unconditional Support two years ago this month when he was still a teenager. He just wanted to visit and say hi.

 

            At 11:30 tonight, Jim Hunsaker stopped by my place. He said he works on Tuesday nights now and that’s why he hasn’t been coming to Unconditional Support. I thought he was just mad at me.

 

            Anyhow, he started in on me again, saying I was obnoxious and pushy. After he unloaded on me, I let him have it with both barrels. I basically told him that I didn’t validate his opinions of me and that my “pushiness”  is just my enthusiasm to build safe places for people and  that attracts some people and don’t  others who have their own hang ups about being Gay. These milquetoast, do nothing but whine, people are the ones who are offended by my actions and I don’t want to be around them anyway.

 

Additional Material

 

·         ARRAIGNMENT SET IN DEATH The arraignment of one of two defendants charged in the bludgeoning death last fall of a Southern Utah State College student has been set for Wednesday in Fillmore.  Michael Anthony Archuleta, 26, faces seven charges, including capital homicide, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping and forcible sexual abuse in the death of 28-year-old Gordon Ray Church, son of Delta City Councilman David Church. His body was found Nov. 23 in a desolate area off I-15 near Kanosh. Archuleta and co-defendant Lance Conway Wood, 20, were arrested two days later. Both defendants face a total of seven charges. Wood's arraignment is pending. Archuleta and Wood - originally from Salem and Bountiful, respectively - were paroled from the state prison annex in Cedar City last October, where they were doing time on drug and theft convictions. They are being held in the Millard County Jail.

 

 

 

7 June 1989 Wednesday

 

I stayed around the apartment most of the morning still fuming about Jim Hunsaker’s rant last night. At noon I tape recorded “Concerning Gays and Lesbians” off the radio to hear what it sounded like. It’s one thing to tape it and another to actually listen to it on the radio. This week’s show was on Gay Spirituality. Last week’s show was Rocky O’Donovan speaking about the Historical Society.

 

            Anyhow, Jim Rieger dropped by at four this afternoon to take me out to dinner before going down to the KRCL recording studio. While we were eating, a wild summer storm blew in and it began to rain. The air is so dry that most of the moisture evaporated quickly.

 

            We went down to KRCL at five and we did a quick show on community events and then I said “why don’t we take in a movie”. So we drove out to the dollar movie theaters in the West Valley Mall and since neither one of us had seen “Accidental Tourist” with actor William Hurt in it, we watched it. The movie was painful yet wonderful. William Hurt is the consummate actor. His smile at the end of the movie was so wonderful that I had to keep from crying.

 

However the movie had a false premise because love does not conquer all. No matter what one might do, you cannot make some someone fall in love with you. Both John Cunningham and Billy Bikowski are living proof of that fact. Funny, just as I wrote Billy’s name, it seemed not to have its magical allure anymore.

 

            Anyway, after the movie we went to the Deerhunter for a drink before Jim dropping me off at home.

 

 

 

8 June 1989 Thursday

 

I spent much of the day up at the University of Utah either in the sauna or in Orson Spenser Hall. I needed to get out of my apartment. I’m searching for something but I don’t know what? John Cunningham? My lost youth?

 

            I tried calling Jim Rieger today to see how his last day went. He said yesterday that Uncle Sam won’t pick up his Fall Term Tuition so be will be on his own to pay the tab. I suggested that we might become roommates to share expenses in that case because I am definitely moving from the Juel Apartment and away from the owner’s homophobia.  Three years has taken its toll on me and I need a fresh start.

 

            Anyhow at five this afternoon, Jim Hunsaker showed up at my door asking me if he could come in and watch a video with him. I figured this was his way of apologizing so I agreed. We watched this really dumb movie called “Night Wings”. Jim is really into Vampires.

 

            Anyway I was a little disappointed that Jim Rieger didn’t call because we had made plans to see a video ourselves with another friend of his. Oh Well. I am sure he is busy with his move back to California.

 

 

 

9 June 1989 Friday

 

It’s my sister Charline Wach’s 42nd birthday. I started tearing my place apart anticipating a move from here. I’ve taken down everything off the walls and my place is rather a mess. I didn’t hear anything from Jim Rieger today. I hope he’s not mad at me for some reason.

 

            I’ve had to encourage Allan Peterson a lot this week. On Wednesday he was fired from his job for being Gay and he’s been so depressed. I had to talk him into going down and filing for unemployment. Why are Mormons so reluctant to get the assistance that they have paid into at times like these?  Anyhow, I guess, he’ll move in with Mike Casey so things will work out for him.

 

            I just watched the dumbest things on TV before feeling like I needed to get out. So I rode down to Cinema In Your Face to see a movie called “The Last of England.” It was reviewed favorably in the Triangle and while it did have some choice moments, like when this teenager fucked this guy on a Union Jack flag, I still wouldn’t recommend it myself. I had asked Robert Smith if he wanted to meet me there and we sat together. I also saw the Asian guy from KRCL named Jimmy Hamamoto, there too, so it was kind of a fun event.

 

            When I was riding my bike downtown, it was lightning and thundering but it didn’t begin to rain hard until the movie was over at 11:30 at night. On the way home I ducked under a parking terrace on Broadway between Main and State to avoid getting soaked. There I saw a man walking with a “cruising gait” and I thought, “hmmm”.  Then to my surprise it turned out to be my old BYU friend, Elbert Peck. Dear old, sweet, closeted Elbert. He said he was just out walking home, having worked late at the Sunstone Magazine of which he is the editor. Give me a break! I smiled and left him riding my bike as fast as I could to get home and out of the pouring rain. Your secret is safe with me.

 

 

 

10 June 1989 Saturday

 

Michael Casey dropped off some packing boxes for me, when he picked me up to take me to Volleyball in Memory Grove. It was a good turn out and I had fun although I only played until four this afternoon because I had to go home and get ready to meet Gary Boren. He had invited me up Millcreek Canyon for  a going away party for Chris Brown.

 

            Anyway I didn’t exactly connect up with him but he got me a ride there with Ron Richardson, his boyfriend. I brought chips and homemade salsa plus a bottle of vodka to make greyhound cocktails.  That’s about all I was drinking and I got pretty drunk.

 

            The party was fairly fun but I felt mildly left out because it was such a younger college crowd. I met someone there however I think will facilitate our campfire at Beyond Stonewall.  Dale Sorenson was a complete ass to me again.

 

 

 

11 June 1989 Sunday

 

What a long and bizarre day it was today. Mike Pipkin dropped by this morning wanting to go with me to the Quaker Meeting. He had his roommate’s car so we drove there to attend the meeting.

 

            Afterwards, Rocky O’Donovan suggested we head out to Bare Ass Beach. So we did. I brought along sundry items for a picnic and blankets to sit on once out there and we were on our way. I said “I feel like we are on an adventure.”

 

            On the way to the beach while driving through a sage brush cow trail, we hit a bump and the car’s muffler fell off. I got down in the sand and wired it back on saying, “We are hurting dogs if I am the most butch among us.”

 

            Anyhow, we found a spot, pitched our blankets out, and stripped. You have to be pretty close friends to get naked in front of each other. But it was fairly uneventful out there and we got some good sun. At the beach there were mostly older men cruising who evidently don’t know where Liberty Park is. I did see Greg Garcia and the other Leather Men naked as jaybirds out on a sandy bluff sitting off by their selves.

 

            When we left for home, later Mike took me up to Affirmation where we saw the same old same old faces except it did feel like a homecoming when I saw Walt Larrabee and Keith McBride there. Billy Butthead was sitting with this Hispanic man, I think, could be Pilipino, and named Renn. I later found out that he was putting Billy up as that he’s out of his apartment again. Same story different actors. I wonder if Billy is putting out to be put up?

 

            Any way handsome Phil Ketich was at the meeting and acted glad to see me. I am so taken by him. I talked him into going with Mike and me to the In-Between. He said he had never been to a Gay Bar before so we corrupted him. We sat out on the patio and talked to some other people we knew from Volleyball. I felt like I was in heaven.

 

 

 

12 June 1989 Monday

 

I packed away much of my apartment today. Mike Pipkin dropped by in the afternoon for a little bit and then took me down to get more liquor boxes which are the best for packing. He spent the night with this Jodie kid; we met at the In-Between last night.

 

            I can’t get Phil Ketich off my mind and I dreamt about him all last night. It’s easy to conjure up his handsome face before me. In the afternoon at three, I called him at his work at Westminster College where he is a recruiter counselor. He sounded happy to hear from me. Anyway I asked him over to go out for pizza and a movie this week and he agreed. We are going out this Saturday to Dead Poets Society. After getting off the phone I yelled, “Whoopee”. I don’t know if anything will come of this but I have been attracted to him for so long and more than just physically.

 

            Anyhow, I finished straightening up the place for the Beyond Stonewall Meeting tonight but neither Liza Smart nor Michael Anderson showed up. Later I was able to get a hold of Liza. She said she never got my postcard I sent, but as for Michael, I heard from Dan Fahndrich, that Michael may be moving to San Francisco in a couple of weeks! News to me, and good of him to tell me when I counted on him.  He never made the posters I advanced him $120 to make, so goodbye to that I suppose. Well what goes around will come around I firmly believe, and he’s lost all my trust. Dan and Guy Larson are both okay with their committees. We made tentative plans to go up to Camp Rogers on July 15th to inspect it.

 

            After the meeting I rode over to Satu Servigna’s and she said she was going to run Beyond Stonewall as the cover for the August Issue. From talking with her, I also decided to get Val Mansfield to do a registration form to print in the July Triangle.

 

 

 

13 June 1989 Tuesday

 

I was woken at 3:30 in the morning by the doorbell ringing. It was Lee and Michael down from Brigham City again. They needed a place to crash. I’m starting to resent them being here as I have done my good deed. They’re drinking up all the wine in the house and their things are cluttering up the stuff I am packing away. Maybe I am just being bitchy.

 

            Anyway I also had a letter pushed under my door from the YMCA saying that the camp director had resigned. Oh Great! The letter must have been sent to the wrong apartment.

 

            To get out of the house, I rode over to the Post Office to see if any mail was in the mail box. I had two more registrations for Beyond Stonewall in there. I rode back home to met up with John Bush at 11:30 this morning where I gave him the registrations and checks plus the letter I received from the Y about the camp director quitting.

 

I then took off and had 500 more Beyond Stonewall fliers made to distribute at various places. I also rode my bile down to 800 West and 17th South to talk Val Mansfield into making posters for the retreat, offering the same amount of money I had given to Mike Anderson to make this happen. We visited for an hour and I really like Val.

 

            Back at my place I baked some cookies for Unconditional Support where I did a presentation of the Stonewall Riots. I need to fire up people about Gay Liberation once in a while.

 

After the meeting I went to Dee’s and sat with Dave Omer and Jon Schild about what an asshole Billy Butthead is. It’s therapeutic for me. After that Robert Smith and I sat on the grass in front of my apartment in the warm night air, talking about life in general. He said he’s grown more from these six months in Unconditional Support than in any other period of his experience as a Gay man.

 

When Bobbie left and I came inside,  it was midnight. I finally got a hold of Dean Shute and asked him to call the prosecuting attorney’s office about Darrell Webber’s murder case. It was a long busy day but I’m excited about going out with Phil Ketich. He does kick Billy right out of my head.

 

 

 

14 June 1989 Wednesday

 

 I am in the doldrums again. I can hardly wait for my date with Phil Ketich but I am scaring myself by building my expectations up. I went to Memory Grove today to get out of the apartment. It’s been so warm.

 

Billy Bikowski’s been occupying my head a lot today. I am not sure why. I know he’s living with someone now.

 

            Chris Brown is leaving Utah tomorrow for Portland, Oregon where he will be for the summer before heading back to New York City for school. I’m not really connected with anyone right now. All those who were my best confidants and friends are scattered hither and thither. I feel there’s a change a-coming.

 

 

 

15 June 1989 Thursday

 

I forgot to mention that the 13th was the 20th anniversary of my graduation from Rancho Alamitos High School.  I spent much of the day with Chuck Whyte typing up the minutes from community council. I had to leave at six this evening, so I took the minutes home with me where I stuffed them into envelopes and later went out to deliver some of them and mail the rest out.

 

 

 

16 June 1989 Friday

 

It’s my Grandma Johnson’s 90th birthday even though she won’t admit to it. She tells everyone she was born in 1901 although she has a twin brother who turned 90 today and she is listed in the 1900 Census as a six month old baby.

 

It rained a little in the afternoon.

 

            Mike Pipkin dropped by this evening and we started walking over to Trolley Square then to the Smith’s on 9th East and finally to Liberty Park. It felt good to be outside and walking.

 

 

 

17 June 1989 Saturday

 

Lee and Michael spent the night here again after coming in at 3:30 this morning. I’m really getting sick of them.

 

            I played some volleyball a little bit, this afternoon, and told John Bennett to fuck off.  He’s another LGSU Utah prick. I don’t know why they think they can talk to me the way they do.

 

            Anyhow, Rocky O’Donovan and I walked to the drinking fountain by the bridge to get a drink when I saw Billy Bikowski with the guy he’s using now. Rocky left me standing there to go over and talk to Billy and I can say that my feelings were really hurt. I went home after that and cried. Rationally I know that Billy is just using this because he’s out of work and has lost his job. Sounds so familiar.

 

            Anyway I spent the rest of the late afternoon getting ready for my date with Phil Ketich for which I have worked myself into frenzy because I was giving myself an ultimatum that this had better be the one or I am swearing off men.

 

            Phil came over at 6:45 which was a good sign as I had already resigned myself that he wouldn’t show up like Billy had time and time again; leaving me disappointed. But Phil was here and we had fun sitting on the carpet eating pizza and a fruit salad I had out on the coffee table.

 

            Phil is an Aries like me, born March 27th and is even a vegetarian. He said he was of Croatian and Spanish descent, hence his beauty.  I am so attracted to him and when he smiles he kicks Billy right out of my head.

 

            Anyhow I suggested going to a drive-In to see a double feature of “Beaches” and “Dead Poets Society” and he agreed. I popped some popcorn and then we were off to the Redwood Drive-in. I just wanted to spend more alone time with him. While visiting I realized that Phil is really dealing with some fundamental issues and isn’t very affectionate.

 

            After coming back to my place at one in the morning we sat on the couch where I wanted to talk more about where our relationship was heading, when Mike poked his head through my front room basement window and said the front doors were locked. I was really pissed. He and Lee said they wouldn’t be back until three in the morning. I think it also freaked Phil out. Well that ended any hope of a romantic conversation between us. Hopefully I will see Phil and Affirmation tomorrow.

 

 

 

18 June 1989 Sunday

 

I felt slightly let down and disappointed about my date yesterday with Phil Ketich. I guess I am still a little depressed over Billy Butthead finding someone to share his life with while I am still floundering. I hate that.

 

Rather than just staying home and wallowing in self pity I walked to my Quaker Meeting to meditate. After the meeting while there, I took Rocky O’Donovan aside and told him how hurt I was yesterday. I began to cry and Rocky said he never saw this side of me before only my tough shell. He said he hadn’t realized how much I loved Billy. He said he, himself was having problems dealing with Billy’s homophobia and said he thought Billy had some serious mental issues and that I was far ahead of Billy in self actualization.

 

            Anyway Robert Smith also attended the Quaker Meeting and he said he enjoyed it. I had him come home with me where I fixed him some dinner.  He said that Liza Smart was not doing well, because her daughter  had really dumped on her before leaving to stay with her father. So we walked to the store and bought some greeting cards to cheer her up. We walked over to her place and gave them to her.

 

            I spent much of the afternoon with Robert as he wanted me to read some of my poetry to him. I think he enjoyed them.

 

            Anyhow John Terrill surprised me by dropping by for a while. I didn’t even think he liked me well enough to drop in for a chat. When it was time for Affirmation, he drove me up the hill. Phil Ketich wasn’t there and that was disappointing. Billy didn’t show up either which was a relief.

 

            Dave Omer and I sat together and were the bad boys all throughout the meeting. John Cooper was in town and it was fun to see him again. His presence was kind of pertinent since this was a restructuring meeting for Affirmation and he was one of the earlier founders of Affirmation in Salt Lake City.

 

            The gist of the meeting was that Affirmation will continue to meet weekly at the Unitarian Church, but a basket will be passed around for money and donations like Unconditional Support has always done. The pot lucks were eliminated and there will be a monthly speaker and the rest of the meetings will feature rap groups. People are going to have to step up and carry the meetings more with leading the rap groups.

 

            I think a lot of these changes will be good for Affirmation and will keep it from fossilizing.  I am so proud of Unconditional Support members who also attend Affirmation. They were pretty right on with their critiques and having a more positive Gay attitude than those who only attend Affirmation. They are still dealing with some basic issues such as being touched, not wanting to be hugged, and still hung up on the Mormon Church. Pathetic, but each at their own pace; but you got to keep on moving.

 

Additional Material

 

·         NOT GUILTY PLEA IN SUSC MURDER One of two men charged in the November slaying of a Southern Utah State College student has pleaded innocent to first-degree murder and six other charges. Michael Anthony Archuleta, 26, entered the pleas in a hearing Tuesday before 4th District Judge Boyd Park. Park sat in for Judge George E. Ballif, who will preside over Archuleta's Oct. 10 trial. Archuleta and Lance Conway Wood, 20, are charged in the kidnapping, rape and killing of Gordon Ray Church, 28, who last was seen alive Nov. 21, 1988, at a Cedar City convenience store. His body was found Nov. 23 in a remote area off I-15 near Kanosh. Archuleta pleaded innocent to capital homicide, object rape, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated assault, aggravated sexual assault, forcible sexual abuse and possession of a stolen vehicle. Wood, who faces the same charges, has been bound over for trial but no date has been set. Last Friday, Ballif took under advisement a motion to dismiss the charges against Archuleta after public defender Michael Esplin had argued there was insufficient evidence linking him to the crime. Wood and Archuleta being held without bail in the Millard County Jail.

 

 

 

19 June 1989 Monday

 

I was sick today. I know I poisoned myself from either eating some fruit that had gone sour or from the pizza last night that had pepperoni on it from last Saturday. I had no strength, my muscles left like water and as the day progressed, I thought oh great I’ll probably be sick on my Boston vacation. I didn’t put anything on my stomach today except some yogurt and bananas.  I was too nauseous for anything else.

 

            When Mike Pipkin came over I gave him keys to my apartment so he could come over and feed Billy Cat. I also withdrew $570 from my checking account and turned $500 of that into traveler’s checks.

 

            Mike wanted to go up to the sauna and I thought it might do me some good to sweat out any toxins but it didn’t actually help any.  In the sauna Mike made it with these two hunky black dudes while I just watched the door.

 

            At 4:30 in the afternoon, we went over to Orson Spenser Hall where I saw Jeff Wood cruising. There wasn’t much action so he gave us a ride home and spent the evening with us.

 

            In my estimation, Jeff has totally redeemed himself to me and is really on his way to Gay awareness and acceptance. Jeff bought a pizza that just Mike and he ate as I was still feeling too sick. I just lay on the couch with my head in his lap while he gently brushed back my hair. He just held me while I was feeling so ill. He also said he would take me to the airport tomorrow morning. He really did do right by me and I completely forgive what I thought, rightly or wrongly, that he had injured me.

 

            Anyway I went to bed at 10:30 tonight hoping I won’t be this sick in the morning. Mike said he’s going to run Mike and Lee off if he gets tired of their shit. They really have worn out their welcome.

 

 

 

20 June 1989 Tuesday

 

I broke a hard fever during the night and I was drenched in sweat this morning as if I had peed my bed, but I felt so much better. Jeff Wood picked me up at 7:30  to take me to the airport. My flight didn’t leave until 9:30 but I didn’t want to tie Jeff up all morning waiting on me. He again was so sweet to me and rested his hand on my knee with my hand over his all the way out there.

 

            I only took two pieces of luggage; both were carry-ons, so I wouldn’t have to get hung up waiting for them when I get to Boston. The flight was smooth. We flew over Colorado, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, parts of Canada, New York and landed in Boston at 4 in the afternoon Eastern Time. John Reeves was waiting for me at the Logan Airport ad it was great to see his beaming face again.

 

            He took me on a quick drive around Boston before taking me up onto the 60th Floor of the John Hancock Building to look out over the city.  From there we went to Boston Commons where we walked all over, then we went to Market Street where John wanted to treat me to dinner at Ye Old Union Oyster House which is the oldest restaurant, in continuous service for 250 years, in the United States. Daniel Webster and John F Kennedy both used to eat there all the time some, one hundred years apart.  It was expensive about $20 per meal but it was very good and it was exciting to being Boston.

 

            John later drove us over to Cambridge where we walked around Harvard. We touched the statue of the Puritan John Harvard and I saw the library which was built on my ancestor, Nicholas Danforth’s home lot back in the 1600’s.

 

            We walked around Cambridge at night listening to lots of street musicians, feeling the high energy of the college students, and looked in a few bookstores which were everywhere. I loved it. John had me see where Longfellow’s house is, took me over to Radcliffe College, and showed me some other sights I was being bombarded with. After the tour of Cambridge, John had to take me to his favorite Gay bar Napoleons.

 

            It was a fun whirlwind day but a long one. We didn’t get to John’s son place in Framingham until two in the morning. We are staying with Mark Reeves and his family and I am sleeping on their couch.

 

 

 

21 June 1989 Wednesday

 

It is the first official day of summer and I am in Boston. The sunlight filtered in at 5:30 this morning and it was hard to get back to sleep.  Living in Utah, the sun doesn’t get over the tops of the mountains until much later.

 

            I got up finally after nine,  after John’s son Mark and his wife  left work. I found out that John had never told his daughter in law that I was coming to stay with them and she was somewhat upset with me being there. That was really awkward so I gave John $50 to give to them for sleeping on their couch and hoped that would calm down their ruffled feathers. However its going to awkward and tense being here. If I would have known this I would not have come back as they are Mormons and are still upset with John for coming out of the closet and leaving Mark’s mother.

 

            I was glad to be gone as soon as we could this morning,  when John and I went for a drive to the village of Hardwick in central Massachusetts. I wanted to find the graves of my ancestors Jonathan and Susannah Danforth who lived there during the Revolutionary War. It was a misty drive but very pleasant. Driving through all the little towns to get to Hardwick will be one of the best memories that I will carry away from this trip.

 

Hardwick is one of the most beautiful, little, New England Villages and coincidently we arrived in the village of the 250th anniversary of the founding of Hardwick. It has changed very little over the years. It was absolutely charming.

 

A man named Myron Goddard, head of the village’s historical society, showed me also the house of Rev. David White who was Jonathan Danforth’s father in law. The house was built in 1736 and amazingly it still standing and is in good shape. It’s a typical wooden frame New England style Salt Box home.

 

After being here, I feel even more connected to that old rascal Jonathan Danforth who gave the townspeople such fits during the War of Independence. It felt good seeing where the bones of my forbearers lay in the church’s graveyard.

 

            In the evening, John and I traveled back to Boston. My stomach was still a little queasy from all the food we ate yesterday so I only ate soup and crackers and a salad all day.

 

John wanted to show me an area of Boston called the Combat Zone where all the sex shops, arcades, and theaters are. We went to this porno video arcade called Liberty. It was interesting. Driving around the zone I saw so many cute guys. Boston does have a high sexual energy level. I like it.

 

Additional Material

 

·         MOTION TO DISMISS MURDER CHARGES DENIED Fourth District Judge George E. Ballif has denied a motion to dismiss the murder charges against one of two men charged in the slaying of a Southern Utah State College student. Ballif notified attorneys in a letter received Monday that he had denied the motion public defender Michael Esplin made in behalf of Michael Anthony Archuleta, 26. Archuleta and Lance Conway Wood, 20, are charged in the kidnapping, rape and killing of Gordon Ray Church, 28, who last was seen alive Nov. 21, 1988, at a Cedar City convenience store. His body was found Nov. 23 in a remote area off I-15 near Kanosh. Archuleta is to be tried Oct. 10 on charges of capital homicide, object rape, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated assault, aggravated sexual assault, forcible sexual abuse and possession of a stolen vehicle. Esplin, in his motion to dismiss the charges, had contended portions of the state's murder law regarding the heinousness of the act were unconstitutionally vague and there was insufficient evidence.

 

 

 

22 June 1989 Thursday

 

Because today was John Reeve’s daughter in law’s day off, we wanted to be on our way before having to deal with her; so we were on the road by nine this morning. Our agenda today was to take a road trip to Gloucester and Salem.

 

            It was already pretty warm by mid morning and it’s been humid all day but still pleasant, just kind of clammy. We stopped and got some muffins and fruit for breakfast and then drove to Gloucester first. It’s a beautiful harbor town and I noticed immediately that you don’t have the same salty smell that is associated with the Pacific Ocean. It’s more subtle. We saw the Gloucester Fisherman’s Memorial statue dedicated to the men who “go down to sea in ship.” Then we sat in a park that used to be a fort looking over the harbor. It was pretty but I have seen more seagulls in Salt Lake than I have in New England as of yet.

 

            I am really amazed how much the influence of New England has had on the architecture of the coastal towns of California.  Most of these New England towns are kept up beautifully. From the size of the homes and mansions, it’s easy to see that Massachusetts was and is a very powerful and influential state.

 

            Anyhow we left Gloucester and drove down the coast, stopped in Manchester, just briefly, then arrived in Salem at noon. I sure saw a lot of New England’s maritime heritage today. We even went to the Peabody Museum of Maritime History before going to the Witch Museum. I think it’s funny that Peabody is pronounced Peb-a-dee here instead of Pee-body.

 

            While in Salem, I bought myself sailor weaved wristlet as my only souvenir. I was not all the impressed with the Witch Museum. Not sure what I had expected.  But it was all very interesting.

 

             We left Salem and drove in land towards Billerica which turned out to be a very large suburban community. I was expecting just a little crossroads village like Hardwick. I had three generations of Danforths living in Billerica in the 17th and 18th Centuries before Jonathan Danforth moved away to Hardwick. We couldn’t locate the old church cemetery and since John wanted to take me out to a bar called Club West in Marlboro we pressed on. He wanted me to meet some of the people he works with at Digital,.

 

            It was six in the evening when we arrived at Club West and I felt awkward for John once we were there. I think he wanted some of his friends to meet me but I guess his closest ones weren’t there and the others just kind of acknowledged him but went on about their affairs with the people sitting with them. Since one bar is very much like another as far as I am concerned, we left by seven and went back to Boston. I enjoy being there and its vibe.

 

            We drove around Boston some more than found a place to park in China Town which from there we walked over to the Combat Zone; the XXX rated part of the city. We went back to this video arcade called Liberty but it was too “hetero” for my taste but there were a lot of cruisy guys there probably not caring who sucks their dicks.

 

            We went from there over to the Boston Commons where we ate at a McDonalds but I only had fries.  Then John took me to this Gay movie house called the ART Theater which was very “action oriented. It was really sleazy but fun. Guys were stroking themselves while the movie screen showed Gay pornos. A few guys were sitting next to someone stroking them or bending over and giving them head in the darken theater. Some were really cute college guys too.

 

            John Reeves went one way and I went the other, where I found a dark secluded corner to sit. Eventually this tall blond good-looking man sat behind me rubbing his self. I reached behind me and touched his knee, then his groin. Since he didn’t seem to mind I went and sat next to him. There was hardly anyone else in that part of the theater so I took my time playing with his nipples and caressing him. He acted like he really enjoyed being touched and tenderly being played with so I gave him head. I thought he’d go crazy the way he responded to my mouth. It was a good way to relieve some sexual tension. He had the cutest smile and a great body. I’ll remember him.

 

            John and I got home to Framlingham at 11:30 at night.

 

 

 

23 June 1989 Friday

 

We did the Freedom trail today and we walked out feet off. I have the blisters to prove it.  After having an early lunch, we started from the Boston Commons and then followed this red brick trail that wound through the city. It took us from  the State Capitol building, to the Old Granary Burial Grounds where Sam Adams, John Hancock and Paul Revere are buried, then over to the Old State House which the Boston Massacre took place. We walked through Faneuil Hall Market Place, crossed over to the North End of Boston to Paul Revere’s House, to the Old North Church “Two if by land One if by sea”, then across the Charles River to the U.S.S. Constitution. The sailors on the U.S.S. Constitution are dressed in the uniforms of 1812 and they sure were cute. So you can see we made a full day of it; a real tourist day.

 

            After walking back to Boston, we strolled through the Italian section of the North end and the smells and aroma’s were out of this world.  We walked through a farmer’s market and a fish market, where there were lots of sights and smells and sounds of real Boston. It was a sensory overload.

 

            We were done by 6:30 this evening and not wishing to go back to Framlingham to be scowled at, we went back to the ART Theater again. It’s a gay movie house and costs $6 for admissions. I thought it would be a great place to sit down, relax, put my tired feet up and even sleep a little in the darken theater. However I met this nice man who gave his name as Bill, tall, sandy blond hair, academic looking, kind of cute who sat next to me and started messing with me. I was really attracted to him and we decided to go off together to a motel. I told John that I would met him at the Information Booth in the Commons at ten tonight.

 

            So I went off with this stranger, who turned out to be so wonderful. “Strangers in the night exchanging glances”.  We split the cost of a motel room, took a shower together, but before making love I noticed he put on two condoms one over the other. Sign of the times I suppose. We made love and afterwards I gave him a long full body massage. He was really handsome and he said I was wonderful. When he took me back into Boston, I thanked him for letting me taste, “the local flavor” of Massachusetts.

 

            It was raining by the time I connected back up with John, but it was a warm summer shower. He seemed rather down and I felt bad that I had left him but I needed some time alone. He said he understood completely. That is why we are such good companions.

 

 

 

24 June 1989 Saturday

 

 Today was one of the most important days of my life.  I was able to participate in a re-enactment of the first Stonewall Riot at the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street which led to a second "riot/celebration" in and of itself alone!

 

Sequence of events:  I was up by 5:30 this morning.  I kept waking up early for some reason. Anyway John Reeves and I wanted to be down at the Greyhound bus terminal in Boston by 7:30 to catch the 8:00 bus, which we did.

 

 It was a four and a half hour bus trip into New York City from Boston.  The NYC terminal was located at about 42nd Ave. and 8th Street. We were pretty weary from the bus ride but John wanted to drag me around to see some of the sights. I suggested that we get our rooms first.

 

We planned on staying at the Sloan YMCA which was located on 34th and 7th street and although it was big and dirty, it was also cheap.  A single room with shared showers was about $33 with a $5 key deposit.  For New York City, this was mega cheap because most rooms are $75 or more a night.

 

The Sloan YMCA is an international youth hostel and in the lobby all types of Americans and hundreds of foreign students traveling abroad were swarming about, bustling about their business with backpacks in tow.  It took what seemed forever to check in, about 45 minutes, but with that taken care of I was relieved to get on with things.         

 

We ate a bite and made our way to Central Park. We originally started on down towards Greenwich Village but I saw a poster stating that the Gay Pride Day Rally was being held in Central Park.  We made an about face and I took my first "real" subway ride up to 60th Ave and 7th Street at the end of Central Park. 

 

Central Park was huge and we had no idea where the Great Lawn was.  The Great Lawn was where the rally was being held.  I was more single minded in purpose than John and it slightly annoyed me that he wanted to stop and listen to the different musicians in the park and such, while I had this pressing feeling of urgency to get to the rally.  I felt something was going to happen tonight which I needed to be a part of.

 

The rally was half over by the time we finally found it but it was still huge and yet not what I really expected.  I thought there would be more of a carnival atmosphere but there wasn't. There was a large stage with a huge rainbow of colored balloons surrounded by thousands of people sitting on the grass and listening to the speakers.

 

  We stopped and listened to a woman's comedy team who was really funny, along with a Lesbian singer before we realized that Harry Hay was going to address the crowd.  I was amazed that the founder of the modern Gay Liberation Movement had identified himself with the Radical Faeries and addressed the crowd while wearing a pink tutu!!  Harry Hay gave a brief history of the Mattachine Society but mostly dwelt on the topic that Gay people collaborate in their own oppression by their silence!

 

I had come to hear Harry Hay and after he was finished, fatigue caught up with both of us.  We were tired, hungry, and perhaps even exhausted from walking so much yesterday in Boston, so John and I decided to take the subway back to our rooms, take a nap, get some dinner, and then head on down to the Village.

 

However back at the YMCA, I was too keyed up to sleep so I went and took a long shower in the communal bathroom.  I wanted to wash the New York slime off of me and check out the view.  It's so humid in NYC and dirty.  I feel sticky all the time but one does kind of get use to it.

 

 Anyhow after I finished my shower and John woke from his nap, we ate at TAD's, which is a steak place.  Since I'm a summer vegetarian I just had corn on the cob and some New York Cheesecake.  Yummy.

 

After eating we caught the subway train down to Christopher Street on 7th Ave and as we emerged from the NYC intestines we saw thousands of people milling around in the warm evening air.  It was electrifying!  I spotted the faded black and white STONEWALL sign in front of Sheridan Square and saw that the area was surrounded by a large crowd of fifty people or more.  I hurried John over to see what was going on.  It was about 8:30 p.m. by now and someone in the crowd said that a mock re-enactment of the raid that set off  the Stonewall Riot was taking place.

 

By now hundreds were jammed along the front sidewalk and in the street in front of what was the Stonewall Inn and they were yelling at the fake cops who were pretending to haul off patrons and drag queens.

 

From the steps of the old Stonewall Inn my adventure began! The crowd was handed foam yellow bricks to throw at the cops while calling them names like "Pigs!"  I, remembering a scene from the Black Cat café in San Francisco, began yelling "God Save the Nelly Queens!"

 

A magical combination of high energy levels and the spirit of Gay Liberation worked its way through the crowd of taunting and booing Gays and Lesbians.  It seemed like a time capsule to me.  It was magical and somewhat intoxicating and I felt so fortunate to be here where it all began, acting out my own Gay Liberation in front of the very building that twenty years before had seen a true miracle.

 

After about twenty minutes of enthusiastic yelling and taunting I was the first to shout out "GAY POWER!"  I wanted to agitate the crowd and focus the circus like atmosphere into what this night was truly about!  Then others raised the chorus of Gay Power and someone yelled out, "Let's take back 7th Avenue and almost spontaneously a crowd of several hundred including myself converged into the intersection of Christopher Street and 7th Ave.

 

I,  along with about seven others, lifted up the police barricade, holding it aloft, so that the crowd could move on down to the next intersection.  Almost immediately the NYC police arrived on the scene but they just cautiously watched as the crowd almost magically swelled to over several hundred.  We all started shouting to the police which became a chant "Arrest US! Just Try it! Remember Stonewall was a Riot!"

 

Tonight Years of Gay oppression and frustration over AIDS was letting off steam and the NYC police had the common sense to keep a respectful distance as we danced in the streets, chanting our slogans "Hey, Hey, Ho, Ho, Homophobia's got to go!", "We're here because we're Queer!", and "Gay Power!".

 

The crowd was now more than a thousand strong and with the increased numbers, the playfulness of the earlier revelers turned more serious. There was a completely different air about us now. The thousands of marchers now in the street were basically saying "this is OUR night and we are going to howl!"

 

I stayed up front with the young radicals who were carrying the confiscated police barricade, stopping traffic, and working up the crowd.  Definitely the event was taking on an life of its own.  Young and old, Gay and Lesbian, taking to the streets to scream, "Gay Liberation!"  What a trip!

 

At one intersection, which was blocked off  by our marching, this rich, macho dude (probably out to impress his rich cunt), tried to run down some of us in his car.  I witnessed it and some of the others who did also were so outraged that a chase began.  Someone copied down his license number (RWR349) which became our rallying chant as thousands more streamed over to the 6th Precinct Police Department, angry that the police had let this guy get away.  People demanded that the police do something.

 

The crowd had turned militant at this point, angry at the police for not doing anything.  Some of the hot heads began jumping on the police cars parked out front and banging on the police station's front doors which the cops had locked in case the crowd really turned ugly.

 

Several American flags were set on fire in front of the police station and finally the cops came out with a bull horn to address the crowd that had filled the street.  Some self appointed spokesperson from the crowd shouted at the police that Gays in the Village were also outraged over the recent killings of  two Gay men but when the police officer said that the murders were not Gay related, a chorus of "Bull Shit!" interrupted him.  The crowd began to shout "No  more lies!" but finding that they were getting nowhere with the police, they retreated after pelting the police station with condom packages.

 

We left the Sixth Precinct then and headed for West Ave which runs along the Hudson River down to the area where the Gay men were murdered.  Practicing civil disobedience, we sat down in the middle of the Highway and blocked Saturday night traffic along this major thorough fare.  We declared our sit down space "Queer Nation" and we sang out "hey, hey Ho, Ho Patriarchy has got to go!" and "Not the Church! Not the State! We alone decide our fate!" and "Keep your laws off my body!"

 

The police came out in full force for the sit down demonstration and while I was slightly fearful that  I was going to get arrested for disturbing the peace, the police faced with a volatile situation, just re-routed traffic rather than take on a crowd of Gay Radicals who were screaming and taunting, "Arrest us just try it Remember Stonewall was a riot!"

 

  I have to praise the New York Police on how swiftly they redirected traffic and took the wind out of our sails. With no more traffic to hold up, we left the West Highway and went back to the streets where the Gay Bars were located.

 

As the crowd surged back into the village we made a pilgrimage to each of the bars where we pounded on the windows, yelled through the open front doors, and encouraged the bar patrons to join us by singing "Out of the Bars and Into the Streets".

 

As bar patrons emptied into the streets, cheers and applause broke out.  Most quickly joined us but a few just smiled and shook their heads in mild timidity. 

 

 The woman's bar and a Yuppie bar were the only bars not having a large amount of people respond.  However those of us who were in the streets were at least 10,000 strong and our one voice was shouting "Gay Power" which echoed down the narrow streets of the Village.

 

 As we slowly and aimlessly walked along the streets of the village, cars on cross streets were immobilized by the endless procession.  Most people sat in their cars smiling and waving, being very supportive but some looked very bewildered by it all, even scared and some really mad.

 

At side street intersections I, along with others acted as a human barricade, holding hands with other faggots, sort of like crossing guards and at one point I saw a line of drag queens doing a chorus line of high kicks and I felt the night air was full of enchantment.

 

However at one particular intersection, as I was holding hands with this guy, a brand new red automobile had stopped in front of us.  It was full of young guys and they started yelling, "Faggots get out of the fucking way!" and immediately the car was surrounded by people pounding on his car to let him know we weren't taking heterosexual crap tonight.

 

The idiot driver then began flipping us off with the finger and all of a sudden ploughed right into the human barricade knocking down about five Gays before speeding away.  I was just feet away from being hit also.

 

 Immediately a chase arose and through the narrow streets hundreds ran after the car with the punks inside.  I ran as fast as I could but kept getting passed up by younger and stronger ones who were intent that this one would not get away.

 

It was bedlam as the car drove up on the sidewalk, hitting some more Gay people until cornered and surrounded, the punks couldn't get away.  The cops finally arrived to disperse the angry and frustrated crowd.  And rather than just getting the hell out of there, incredibly, the punks backed the car up and tried to run down some more people.

 

The crowd was intent on revenge now, cops or no cops, and the car was surrounded and under siege by a tumultuous angry crowd of hundreds.  They began rocking the car back and forth, smashing windshields, tail lights, pulling off every bit of the car that was detachable.  Only after a squadron of cops put a stop to the melee were the visibly shaken and scared punks pulled from the car by the police.

 

The car was trashed.  Windshields smashed to smithereens, head lights and tail lights kicked out.  Someone even had taken a police barricade and smashed in the hood with it.  The mood of the crowd mellowed after seeing the punks arrested and that the car was totally destroyed.  The car really took the blunt of pent up rage.

 

 Heterosexuals should be thankful that we are a gentle people because considering the oppression and years of emotional, physical, and spiritual abuse inflicted on us as a people, it’s a wonder that we haven't gone completely berserk.

 

 Meandering back down the street to get back to Christopher Street, this young Lesbian triumphantly exclaimed to me, "I use to be a Yuppie but I'm an anarchist now!" and she proudly showed off to me a section of the red plastic tail light that she had ripped off the car.  She held it like some trophy or treasured memento of a heroic battle.  I suppose it was.

 

After the intensity of the destruction of the vehicle, the crowd kind of dispersed and drifted back to Christopher and 7th Ave.  It was late and I was thinking that anything else tonight would be pretty anti-climatic however I was wrong.  Faerie magick was not through with me yet.         

 

Exhausted I sat down in the middle of the intersection of Christopher Street and 7th Ave along with this Gay man I met named Michelle.  He was the first one hit by the car but he said he was okay.  We sat in the middle of the street with our arms around each other and just drank in the scene of thousands milling around on this warm June night.

 

Michelle looked about 30 but must have been closer to 40 because he echoed the same sentiments that I was having at the moment.  We both felt lucky and grateful to have taken part in the Second Stonewall Riot and able to re-enact the magick of 1969.  It was like being given a second chance to be a part of the most significant event in Gay History.

 

 Michelle said he was living in the Village in 1969 having just arrived from Minneapolis.  However he also said he was too young at the time to appreciate the importance of the riots of 1969.   I was living in Garden Grove California, having just graduated from Rancho Alamitos High School and in love with John Cunningham.  Now here we are 20 years later, two strangers locked in each other’s arms united in a Gay brotherhood. It was way better than any 20th high school reunion.

 

Michelle also informed me that he just went off AZT because it wasn't doing him any good and as he spoke I reflected on my life and thought that here it is at midnight and I'm sitting in my white shorts on a dirty New York City intersection, holding a Gay man who is dying of AIDS, and extremely grateful for every minute of it.

 

Eventually Michelle wandered off into the night and I began to look for John who I had lost in all the hubbub. As I was drawn again to Sheridan Square I saw that the Radical Faeries had a wonderful poster on a wall which had a picture of a screaming, in your face, drag queen with the caption: DO YOU THINK HOMOSEXUALS ARE REVOLTING? YOU BET YOUR SWEET ASS WE ARE! Stonewall Rebellion 1969.

 

The poster went on to say that the Radical Faeries were hosting a tour of the Stonewall Inn to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the riots.  I went over to where the Stonewall Bar use to be and found out that the Radical Faeries had rented the basement of the building that once housed the Stonewall Inn and they were hosting a walk through guided tour of 20,000 years of Gay History in 5 minutes. It was wonderfully farcical.

 

They started off by paying a tribute to Judy Garland, whose death I was to learn, precipitated the Stonewall Riots.  They had the mock coffin of Judy and a shrine of all types of Mabeline nail polish on a type of an altar.

 

The tour was a shamanic experience.  I saw Gay cavemen painting Gay graffiti on their cave walls, Gay Greeks in togas sporting Dorian capstones as headgear, the burning times when Gays were used as faggots, and then jumping right to the 20th Century- Gay Go-Go Boys in cages.

 

We got to throw foam yellow bricks at the "pigs" and then before being ushered out we formed a Faerie circle and was sprinkled with Faerie dusts.  We were taught a song to help end patriarchal suppression and then shooed out the door!

 

In that brief tour of the basement of the Stonewall Inn I experienced a life transforming experience.  A conversion of the soul, if you will by the Gay Spirit.  That basement was hot and humid and I sweated like a pig but it was also wonderful and I laughed and had fun and I knew that my Spirit was telling me that I was at the Holy Shrine of Stonewall.  I came to place a rose on the doorsteps of Stonewall Inn in remembrance  but it was me who was given a rose in my heart.

 

Outside in the cooler night air I began to hawk the merits of the Radical Faerie Tour and got several people to come on inside and at one point this Faerie came out and saw what I was doing and he asked if I would do the Faeries a favor.  He said that they were dying of thirst in the sweltering building and asked if I would take the $10 he gave me to go across the street and buy an assortment of pop for them.

 

I looked at the guy and said, "You picked the  right person because I will do it. You can trust me," and he smiled at me and said, " I knew I could, that's why I asked you."

 

So after coming back and giving him his change he tapped me on the head with his Faerie wand and said, "For your good deed, I dub  you an honorary Faerie."   I don't think he realized how much I took that symbolic gesture to heart.

 

Later about one in the morning, hundreds, of those who were still left in the streets, gathered in a huge circle formed by the radical Faeries in the middle of the intersections of Christopher and 7th Ave. The Radical Faeries led us in songs, and we danced, and we hissed (which I learned that Faeries do when they are happy), and the Faeries sang out  "WE ARE THE STONEWALL GIRLS-WE WEAR OUR HAIR IN CURLS- WE DON'T WEAR UNDERWEAR- WE SHOW OUR PUBIC HAIR! WE WEAR OUR DUNGEREES BELOW OUR NELLY KNEES"

 

To close the circle we sang, some 300  voices strong, "Somewhere Over The Rainbow".  My soul was fulfilled. A spiritual longing for home was satisfied. True enchantment enveloped my being. True liberation from the chains that bind the captives and the mending of the broken hearted could now begin.  Thank God I am who I am!  I sacrificed to be here this night and my sacrifice was rewarded. This wonderful nights of all nights!

 

John, I learned later, had left earlier then I did  and went back to the Sloan Hostel and about 1:30 in the morning this tired little Faerie boy walked the darken streets of New York City  all by his brave little self, truly liberated and in tune with his Gay soul.  Fairy dust in my hair and enchantment all around me! Hisssssssss!

 

 

 

25 June 1989 Sunday

 

Today is my sister Donna Jones' 40th birthday. Oh well. I woke up about 6 this morning after not getting back to the YMCA until almost two.  I couldn't sleep.  Images of me, running through the streets of the village, singing "Somewhere over the rainbow" kept me keyed up.  In fact my circuit board was over loaded with the sights, and smells, and sounds of New York City.

 

I'm on the 11th floor of the Sloan International YMCA and I can see the Hudson River from my room.  I kept my window open because it was stuffy and thus the constant traffic noise was always with me, like a vibrating blanket of sound.  My feet are full of blisters and only sheer will power keeps me from collapsing but while to some people this may seem like a nightmare; to me it is celestial bliss.  I am animated.  I no longer feel like dead men bones. I've been jolted by the purging, cleansing fire of Gay Pride and filled with the spirit.

 

I just couldn't lie in bed any longer so at 6:30  so I got up to shower.  My clothes are so damp and moist from the humidity.  It's not like anything I've experienced before not even in California or Texas.  Cute foreign, uncut students, traveling abroad, were in the shower room soaping themselves up.  It's like Babel with all the different tongues.  I can spot the Israelis right away because I think they and Americans are the only men who are circumcised anymore.

 

Anyway, I went down to the lobby where I was greeted with a pandemonium of young energetic travelers saying their goodbyes to brief friendships, and throwing on back packs. There’s a flurry of fluttering maps being folded and unfolded.  I thought the Britons were the most interesting and handsome. I loved their debonair, touring class, English “Brideshead Revisited” demeanor. John Reeves wasn’t down until nine which gave me plenty of time to observe the traveling class of young worldly vagabonds.

 

 Upon his arrival, out we went into the Big Apple. We stopped at Scott’s Deli on 46th and Sixth Avenue where we had a bagel with cream cheese, a fruit salad and I had New York coffee. It was wonderful. Oddly I found that traveler checks are hard to cash on the weekends in New York City; not impossible but difficult. I would have been better off bringing some cash even if travelers checks are suppose to be safer.

 

After we ate we walked over to Fifth Avenue where a lavender line was painted in the street to designate the parade route. We walked over to St. Patrick’s Cathedral because John had heard that there was going to a commotion there to protest Catholic homophobia. However we saw that nothing was really going on at St. Patrick’s, so we went off to Columbus Circle near Central Park where the parade rally was to kick off. All along the route hundreds of rainbow flags, in all their rainbow splendor, flew from lampposts. It was a magnificent sight to see.

 

At Columbus Circle there were several huge rainbow balloons arches that seem to boldly proclaim, “this was the place”, to use a Utah phrase. It was a hive of activity. John and I found a booth selling Gay Pride tee shirts and buttons finally. I bought some buttons and a Gay Pride flag also.

 

Walking along the parade route, John and I spotted Harvey Fierstein, who was the Grand Marshall. He was just standing by himself visiting with someone. So I went up to him, shook his hand, and said I was from Salt Lake City and wanted him to know how much we appreciated his Gay Rights work and how much  his Torch Song Trilogy movie meant to us in the hinterlands. Imagine me, visiting with Harvey Fierstein, who was as pleasant and nice a person as anyone one could be.  Gawd, I love being Gay.

 

Anyhow, John and I stationed ourselves by a New York City barricade at Columbus Circle where we would have a great view of the massive parade which started at 12:30 in the afternoon and lasted until 2:30 before all the entries had stepped off. Towards the end, after seeing the majority of it, John and I joined in with hundreds of others, and paraded down to 34th Street. Along the route we witnessed a small group of anti-Gay demonstrators, perhaps less than two dozen compared to the 150,000 parade participants that the newspaper estimated were there. Mostly on the sidelines were supporters cheering and clapping.

 

After the parade was over we went back to the YMCA, I took another shower, and then collapsed in my room. My feet are a mass of blisters and my legs muscles are extremely sore. Both John and I were exhausted. He took a nap to recover while I sat by the open window and looked out over the great big city and thought of the events that led me to this point.

 

At six this evening, John and I, feeling rested, went out to dinner again. Afterwards we took the subway back into the Village where Sheridan Square was actually wall to wall filled with revelers. The streets were literally littered with pink confetti that must have been tossed and strewn onto the parade,  as people entered the village. Music was blaring, Gay flags and balloons were draped from the windows and balconies of the rows of apartments. Gays were dancing from the same balconies to the delight of the throng below; many who would stop and encourage the dancers, who were half naked anyway, to remove more clothing. Believe it or not I was not one of those shouting to take off their shorts.

 

John and I walked to the end of Christopher Street where there was a wharf that was grid locked with massive amounts of people, because here were where most of the vendors were located. It seemed like hundreds of booths were selling Gay merchandize, and every imaginable item of finger food, beer and wine, and Margaritas and Pina Coladas which were all be sold freely and consumed in a Mardi Gras type atmosphere. Dorothy we are not in Utah anymore.

 

I bought several tee-shirts and more pro-Gay buttons. I also bought for a $1 a Keith Haring Stop AIDS poster that the Gay Men’s AIDS Health Clinic was selling as a fundraiser.

 

Eventually the constant beat of the music, the heat of the pavement, the constant grime, the body odor, and most of all the smell of barbecuing meats made me queasy and overcame my desire to stay. My 38 year old body overcame the spirit and demanded “Take  me  home”. I know, if I was exhausted, John at 55 had to be running on sheer will power. So I bade adieu to fairyland and made one last pilgrimage to Stonewall, to touch the bricks of the building that is a symbol of liberation. Then I walked  back to the YMCA with John, feeling triumphant but exhausted.

 

There from my bedroom window on the 11th floor, I could see the Gay Pride fireworks bursting over the river which concluded a wonderful, marvelous, and soul transforming Gay Pride weekend. I knew I would sleep well tonight.

 

 

 

26 June 1989 Monday

 

John and I checked out of the Sloan YMCA at 9:30 this morning and we started to look for a place to eat breakfast. I also wanted to cash some traveler’s checks at the bank. Anyhow, we walked around and we honestly intended to do some more sightseeing but we were weary beyond words.

 

            Our bus back to Boston was leaving at two in the afternoon; so we just decided that we had to be back at the Greyhound Terminal by one to get in line for a seat if we were going to catch that bus. It truly is first come first served when riding the bus as there’s no reserved seating.

 

            I wanted to go back to the Village to look for some Gay men’s music to play on KRCL. I found some at the “Different Light Bookstore” on Hudson Street. I bought four albums that were recommended to take back with me. They were The Nylons’, Michael Callen’s “Purple Heart”, Barton’s “Elvira Gulch Rides Again” and Elliott Pilshaw’s “Feels Like Home”.

 

            Next door, at “Gay Treasures”, I bought a Mattachine Society Magazine dated Sept 1961. I know I only choose that date because that was the month and year Billy Bikowski was born.

 

            Anyway we caught our bus out of New York City and four and a half hours later we were back in Boston. John’s son Mark Reeves came to pick us up and take us back to Framlingham, So thus ended my New York City Gay Pride adventure and what an adventure it was.  Hissss.

 

 

 

27 June 1989 Tuesday

 

John Reeves had to babysit his grandchildren today so I was on my own. I took the T-Train from Framington into Boston. That cost me $2.75. I rode the train this morning accompanied by this Lesbian who after seeing my Gay Pride Button, asked me how the New York City Pride parade was.

 

In Boston, I mostly walked around on my own, exploring where I pleased. I had a wonderful vegetarian burrito of sorts. I think they called it a wrap. It was like a salad rolled up in a giant pita like bread. It was yummy.

 

            I walked back over to the Italian section in the North End  and bought a huge hubcap size loaf of crusty Italian bread for $1.50 I lived on that and a large coke from the Red Hen convenient store for most of the day as I strolled around. I was amazed not to see any 7-11 stores in Boston.

 

            It was warm 91 degrees and humid. Walking back to the Boston Commons, I sat beneath a towering shade tree and watched a procession of busy people strolling by. A black Evangelical Preacher was in the park shouting about accepting Jesus Christ as lord and savior, however when he started in on Gays, and Sodom and Gomorrah, I whipped out my old Gay Pride Button with a Pink Triangle on it, that  I had from the 1987 March on Washington,  and put it on while in front of him. It was my silent protest.

 

            When it was too hot to be outside, I went to the ART male porno theater on Tremont Street to use their air conditioning. I watched movies and other activities for about three hours during the heat of the day, until going back out to the Commons to meet up with John at six thirty in the evening.

 

We were going to walk to the Gay area near Fenway Park but my poor feet are abut crippled. I can’t walk anymore. John took off then to go to the ART Theater but as I had seen as much porno as I could stand, I stayed in the Common’s area and watched an actor’s troop rehearse. That was fun and the weather was cooler by then.

 

            So I’m sitting on a park bench surrounded by Bostonians, just enjoying this early summer’s evening.  Boston reeks of history. It oozes tradition, and I have seen one too many New England style architectural structure. I think I am already getting homesick being in this city of strangers.

 

I’m really feeling lonesome and missing Billy Bikowski today. Amy Grant’s song “Everywhere I go, I see your face through the crowd Everywhere I go I hear your voice clear and loud” kept haunting me.  I even saw a statue of a young Polish Revolutionary War General and he had Billy’s face, young and fair, and I began to choke up on the Italian bread I had been gnawing on. The refrains “Everywhere I go I hear your voice clear and load” keeps ringing in my ears and I really hate him for being in my head.

 

 

 

28 June 1989 Wednesday

 

 It rained for much of the day, a cold dreary overcast rain. John Reeves and I drove to Concord and Lexington today but it was raining so hard that we didn’t get out to look at the Revolutionary Battlefield but we did go to the Concord Cemetery where John wanted to show me the graves of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Louisa May Alcott. They are all buried fairly close to each other. They are the giants of American 19th Century literature and philosophy and now they are moldering in their graves.   Well I guess it’s only right that I pay tribute to Thoreau after all I definitely march to the beat of a different drum.

 

            My funds are getting low and I am travel weary. I am getting tired of New England. It’s too green, no variations, or contrasts. But I imagine it’s absolutely beautiful in the fall but I can also see why my ancestors migrated south and west.

 

            Anyhow, after driving back to Framlingham and after eating at this Italian dinner house, we decided to go see an early showing of Batman rather than return to the house of horrible vibes. The movie Batman is all the rage back here on the East Coast. It seems that people can’t get enough of Batman tee-shirts, hats, and buttons.  Almost every store carries some type of Batman merchandise and paraphernalia.

 

            I thought the music in the movie was beautiful and the set designs gorgeous but I thought the mood was too dark and brooding. The story line was much too thin and didn’t hold much of a momentum for being a so called “epic” movie. I wasn’t all that impressed considering the hype. After the movie we went back into Boston.

 

            .  John wanted to go back to the ART porno theater and I told him to go ahead but I wanted to spend some time at the Glad Day Bookstore because I just needed some space to myself.

 

            John dropped me off at Copley Square and I went to the Back Bay Station to use the restroom. Not surprisingly I found the men’s rooms a really cruisy T-room. It was not that way in the day time when the station is filled with commuters.  There were hunky guys standing at the stalls watching each other stroke their hard-ons. There is something mystical even primeval in this mating ritual of group sex among males.  I don’t know what it is exactly but it’s more powerful than the nucleus of an atom.

 

            After enjoying this Bostonian existentialistic experience, I met up with John in front of the ART Theater and we went back to Framlingham at eleven at night.

 

 I try to be at Mark Reeve’s place as little as possible as I know his wife is resentful of me even being there; afraid I am corrupting John. I think she is very homophobic and Mark quarrels with her about John and I even being there. So except for the use of her couch I am completely out of her way and she doesn’t  even know I am there except to sleep on her basement couch.  She’s a very typical ungenerous Mormon.

 

 

 

29 June 1989 Thursday

 

It was an absolutely gorgeous summer day after yesterday’s gloomy rain storm. It was an ideal day for us to take a trip down to Cape Cod and Provincetown which John Reeves calls P-Town. I guess P-Town supposedly is the Gay Resort area of Massachusetts.

 

            It was a long 100 mile trip to get to Provincetown and when we got there we had lunch at “the Lobster Pot”. I had a yummy lobster salad. We spent much of the afternoon browsing through expensive tourist shops, window shopping. Every store here sells over priced salt water taffy and fudge. I had some Ben and Jerry ice cream finally as we were about to leave. It tastes good and supports socialist causes.

 

Provincetown was an interesting place but really a tourist trap I thought. I’m much too Bohemian to fit in with the older fussy Gays with their beautiful Cape Cod homes filled with pretty house boys. It was all too prissy for my taste but still it was interesting in an anthropologist sort of way.

 

After leaving Provincetown, John drove down over to Rhode Island to stop in Providence. There is an adult bookstore he wanted to visit but I waited in the car for him. I am all Adult Bookstore out. If you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all. Rhode Island has the only remaining Bathhouse in all the New England area anymore. John showed me where it is located. I wonder how long it will last until it’s shut down?

 

After returning to Massachusetts we drove back into Boston because John was horny and wanted to play some more. I,  instead, went to the Copley Square Mall to look around. I’m missing being with people. I want to meet people and not just do people.

 

After John was finished at the Art Theater, we went out for a late night snack at the Stage Deli in the theater district of Boston.  I had a plate of onion rings and John had corned beef on rye bread that I must say looked yummy.

 

I finished reading the “Mayor of Castro Street,” today that I had been lugging around everywhere in my shoulder parcel. It was about Harvey Milk  and it was an important book which I think every Gay person ought to read.

 

John and I have been discussing compiling a reading list of important “must read” Gay books such as the “Mayor of Castro Street”, “Confession of a Rock Lobster”, “Christianity, Social Intolerance, and Homosexuality”, “Sexual Communities Sexual Politics” and the “Homosexual Matrix” just to name a few.

 

Additional Material           

 

·         INMATE WITH AIDS GETS PAROLE DATE 4 MONTHS AFTER HER COMMITMENT By Peg McEntee, Associated Press Dianna Hernandez, a Utah State Prison inmate with AIDS, has been granted a Sept. 12 parole date less than four months after her commitment for theft and attempted drug distribution. Hernandez, 32, appeared Wednesday before the two of the three members of Board of Pardons, who said she would be released to a halfway house on condition she undergo medical treatment and continue in drug counseling. Victoria Palacios was absent. Hernandez was committed March 14 after pleading guilty to third-degree theft, a charge that came on the heels of other offenses related to the drug abuse she acknowledged to the board. The crime also violated her probation on an earlier charge of attempted distribution of cocaine. The zero-to-five-year terms were concurrent. Hernandez told board members Paul Boyden and Henry Haun she had become involved with heroin in her teens, kicked that habit in 1979 and turned to cocaine. However, she said that after she learned a year ago that she was infected with the HIV virus that causes AIDS, she sought treatment for her cocaine addiction and had not used the drug since November. Hernandez, whose parents and brother were present, told the board she has her family's support And that of her outside physician, drug counselor and the Utah AIDS Foundation. She also submitted letters written on her behalf by the Alcoholics Anonymous chapter she attends behind bars, the LDS Institute and a guard, therapist and caseworker. Board member Paul Boyden told Hernandez that based on her criminal history, sentencing guidelines called for a minimum stay of 21 months, and that her confinement would be "extraordinarily short." However, he said that while her AIDS was a "significant factor," the board also recognized that none of her offenses had involved violence.

 

 

 

30 June 1989 Friday

 

It is the National Day of Mourning for loss of the Rights to Privacy today. I wonder if anyone wore purple in Salt Lake City? 

 

            John and I went to Boston this evening to get away. John wanted to go to the ART porno theater tonight but I wanted to go to the Boston Commons to see a free performance of Dionysus ’89 a production of theater in the park.

 

            Before the theater in the park was to begin, I walked all over North Boston within the Italian Section. That was a lot of fun seeing people hanging out their upper widows and calling down to people on the street with lots of people shouting in Italian. I bought some more of that delicious crusty Italian bread which I  brought t back to the Commons. There I sat on a park bench and read from the Homosexual Matrix before the play began at 8:30.

 

            It was a nice warm night to be out and a wonderful way to spend the last day in June, sitting in Boston, watching live theater in the park with the Boston Skyline silhouetted  as a background.

 

            After the play was over, I connected up with John and we drove over the Charles River Bridge into Cambridge where we went back to Harvard Square. There we walked around, stopping only to listen to street musicians and with their high energy levels as were so young.

 

            Leaving there, John drove me to a cruisy back street behind a Gay club called Paradise on Massachusetts Avenue. In the alley, this cute guy was cruising. John parked and walked over to the Paradise to check out the cover to go in to look around while the cute guy came over to the passenger side of the car. We began to make eye contact and he asked me to follow him into this alley where he performed fellatio on me. He was wonderful and I wanted to reciprocate but he was happy just being “French Active”.  Besides I had to get back to the car before John missed me. “Strangers in the Night exchanging glances”

 

            Leaving Cambridge, we drove back into Boston where we ended up at Napoleon Club in the Back Bay area which is more John’s kind of bar. John likes it because it is a piano bar that also attracts musical theater kids. He said that Judy Garland and Liberace used to come here. Napoleons actually has two piano bars, and a dance floor upstairs, that is called Josephine's.  I had a fuzzy navel and enjoyed the ambiance of what was once called a “Gentleman’s Club.” We didn’t stay too long as we were back in Framlingham by 1:30 in the morning.

 

            Well this month has been fascinating with the highlight being with the demonstrators at the Stonewall Inn in New York City. I am getting really homesick. It’s time to go home and put my energies back into the Gay community of Salt Lake City, John has been asking me what do I want to accomplish when I return home. My honest answer is I don’t know yet. I want to fly, to create, to be animated. I think I want to form a true Bohemian Club of radical thought where I can discuss issues that are on the cutting edge of what is acceptable.

Additional Material

The terms French Active and French Passive referred to oral sex under the myth that the French had perfected fellatio. Active was the person giving and passive was the person receiving. Another term was Greek Active and Greek Passive for anal sex as the Ancient Greeks were attributed to  rise of the popularity of that practice. Active was the top and Passive was the bottom.

AUGUST

1 August 1989 Tuesday

I went up to the University of Utah with Jim Rieger this morning to type up on their computers this weekend’s agenda for Beyond Stonewall. It took until 2 in the afternoon but at least I got it done. I then took it to Aztec Copy and 100 copies of each ran off. While out I stopped and visited with Jon Merrill. He gave me the Gay definition  that Curtis Robinson made up and I had it printed on business cards. I’m putting them in the registration packets also. I got a bunch of condoms from the Utah AIDS Foundation that will also be included

I went down to the O.P. Office Club Office and Supplies on 8^th South and Main and bought 100 folders and 25 covers for the Music that Becky Christensen dropped off.

I didn't attend Unconditional Support tonight but just stayed home to start assembling these hundred registration packets so I know they are done correctly. Besides Allan Peterson was going to lead the meeting and it should be boring. He didn’t follow through on his commitment to Gay Pride Day, I knew he wouldn’t.  He doesn’t have good follow through.

I did go down to Radio City and visited some with Jon Merrill and Curtis Robinson. Later  I called Becky Christensen tonight and she is excited about leading a sing a long at the Friday night campfire.  Jim Rieger is getting settled in.

 

2 August 1989 Wednesday

So much last minute running around  to get prepared for the weekend. John Bush is going to buy cases of soda pop for up there and I called every one of the presenters to make sure they were fine. I wasn’t able to get a hold of Brook Hallock or Dr. Michael Elliott but I did leave them messages to call me back about their workshops at Beyond Stonewall. I also called and talked Thom Jensen Abizu into doing John Reeve’s workshop so I don’t have to cancel it or do it myself.

I talked to Robert Smith. He’s pissed off at Allan Peterson regarding how Unconditional Support’s meeting went yesterday. He said that Allan talked to the group saying how I had treated him badly over an innocent comment he made about Billy Bikowski. Shit! That really pisses me off too. How dare he discuss a private matter in a public forum but I don’t have time to deal with him however.

 Mom called me to say that they were coming through Salt Lake City on their way to Yellowstone but I said I would probably miss them because my retreat is this weekend and there’s no way short of jail or death can I not be there. She sounded a little disappointed but understood. I told her about Terry Johnson so he must be becoming important to me. Will he be the one to heal my heart over Billy Bikowski? Mom said that my Uncle Milton Williams has colon cancer and it doesn’t look good for him. I don’t know how to deal with that news yet.

 

3 August 1989 Thursday

There was a small turn out at the Gay Community Council Meeting. We postponed discussing a Gay Pride Parade for 1990 until September. 

Terry Johnson picked me up after the meeting and he took me home. He moved out of the house he was staying at on 8^th East so it’s hard to get a hold of him. He moved out of his old boyfriend Larry’s place and is staying with his grandma until he can find a place on his own.  He went to the dentist and we got some antibiotics for his tooth which was hurting him so much last Saturday so he’s feeling a lot better. Anyhow tomorrow is the big day. If I am not ready now I never will be.

 

4 August 1989 Friday

John Bush picked me up at noon and we went in his pickup truck with his lover Mike Connor. On the road to Kamas, I said to John, “That looks like my wife” who was working hold signs for a road work crew. And it was!! We turned around and stopped and I was able to visit with Fran who was wearing an orange vest and hard hat! That was fun and what a coincidence. After hugging her goodbye we continued up to Camp Rogers with John Bush to set up a registration table which was over by the horse corral this year.

The camp staff looked pretty scurvy this year compared to last year and while we didn’t have any problems with them they were very, very unfriendly.

Dan Fahndrich did a wonderful job with his accommodation crew and Guy Larson came through although I felt like he was being too laid back compared to Ken Francis last year. Could it be only a year since Ken left me for California?

Anyway as people started arriving, excitement began to build. Dinner was about six thirty and the camp staff changed our eating arrangements from last year which screwed up our agenda for the evening somewhat for the weekend. They served tasteless meatloaf that was mostly filler. Ugh.

Anyhow we held our  rainbow flag raising ceremony and our campfire key note speaker began at nine featuring Rocky O’Donovan. Becky Christensen led the sing a long after Rocky’s talk and I closed the event by having everyone gather in a circle to sing "Some Where Over the Rainbow".

I was somewhat bummed because I’d been looking forward to my boyfriend Terry Johnson coming up and he did but late around ten at night. Then I was happy and could enjoy myself. Terry Johnson and I had our own cabin to ourselves and we made love for most of the night.

So far everything is going wonderfully but I am exhausted and after registering everyone and getting them settled in their cabins and camping spots it’s pretty anticlimactic for me.

 

5 August 1989 Saturday

I thought I was in a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from this evening. 

           The day went smooth, workshops were great, however Michael Elliott was a no show and Brooke Hallock was late. I also was upset that for lunch the Spaghetti which was made from last night’s meat loaf and I was pissed. But I really could tell that most people were caught up in the magic and spirit of the retreat so I just let it go.

Terry Johnson had to leave several times to go find his brother David because he was suppose to have brought Terry his medicine. But when he didn’t bring it with him, Terry  had to leave and go back down to Salt Lake City which for me was good and bad. Good, because my attention could be back on the retreat and bad, because I felt lonely.

Anyhow Richard Morris set up the dance for this evening and Dan Fahndrich did a slide show in the lodge. As I was watching the slides, Don Penrose came up to me and asked “Are you going to be okay?” Taken back by his question, I said “Why shouldn’t I be? What is wrong?" and Don said, “Billy is here.”

I went into a shock of sorts and said, "No that’s impossible. Billy Bikowski wouldn’t come here. He wouldn’t come here.” But Don’s sad eyes told me the truth, that yes it was true. I then instinctively shut down my heart, fled to my cabin and began to sob and cry uncontrollably. I cried out to the Gay spirit “Why? Why is he here? Why can’t he just leave me alone?”

Don came into the cabin and was so sweet hugging me telling me that Billy is just not worth it and he was trying to comfort me as I just cried out my grief and cried myself into a state of exhaustion. Don told me to try and get some sleep but I just wanted to die.

Then as to exasperate the pain I heard Richard Morris playing “You Take My Breath Away” at the dance which was how I felt about Billy when I first met him. As if I could no longer control myself, I got out of my bunk. I had to see for myself. I had to see for myself that indeed Billy was here and I wasn’t simply going crazy because I felt like I was going insane. And there he was slow dancing with Renn and holding him tight like he never did me.

At that I just spaced out and thought “How dare he be here! Enjoying with another man everything I built and leaving me nothing”. I walked straight over to him and demanded, “What are you doing here?”  Then Renn said to me “We were invited”.  I retorted “Are you registered?” He said “No” and I said then "You can’t stay here. I want you gone".

Renn asked how much did I want for the to stay I said $60 each. Billy then looked at me and said “Don’t do this to us” which ripped my heart to shreds. I just steely said “I want you gone.” Renn demanded “Who are you?” And I said “I’m the director and you are leaving now.”

 I know it must have been humiliating and I was not getting any pleasure from it, but rather I was dying inside.  I just had to do what I needed for me to survive this weekend. I was adamant that Billy leave now. He sent Renn over to talk to Dave Omer at one point but I just dogged Billy’s steps until he left. At one point Billy turned to touch me like that would have made me soften like it always had before, but I jumped back, and fell in the bushes losing my glasses in the dark.  Bill started looking for them and said “I don’t want your help. I want you to leave now.”

So while blinded in the inky darkness I made the man I loved, but didn’t love me, leave. As they were going Renn was insulting to me, and Billy was saying something to him and I just told them both to shut up and leave.

Dave Omer was with me the whole time and as they drove off, I collapsed into his arms, totally destroyed, crushed and feeling so lost. I drove away what I wanted most in this world. Dave held me and led me half blind and full of grief back to my cabin where he stayed with me until I sobbed myself into a stated of exhausted oblivion.

How could Billy do this to me? Cruel beyond belief. The cruelest he’s been yet.  I could not attend the Faerie Gathering at Beyond Stonewall that Rocky O’Donovan and Mike Pipkin had planned because of my shattered state of being. I felt somewhat  that Mike Pipkin and Rocky O’Donovan, who could have healed me,  deserted me in a time of need.

 

6 August 1989 Sunday

I cried all night long and sought out Liza Smart to help me get the morning programs going because I was so mentally wounded and exhausted. I lay the fact that much of Sunday’s disorganization, that was totally unnecessary, at Billy Bikowski’s feet.  He drained me of so much energy that I was dysfunctional for most of the day.

I remember little of the rest of the day at Camp Rogers because all my energies went into control my tears. I did not participate in the Sunday devotional, the morning work shops and had John Bush doing the closing ceremony at one  so we could pack up  before the John Birchers could arrive.

Off the mountain I spent most of the rest of the day with Terry Johnson and his two boys, Austin and Health, over at his cousin Dorinda White’s place. Terry also wanted to go looking at cars. Terry’s strength was the only thing that kept me from going completely crazy.

 I should be analyzing and collecting data about this year’s Beyond Stonewall for next year’s and yet I have no energy. None. I can barely hold this pen to write my feelings. Why do I still allow Billy so much power over my heart. I just miss his soul. I’m sorry but I do.

 

7 August 1989 Monday

I spent what little energy I have, cleaning my apartment. I threw all of the Beyond Stonewall’s records into one box and I will deal with all that later. Jim Rieger was in a fender bender  today but he is okay.

I’m a little frightened by my court appearance tomorrow. Oh Well. Serenity. Serenity.

Robert Smith and Scott Robinson came over this evening to eat pizza talk about the great time they had at Beyond Stonewall.  Robert said the Faerie Gathering was fantastic and several of the women joined in the circle. 

Robert and Scott helped Steve Oldroyd moved out of his place on 1^st Avenue. He had gotten evicted. Mike Pipkin is evicted too and has gone back down to Moab. With all my troubles, I pay my rent first and then everything else later. I never ever want to be homeless and depended on others. 

 

8 August 1989 Tuesday

I went to court today at nine thirty and pled no contest and was fined $250 but got it reduced to $150 by agreeing to do five days of community service which I am going to do through though the Aardvark Corporation, Beau Chaine’s nonprofit. It was an emotionally draining experience even though I had the reading of the charges waived.

I helped out this one confused gentleman that was so upset about having been arrested for trying to pick up a hooker. I assured him that it would be okay and calmed him down. God sent me that bit of service to calm me down too and help me have serenity and keep my dignity.

 I spent some time with Terry Johnson this evening. I didn’t go to Unconditional Support but did attend coffee at Dee’s afterwards. Robert Smith and Troy Lunt came home with me and visited some on my front porch about Gay issues. I love being Gay evening with the occasional arrest.

I’m healing from Saturday night’s fiasco. I have to talk to Rocky O’Donovan about how hurt I was when he wasn’t there for me when I needed a Faerie healing.

John Sassaman died in Monterey California of AIDS. John was a leader and gentleman who was well known among Utah’s Gay and Lesbian Community. In 1986 he was elected as first chairperson of the Gay and Lesbian Community Council of Utah.

Addition Material

·         One of his most regarded accomplishments being the cofounder and publisher of the Triangle Magazine. He also participated in many local organizations in the advancement of Gay/Lesbian issues. John received two Bachelor degrees. One in Anthropology from the University of Utah and the other was in Music Arts from the Western University in Gunnison Colorado. John was also pursuing a graduate degree in Business. “I was always impressed by John’s insightfulness and foresight. He was bright, progressive and very intuitive about human behavior. When I last spoke with John about two months ago he communicated a sense of peacefulness and wisdom. Giving simplicity and understanding in his outlook for the present and the future. John always said that everything happens in its appropriate time and place. He told me that he was happy with his life accomplishments. All regrets and unfinished tasks were unimportant. John opened many doors for me, teaching me on many levels. Locally he was loved by many as a friend. He will be much missed-Satu Servigna

 

9 August 1989 Wednesday

It was twenty years ago today that the Manson Clan killed Sharon Tate and her friends. It was so gruesome that it stands out in my memory to this day. My parents who never locked their doors if we were home started locking them at night after these murders.

At twelve thirty I met with Chuck Whyte to type up the Community Council’s minutes and able to get them all mailed out. We were there at the Crossroad Urban Center until four in the afternoon then I rode my bike over to the Health Department on 7^th South for my court mandated HIV and STD tests. It cost $25 and I will get the results on August 23^rd.

I talked to this one woman clinic worker there named Sue who was really nice and Gay friendly. I gave her contact information for the Youth Group so she could refer young Gay people who came into be tested to a good support group. When the doctor drew my blood for examination he asked if I was a homosexual. I corrected him and said I was Gay. Because of all the visiting with clinicians and the waiting to be seen, I was there until six this evening.

I then rode my bike over to Beau Chaine’s Aardvark Cabaret on 4^th South. Beau just signed off my court ordered work program sheet for all five days of court ordered community service. Beau said to me “Hell Ben, your whole life is community service.”  He also said he had a dream where I was the Community Service Center’s director making $40,000 a year! Dream on.

Anyway when I got home I went with Jim Rieger over to Richard Rodriguez’s farewell party. He’s moving to Santa Ana, California to do an internship at the University of California at Irvine. There I heard some interesting gossip that Mike Casey broke up with Allan Peterson and he is in love with Richard Rodriguez and he with him! They evidently fell in love at Camp Rogers. Good for them.

 

10 August 1989 Thursday-

 I’ve been weepy less and less over Billy Bikowski. Time will heal this one too. What is the saying? Time heals all wounds and wounds all heals? I finally got my bedroom cleaned and straightened up enough to sleep back in my own bed. I’ve been sleeping on the couch in the front room all week.

Becky Moorman and her lover Alice Hart came over this evening to have their medicine cards read.  They said they are getting married this October.  Becky's main totem was the Deer and Alice's was the Swan. The deer represents gentleness, caring and kindness. The Swan represents grace, balance and innocence.

 Jim Rieger had people over for the evening to watch some movies. They were awfully young, nerdy, and kind of goofy. I wonder how old they are? Seemed like high school but probably older. They acted very immature and not at all like they are Gay. I think the main attraction is playing video games that Jim has tons of. Not in the least interested in Donkey Kong. ha!

I called Terry Johnson today and invited him over for dinner tomorrow. He’s trying to push our relationship faster and it scares me. If push comes to shove I’m going to tell him that he needs to decide what he’s looking for in a relationship but I’ll be here if he wants to continue dating me. I am not going anywhere.

Yesterday was Robert Smith's birthday and the 14^th will be Mark Lamar’s birthday.  I need to call Mark. I feel impressed that I need to call him.

 

11 August 1989 Friday

I don’t know who is writing this improbable script, but I wish they would cut it out. At five this afternoon I walked over to Satu Servigna’s apartment on 3^rd Avenue and N Street to deliver the Community Council’s calendar. On my way home, just across from the Wild Rose Bicycle Shop, my heart grieved upon seeing the sign that Billy Bikowski had once carved for them while he was living up in Park City two years ago.

As I was looking at the sign, Billy came riding by on his mountain bike. He was so surprised to see me that he said “hi” to  me without much enthusiasm while I inadvertently pipe up “Oh hi”. Taken back by my greeting he said to me “My, that was kind of cheery”.

I think he was trying to be sarcastic ,so I replied, “Oh, then, well goodbye.” He had had stopped me in my tracks and so he rode his bike back towards me and said, “I can’t talk right now I have to help Frank move a piano.” So I said, “Goodbye again then” and he rode off probably up to Dan Fahndrich’s where Frank Fatah True was living.

As I saw him ride off, I almost started laughing, thinking how certifiable nuts both Billy and I are. Last week I was nigh unto a hysterical exhaustion from seeing him with Renn at Beyond Stonewall.

 Anyhow back at my place Jim Rieger invited Terry Johnson and I out for dinner at this pasta place which was yummy.  We visited over dinner and I think I broke down some of Terry’s barriers of being seen in public with me.

We kissed goodbye when he left my place. He has his kids for the weekend so I don’t know if I’ll get to see him or not. He has to be in by ten at night as that is his grandma’s conditions for him staying with her. What are my feelings for this sweet man?

 

12 August 1989 Saturday

It was a long day but a rather pleasant one. Robert Smith and I walked across the 400 South bridge over 1-15 down to Jordan Park at 900 West and 1000 South for the "Say Yes to Life Day" celebration.  I know that Dan Fahndrich appreciated our making the effort to come.  I'm glad I went too because the Gay Spirit was there at it was wonderful.  It really felt a kin to the old love-in's of the Sixties. 

There Dan told me that Billy Bikowski was moving in with Frank Fatah and this kid named Todd, across from Dan’s place on I Street. That is really interesting. I wonder what happened to Renn? Did Billy escape from the pressure of making a commitment to Renn? Or did Billy wear out his welcome and was kicked out? Perhaps both.

After dropping Bobbie off at his place near the Greek Cathedral, I walked over to Memory Grove.  I wanted to see the cute volleyball players there. I gave out Gay Day at Lagoon discount coupons also to anyone who wanted them. Michael Casey was there and we talked about his relationships with Richard Rodriguez and Allan Peterson. He's crazy about Richard but is sad that he is moving to California.

At five thirty this afternoon, I went home and then went out with Jim Rieger to a party being thrown by Charles Pattamapirat "Charles Patt". He’s a sweet 26 year old Thai man who  I have met through my Ogden friends Steven and Spence Barker. Becky Moss was there as well as were  Neil Hoyt, Jim Dabakis and a few others I knew. However most of the people there I didn’t know. I talked to Neil about what happened between Billy and I up at Camp Rogers and why I was a mess on that Sunday. 

At first the party was dull but I got the party to lighten up by being authentic and letting our hair down instead of being so uptight. I’m sure it was refreshing for many not to just be standing around and modeling. I do have my Grandpa Johnson’s Scottish gift to get people to open up.

I called Mark Lamar last night. He had a rough week but he said things are getting better now. He’s stopped hustling and I’m glad for that. He will turn thirty on his birthday.

 

13 August 1989 Sunday-

 I went to my Quaker meeting this morning and I was asked by Robin to be on the Peace and Social Concerns Committee. So I guess I’m really identified as a Quaker now. I need to request membership.  

Robert Smith was also at meeting and he made me a quartz pennant.  That was very sweet of him. 

After the meeting we walked way up Memory Grove and City Creek Canyon to find a spot for a Faerie circle.  It was fun to be hiking with him.

I miss Terry Johnson. I called the only number I have for him but he wasn’t there. I’m thinking of Billy Bikowski too. I know Billy will take care of himself if not very well.

I watched the Last Days of Pompeii which is one of my favorite old movies which has such great actors like  Preston Foster, Basil Rathbone, and Allan Hale starring in it. The same people who wrote, directed and produced King Kong also worked on Last Days.  King Kong is my all time favorite movie.

When Jim Rieger came home, we went to KRCL and taped two programs. One was on “Stonewall ’89 Remembered” and the other was on chemical dependency within the Gay community.

Afterwards we went over To Becky Moss and Catherine Clark to visit some. John Sassaman’s obituary was in the Salt Lake Tribune today. He died August 8^th in Monterrey, California from AIDS. I cried when I saw it listed in the paper this morning.

John was the first chairman of the Gay and Lesbian Community Council of Utah and co-founder of the Triangle Magazine in 1986. He once told me that I would be a strong community leader. He fought against the special interests of David Nelson, Michael Aaron, and Graham Bell and I followed his lead. 

I wrote up some notes for Beyond Stonewall 1990 while it was still fresh in my mind. First may be we will have catered food next year or have more control over the menu. We need to have vegetarian options as well as omnivorous ones. Maybe I can get Beau Chaine to see about donating food and get Greg Harden to see if he’d cook the food and perhaps get a waiver from the YMCA if we bring our own food.

 Second, it would be fun to have BBQ on the opening Friday Night. We could have a BBQ as people register and Dan Fahndrich could be showing a slide show of pictures he had taken. The opening ceremony would consist of the Rainbow flag raising and a welcoming address.  The keynote speaker should only be a half hour long at the very most and maybe I could get Luci Malin to speak on Gay Myths. At the Friday campfire there should be a director in charge of the sing along. Neil Hoyt would be good at that. I need to pick Becky Moss’ brain for fun camp activities.

  Third,  at the registration table it should be under the direction of John Bush and his committee only to free me up to greet guests.

Fourth have Dan Fandrich combine the responsibilities of the hospitality and accommodation committees.

Fifth ask Brenda Voisard to be a co manager of any women programs.

Sixth put Bobbie Smith in charge of game workshops and activities.

Seventh-Ask any person who wants to do a presentation send in a two paragraph synopsis of what their workshop entails and they must commit to being at the retreat at least an hour prior to their workshop and one hour afterwards. All workshops should be within an hour’s time frame.

Eighth have the dance as a separate activity. 

Ninth perhaps have a sliding scale of $45 for members of the youth group and $45 for hardship cases like for people with AIDS.

 

14 August 1989 Monday-

Today is Mark Lamar’s 30^th birthday.

             I am still kind of in a haze from thinking about Beyond Stonewall for next year. My Gay summer is almost over as it is nearly time to go back to work. It’s been fun but I am tired now.

 As soon as I get the place cleaned and some wash done, I’m going to start going up to Orchard Elementary to start getting my classroom ready.

The weather is still hot and in the nineties but it won’t be long until it starts cooling off again.

Terry Johnson is on my mind a lot. His birthday was in July I think. I need to find out.

Additional Material

·         Gary Spanogle-one time Utahn and AIDS activist died of pneumocystic pneumonia in Bakersfield, California. He turned 50 in March and was one of the first HIV positive people in the country to appear on a nationally televised talk show (The Phil Donahue Show) in the mid 1980’s. A one time employee of the Sun Tavern and a professional dancer who worked for both Arthur Murray and Fred Astaire. Spanogle fought AIDS discrimination by appearing in local news programs, through letter writing campaigns and in a precedent setting case, by fighting in the court system of Bakersfield, California for the ARC status to be defined as a disability under the law. He was a member of the AIDS Project Utah and Bakersfield, Task Force. (Triangle Sept 1989)

 

15 August 1989 Tuesday

At five this afternoon,  I went over to Dorinda White’s place because Terry Johnson had asked me over. Dorinda is married to Todd and is Terry’s cousin who lives just behind where Fran and I used to live when we rented on Roberta Street off of 1300 South.

Anyway I borrowed Jim Rieger’s car and while there Terry said he sold his car for $750. Later I must have said something that pissed him off as he left me there sitting at Todd and Dorinda’s place by myself. That really embarrassed me as well as hurt my feelings so I left and went to Unconditional Support.

Steve Oldroyd is a new officer now and he led the meeting tonight. I really don’t get much out of US anymore. I’m just there for Robert Smith’s sake. I didn’t stay for coffee but just went on home.

Once there, Terry Johnson called to apologize and I accepted it. We are both new at this relationship thing and I’m not going to take offense at every little thing he does. We are different, that’s true but I am so terribly fond of him. I don’t want to say I love him. I told that to Billy Bikowski and look where it landed me. 

Rocky O’Donovan had just returned from Berkeley California this evening and said he'd be at the full moon Fairy gathering.

 

16 August 1989 Wednesday –

I took the Jim Rieger’s car up to Orchard elementary today and started in on my classroom. Rearranging the desks, I also put up bulletin boards with a unicorn and elves themes. I stayed for a couple of hours. I’ll have thirty four students this year. Oh well.  

        When I brought Jim's car back to him at noon, I walked over to Robert Smith’s apartment near the Greek Orthodox Church on 3rd West and 3rd South and from there we walked over to Memory Grove this evening. There we met up Robert Erichssen and Rocky “Kyle Sky Bear”.   

            We walked way deep into City Creek canyon and found a secluded spot for our ceremony.  Kyle Sky Bear took out his wand and drew a fairy circle while I “Gayflower Fearenaught” set up an altar of stones and placed on it totems to represent the male and female elements, Mother Earth and Father Sky.  Kyle Sky Bear and I initiated Robert Smith and Robert Erichssen and they took on their Fairy names to reflect their new fairy identities.  Robert Smith chose the name “Gillian Walkabout” and Robert Erichssen chose the name “Ariel”. 

             Kyle Sky Bear insisted that we be sky clad before entering the circle. So sitting nude in the woods, we shed our egos and  it was truly a healing experience. In the circle I read our Fairy Manifesto which was accepted by the Faeries in the circle. We then read poems we had written for the gathering and sang some chants such as "The Earth is our mother; We must take care of her" and "The Goddess is alive; Magic is afoot".  We evoked the Gay Spirit to help us bring down patriarchy and to bring harmony back to the world.  The Full Moon was in eclipse this first meeting of the Radical Faeries or as our group is known the "Sacred Faeries".  

            The full Eclipse began around eight thirty. I suppose we are the Sacred Faeries since all of the founders are Quakers.  It was a magical night for sure with Kyle Sky Bear burning his ties as symbols of patriarchal oppression.  

            I forgot to mention that my friend Randy Holladay earlier said he is going to get me an introduction to Harry Hay who founded the Radical Faeries a decade ago.

Additional Material

·         STATE URGED TO HELP PAY FOR AIDS DRUG Unless Congress acts to maintain a federal program that pays for the anti-viral medication AZT, state money will be needed to fund treatment for those who have Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.  Members of the People With AIDS Coalition of Utah held a press conference Tuesday to discuss the federal program, scheduled to expire Sept. 30. AZT slows down the Human Immunodeficiency Virus, which causes the syndrome, but the medication costs $700-800 a month per patient, according to David Sharpton, coalition director. Last year, 58 Utahns participated in the program at a cost of $59,644. The number of participants is expected to double this year. The coalition is not worried the program will end, since the Legislature has appropriated $125,000 to provide the AZT if Congress lets it lapse. However, under the federal program all of the money available has been spent on treatment and the coalition fears administration costs will divert money from the purchase of AZT if the state takes over the program. "We feel very strongly that every penny should and must be spent on people with AIDS," he said. "Medication is the only tool we have in the fight against AIDS." Some 212 Utahns have been identified as having AIDS, but between 2,000-4,000 may have HIV, according to Lewis Garrett, manager of the AIDS Control Section of the Utah Health Department. Since the early 1980s, 126 Utahns have died of AIDS. "It's cost-effective for the state to buy this medication, although it's expensive," Garrett said. "People will do what it takes to get this drug, and if we don't pay for it up front we will pay for it with Medicaid. People will quit their jobs to qualify. This keeps people in jobs and on the tax rolls." A person with the disease must be very ill to qualify for the program, which provides the drug to people who are not eligible to receive Medicaid. But the Food and Drug Administration recently approved the early application of AZT for HIV-positive individuals, and Sharpton wants eligibility requirements eased so people can receive help before the disease is critical. Another promising drug, dideoxyinosine, will begin the second phase of clinical testing in the United States and Canada next month, but is not expected to be available for two years. The drug seems to help people who cannot use AZT. The delays in granting federal approval for medications that appear to benefit a person with AIDS are indicative of the government's slow response to the disease, according to the coalition. "A two-year wait . . . is still too long for people who have AIDS. We're losing too many lives because of the bureaucracy that exists," Sharpton said. If the federal program is maintained, the coalition hopes the money allocated by the Legislature will be used for other drugs, like interferon, that help AIDS patients. © 1998 Deseret News Publishing Co.

·         CANDIDATE FOR S.L. CITY COUNCIL ASSAILS `SMEAR TACTIC' LETTER SAYS REPUBLICAN ATTACK IS OUT OF PLACE IN A NON-PARTISAN RACE  By Robert Rice, Staff Writer A letter circulated by the Salt Lake County Republican Party questioning a Salt Lake City Council candidate's "moral integrity" is a smear tactic and out of place in a non-partisan municipal election, the candidate said Tuesday. The Aug. 4 letter, on party stationery, signed by County Republican Chairman Peter Van Alstyne and sent to Republican voting district officers, urges District 5 voters to defeat incumbent Councilman Tom Godfrey. "Tom Godfrey does not represent the Republican values and philosophies of high moral integrity," the letter reads. The letter also said Godfrey has ignored the Republican point of view, noted his "liberal" voting record and concluded, "We must elect a person of high moral integrity to the City Council." The Deseret News obtained the letter from a source requesting confidentiality under the condition it be made clear Godfrey himself did not release the letter. "If one of my high school students had written that, they would have received a failing grade," said Godfrey, a teacher. "It's filled with generalizations and no supporting details . . . because there aren't any supporting details." Godfrey said he has returned a personal letter to Van Alstyne airing his reaction to the letter. Asked for examples of Godfrey not adhering to high moral standards, Van Alstyne said the councilman had advocated positions "supportive of issues such as homosexual rights. "Very recently, he was a keynote speaker at a homosexual-rights rally. As such, we take the position that those are not values compatible with family and community life," Van Alstyne said.  Godfrey said he was not the keynote speaker at the rally, held in a local park on Gay Pride Day. Rather he was invited to give the welcoming speech at the rally on behalf of the city. "What seems to be implied here is that there is a certain denial of one's civil rights - I can welcome some people and not the other people," Godfrey said. "I think Mr. Van Alstyne must remember that as a member of the City Council, I take an oath to uphold the Constitution and the Constitution guarantees people's civil rights," he added. Further, the letter charges Godfrey with supporting "programs and ordinances that are anti-family." Van Alstyne said Godfrey's support of the Salt Lake Community and Resource Shelter, a homeless shelter, is anti-family. "I hope that Peter's not suggesting that the City Council only represent the well-to-do families and not those in low- and moderate-income situations," Godfrey responded. Van Alstyne said he was prompted to write the letter when he learned from "reliable sources" that Godfrey was receiving support from the Democratic Party. "I have no more hard evidence that the Democratic Party is assisting Mr. Godfrey; it is circumstantial," he said, explaining that an accumulation of comments led him to conclude the party is involved. Van Alstyne said Democratic Party leaders have solicited contributions from other Democrats on behalf of Godfrey's campaign. Salt Lake County Democratic Party Chairman Earl Hardwick, once a City Council member, said Godfrey never contacted the party for support. Glen Cahoon, a former Salt Lake police captain running against Godfrey, denied any cooperation in circulating the letter. "That isn't my kind of campaign," he said. Godfrey called the Republican's letter a "smear letter, a piece of political propaganda" and added such strategy shouldn't be employed by a political party in a non-partisan race. "I've always argued strongly . . . that the council needs to be non-partisan," he said. City Council races previously have been non-partisan, Van Alstyne said. "But we have found on an increasing basis that although the public may consider them non-partisan, the parties consider them as significant political races," Van Alstyne said. According to the "Corrupt Practices Act" in the Utah Code governing elections, "No person shall knowingly make or publish, or cause to be made or published, any false statement in relation to any candidate." © 1999 Deseret News Publishing Co.

 

17 August 1989 Thursday

I went back up to Orchard today but first went to ZMCI Mall to pick up a bus schedule to see how to get there. Fortunately it’s not going to be bad at all and the bus will drop me off almost across from the school.

After taking the bus, I spent four hours putting up my bulletin boards because in elementary school bulletin boards are everything.

At home I had a phone message that this woman named Sue from Sunset who is organizing a new Gay and Lesbian social club called “New Horizons”. She asked me to do a feature article on it to go into the Triangle. Becky Moorman wanted me to write an article on the correlation between the Black Civil Rights Movement and the Gay Civil Rights Movement.

Later Bobby Smith and Scott Robinson showed up on my doorstep this evening wanting me to read Scott's medicine cards.  His main totem was the dog which represents being noble, loyal, and teaching.  They brought with them some pizza and I'm totally stuffed. 

In the evening a storm blew in and it poured rain. The weather sure has cooled off because of the rain storm

 

18 August 1989 Friday

I helped Susan McCoy move, for most of the day ,all her classroom stuff up to Monte Vista in Farmington. I’m so glad I choose not to stay with that school. We also drove up to Sunset Elementary and there the new principal was the only one around so we didn’t get to see any of the old faculty. It was a lot of hard work moving Susan but I was glad I was able to help her out. I am also glad that I will be on my own and I can do things the way I want instead of running everything by Susan as I did at Sunset.

When I got home, I was surprised to see a note from Mom and Dad that they were in town. I didn’t expect them in until tomorrow. I barely got settled in when Dad knocked on the door. He sure is getting wizened. I hugged him and we went out to bring mom in. I haven’t seen either one of them in almost two and a half years. We went to the Spaghetti Factory at Trolley Square for dinner and then came back to my place to visit and relax. Anyhow, Dad was really tired from the drive so they left and went back to their Motel room at eight thirty.

Richard Rodriguez called me this evening, all worried about Mike Casey as he was supposed to have shown up for a going away party and hadn’t arrived yet. No one seems to know where he is. He is probably just running late as he is coming down from Wyoming.

Then I got a call from Terry Johnson to see if I wanted to go to Echo Junction to eat dinner with him and Dorinda and Todd White. I was really tired and wondered if I would be any company but Terry sounded disappointed when I was trying to make excuses so I gave in and decided to go. So what if I am tired from a long day? I’ll be with him. We left at nine and went to this little old hick country spoon place and stayed until midnight. There were lots of cute cowboys there.

 

19 August 1989 Saturday

Mom and Dad came by early at nine and because I couldn’t think of anything else to do I asked if they wanted to go on a picnic. I was originally only going to take them up Mill Creek Canyon but then we decided to drive up Ogden Canyon.

 Well we just got to driving and we eventually went to the monastery in Huntsville then over the mountains down into Woodruff and then over to Evanston, Wyoming and back down into Salt Lake City through Echo Canyon and Parley’s. It was a beautiful day for the drive and good for me to get out of the valley.

I was able to have a really nice visit with Mom and Dad although Dad is so hard of hearing now. He is pretty mellow compared to when he was younger and I lived at home. Both Mom and Dad were pretty tired after the long day trip and they were anxious to get home to Victorville after having seen Yellowstone.

I told Mom a little about Terry Johnson not that they are that interested in that part of my life. They left at eight this evening to go back to their motel, and while I was glad to see them, I was also glad to see them go. I have such mixed up feelings about my family. I love them and genetically they are my parents and they did the best they could to raise me right. It’s not their fault, nor mine, that we have drifted apart. It’s been almost three years since I last saw them.

After they left, Terry came over to take me over to Dorinda White’s place to watch some awful blood and guts movie called "Hell Raisers", I think. I really don’t like those kinds of movies at all. But I enjoy being with Terry so I put up with it. We fooled around a little under a blanket while Todd and Dorinda weren’t looking. That was kind of fun. I didn’t get home until real late, after two in the morning.

 

20 August 1989 Sunday-

I didn’t make it to church this morning. I was way too tired. I really didn’t do much of anything today except clean the place.

I was supposed to have gone to a Community Center meeting but I’ve given up any interest in that project as it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. I have too much else I’m involved with.  

In the evening I went with Jim Rieger to  KRCL where we taped a program for Concerning Gays and Lesbians. I had Rocky O'Donavan come in and talk on patriarchy.  The program will air on the thirtieth.

The weather is really cooling off. I believe summer is over.

 

21 August 1989 Monday

I took the bus up to Orchard Elementary in North Salt Lake to try and get my classroom in order. I spent much of the time just trying to scrounge up a complete set of text books for my class of thirty four students. When I inventoried my books I was shocked to discover I had no language books, no math books, no science books, or health books. Mr. Stranger managed to find me some math books thank goodness. I’ll have to dig through the old book room for the others I guess.

I was really tired from getting up so early to catch the bus, so at home I didn’t do much else. Terry Johnson surprised me by dropping by for a little bit after nine.

Then Bobby Smith called me and I asked him if he had heard anything about Mike Casey, figuring that someone at Saturday’s volleyball gave would have heard something. I was not prepared to hear Bobbie say, “Mike Casey is dead.”  I immediately burst into tears. I told Robert I would call him back as I was in no shape to talk. After regaining my composure I called him back and learned that Michael was killed in a head on collision Friday night as he was coming down from Wyoming. I can’t believe it.

Additional Material

·         VICTIMS' FAILURE TO NAME NAMES IMPERILS AIDS PROGRAM By JoAnn Jacobsen-Wells, Medical Writer Utah’s only anonymous AIDS testing program is in danger of being shut down because an increasing number of people are testing positive and few are willing to give the names of their intimate contacts. The program, conducted by the Salt Lake City-County Health Department, has seen a decline in the number of people seeking the test. In 1987 when the program began, 930 people were tested anonymously, compared with 286 in the first six months of 1989.However, county epidemiologist Brian W. Bennion said there has been a dramatic increase in the number of individuals in the anonymous program who have tested positive for HIV, the AIDS virus. And many of those individuals who won't give their names are equally reluctant to give the names of contacts - thus making it impossible for health officials to trace the spread of the disease. By law, every health-care provider must report to the local or state health department the name of any person who has a positive test, indicating he is infected with HIV. There's one exception to the statute. Legislators gave the Salt Lake City-County Health Department the green light to continue its anonymous testing program - at least until November. That’s when the Utah Department of Health will determine if the Salt Lake program has had satisfactory partner notification compared with confidential testing programs throughout the state. If Salt Lake County hasn't, the program may be terminated. Patient advocacy groups fear that will cause high-risk people tonot be tested, to go to other states for testing or use pseudonyms. Ben Barr, executive director of the Utah AIDS Foundation, said the organization would like to conduct a massive campaign encouraging people to be tested for HIV. "But we don't feel we can do that until anti-discrimination legislation is in place and unless anonymous testing is available," he said. Barr said that many people who willingly tell their physicians that they are HIV positive are being discriminated against. In short, their doctors are then refusing to treat them, he said."It is true that there are physicians who are uncomfortable in treating HIV individuals - for personal reasons or lack of training, “said state epidemiologist Craig Nichols. "But I don't know of anyone who has been unable to be referred to a physician for medication attention. That hasn't been a problem in Utah. In fact, physicians have called the Health Department saying they are interested in seeing more AIDS patients and HIV-infected individuals."Barr said some counties have done a bad job with contact tracing."They are putting a lot of pressure on people to name their partners. It is really coercion," he said. "Other counties, like Salt Lake, use contact tracing as a way (infected) people can notify their partners. If they are too frightened, they (health officials)will do it for them."Contact tracing, he says, "frightens many people and always will."Nichols disagrees. He says the Legislature passed a model confidentiality bill to protect records held by the state and local health departments."Our contact tracing is done confidentially and with great success. We are finding a large number of contacts," he said. "Andthe majority of those people we contact appreciate knowing they are at risk, and most seek testing to find out if they have been infected."Nichols believes that every infected person has an ethical responsibility to name partners to help stop the spread of the disease."Those people who are most concerned about the spread of the virus ought to be more interested in assisting with control measures," he said. "All partner notification is voluntary. All people are strongly encouraged to name their partners, but I doubt there has been any coercion."Bennion admits the Salt Lake City-County Health Department's program could be in danger."We would like to keep it open a little longer, until people trust us more," he said. "This anonymous program may help us test afew more people who otherwise wouldn't be tested. At least we are educating those people and are getting a few contacts."Bennion said the county is working to beef up its contact tracing program."But we want to establish a helping relationship, and we can't if we force it (naming of contacts). So, it's a challenge."***** (Additional information) Test results Salt Lake City-County Health Department testing program results from January-June 1989:-Confidential test (where subjects give their names, and pay $10): 758 tested; 24 (3.2 percent) positive.-Anonymous test (where they are not required to give their names, but pay $20): 286 tested; 16 (5.6 percent) positive.

·         Republican Party wants Salt Lake City Councilman Tom Godfrey to take a stand on some issues in his re-election campaign - topics Godfrey says aren't city-scale issues at all. "Will he please respond to the following issues," said party Chairman Peter Van Alstyne. "Where does Tom Godfrey stand on the homosexual-rights issue and secondly, where does he stand on strong family values?" Godfrey countered, "The city doesn't deal with those issues." He also complained that Van Alstyne is "interjecting himself" into a District 5 non-partisan council race. "Mr. Van Alstyne doesn't live in District 5 and as I talk to my constituents, they don't like him butting into District 5," Godfrey said. The debate bagan last week when local media obtained a letter on Republican Party stationery and signed by Van Alstyne in which he urged District 5 voting district officers to defeat Godfrey. The letter charged Godfrey did not adhere to standards of "high moral integrity" and that he supports programs and ordinances that are anti-family. "We must elect a person of high moral integrity to the City Council from District 5," the letter concluded. Central to the charge that Godfrey didn't meet high moral standards, according to Van Alstyne, was Godfrey's decisions to speak at Gay and Lesbian Pride Day in Salt Lake City on July 30. On Wednesday, Van Alstyne said Godfrey's "actions speak louder than words" and challenged Godfrey to publicly explain his position on homosexual rights and family values. "Tom Godfrey has made these campaign issues because as a candidate and as an incumbent, he went and delivered a high profile address to the gay-rights rally. He made this a campaign issue," Van Alstyne said. "Peter's wrong," said Godfrey. "I have not made these campaign issues. If I recall recently it is Mr. Van Alstyne who is trying to make them issues in my campaign." And Godfrey said, if these are campaign issues, "I need to discuss those with my opponents and not with Mr. Van Alstyne." Godfrey said he is "perturbed" Van Alstyne was making an issue of his providing a welcoming address to the gay-rights rally. Not addressing the rally would have been discriminatory, Godfrey said. "If I followed Peter's logic" of discriminating against gays by not addressing their rally, "at some point then I do not address blacks, I do not address Hispanics, I do not address low-income people - I only address those people who fit Peter's description of people who fit Republican values," Godfrey said. Godfrey's failure to recognize homosexual rights and family values as City Council election issues is politically naïve, Van Alstyne said. "He's (Godfrey) in water too deep for his political skills." Van Alstyne also criticized Godfrey for choosing to air a rumor last March that two council members made a deal with Zions First National Bank promising them a $23 million bond package. Later council members W.M. "Willie" Stoler and Florence Bittner denied they had made the bank promises. An independent investigation of the rumor later found no evidence of wrongdoing. Van Alstyne charged that Godfrey was "politically motivated" in choosing to air the rumor. Godfrey denied that charge and noted that the investigator studying the rumor told him it should have been publicly aired as Godfrey chose to do.  The Republican Party is targeting Godfrey for defeat in this year's election and doesn't plan to involve itself in other district races, Van Alstyne said. © 1999 Deseret News Publishing Co.

 

22 August 1989 Tuesday

Getting use to going back to work is slow going. I take the Centerville bus at 7:50 in the morning and get up to Orchard elementary at 8:10. However I am supposed to be at work at eight once school starts so I don’t know how that is going to go.

            Anyhow, Susan McCoy picked me up today to go with her to Layton High School for Davis District’s back to school rally and orientation. What a waste of time when I could be working in my classroom.  I saw some of the people from Orchard there as well as some from Sunset so Stanger will know I attended, as it is mandatory .

            We left early from the rally however and stopped at Idaho and Utah School Supplies on the way home. I bought some more posters for my classroom such as one on the Solar System, patriotism, and stuff like that.

            At noon Neil Hoyt came by with Chuck Whyte to take me to a bank to sign and have notarized the Gay and Lesbian Community Council’s incorporation papers for the state. Afterwards Neil took me back to Orchard where I had to attend a boring faculty meeting for the rest of the afternoon.

            When I came home I was too tired to go to Unconditional Support. Besides I was still upset over Michael Casey’s death. I can’t believe he’s gone. Up at Beyond Stonewall, on the last day, he hugged me and cried and thanked me for all the work that goes into making that event happen.  I am still really upset with Allan Peterson for not having someone call me with news of Michael’s death instead of me just having to hear about it in an offhand remark. What is wrong with people? Has death become so common we cant pick up a phone to let others know when someone from our community has died? Allan and Mike were boyfriends even.

            Terry Johnson has started working a night job in addition to his day job. I probably won’t get to see him much anymore during the week.

 

23 August 1989 Wednesday

I am slowly getting my classroom in shape; I still don’t know what to do about text books as I am short about seven of them for nearly every subject but especially math. I made Mr. Unger, the cute Fifth Grade teacher upset with me when I said I didn’t want my class taught competitive games in PE just team building skills. Oh well.  I just don’t think a child’s self esteem should be based on body image, growth, and coordination especially at this age when in 5^th grade there are so many growth spurts.

            Anyway went to the Health Department after school to get the results of my venereal disease and HIV tests. Everything was still negative. Thank God, although I didn’t think they would be anything else.

            Walking home from the Health Department, I got to thinking about Mike Casey’s death and Richard Rodriguez and his romance. How there’s no guarantee in this life that once we find happiness, we will be able to keep it. So it’s so very important to live life to its fullest.  Grab onto life while we have it and enjoy what is offered today.

            I love Terry Johnson but I’ve not allowed myself to think of a future with him because I was afraid that Billy Bikowski might come back into my life and I’d have to choose between them. Well to forestall that eventuality, I chose today, and that choice is Terry. I do love him and miss him. So what if he doesn’t kick Billy completely out of my head? He does most of the time and Bill will disappear into the mist of memory  given time. I want to make a life with Terry for better or for worse.

 

24 August 1989 Thursday

I went back to school again and finally got my room ready. Now it’s time to make lesson plans. The PTA had a luncheon for all the teacher and I thought I was in Relief Society with an opening prayer to Heavenly Father and lime green punch. Yum! Yum! Hardly. 

            I was really tired coming home so I didn’t go out this evening or anything. I just stayed home and watched some videos. Jim Rieger left tonight to go down to Cedar City for the Shakespearean Festival and won’t be back until Sunday. I should have asked Terry Johnson to come over tonight but the house is a wreck and getting up early is a bitch. It’s been a month since I first met Terry at the Radio City bar of all places.

Pompeii was destroyed 1,910 years ago today. In which of my life times?

 

25 August 1989 Friday

I am glad this week is over but school starts officially on Monday and I’m working without a contract. The Davis Education Association voted to turn down the district’s offer.

            Anyhow after leaving work, I came home and blitzkrieg the apartment and did a load of laundry. Terry Johnson didn’t come over until nearly ten tonight and we went straight to bed. He was sore he said from going to the doctor’s to have a biopsy done on his kidneys because they found a suspicious spot from an x-ray. His blood pressure also was nearly stroke level. He has to take high blood pressure medicine he can’t afford because it costs $50. I’m going to see how much money I have left in the bank and loan him the money to pay for his medicine. I, sure the hell, don’t want him dying on me now that I realize how much I need him and love him.

 

26 August 1989 Saturday

I didn’t do a blasted thing all day, Uncle Albert. I was knocked out for most of the day from not getting enough sleep last with being fucked by Terry Johnson. Between making love and not being used to sleeping in bed with some one, it was a restless night. I ended up napping most of the afternoon away.

            The weather has really changed too. A cool snap has really broken the heat of the long hot summer. It’s still warm but you can tell that autumn is in the air and just around the corner.

            I heard from Bobbie Smith that Allan Peterson resigned from Unconditional Support, leaving Bobbie in charge now as the director. Steve Oldroyd and Dean Shute said they would help out as assistants but in affect they are worthless. Dean more than Steve, as a leader of an organization, as they both lack people skills and vision. But hey at least they are willing to serve. 

            Terry Johnson had his boys today and he picked me up at six  this evening to go out to Tooele for dinner. I first stopped at the bank to withdraw $50 for Terry, so he could buy some medicine. Dorinda and her husband Todd White went with us out to Tooele.

            I have to say going back out to Grantsville made me really sad and depressed over the memories of the year Fran and I lived there. At one point I had to really fight back the tears remembering my pups Sam and Toby and how hard it was for us living in that awful place. I hadn’t been back to Tooele since Fran and I left in ’79.

            Anyhow, I think Terry was a little perturbed that I only had a salad and not a dinner entre, but there really wasn't anything on the menu that I could eat that didn’t contain meat. Besides, I really wasn’t all that hungry. If I did have an appetite, seeing Dorinda’s baby Lacy puke all over the floor would have ended it. I just wanted to be with Terry anyway.

            After dinner, we went back to Magna and picked up Terry’s sons Heath and Austin.  Then we all went back to Dorinda’s place where we watched “Lust in the Dust” with Divine and Tab Hunter in it and “Married to the Mob”. I now know why Married to the Mob disturbed me as the main FBI Agent Hero, has the same physical features and mannerisms of Billy Bikowski.

            Anyhow, Terry and I got into a quarrel when he implied that “I’ve been on one,” all night and that I could walk home if I didn’t shape up. At that comment, I said “see you later kids” to Heath and Austin and I took a hike. I only got a block to 13^th South, when Terry drove by and said to get in the car. I said to him that “I have walked further than this!” Then he apologized and asked me to get in the car and he took me home.

            I told him at my place that I wasn’t going to fight with him in front of his children and that if he didn’t want to lose me, he better start treating me better. He said he was sorry and that he loved me and didn’t want to lose me. I said I was sorry for what ever it was that pissed him off.

 

27 August 1989 Sunday

When I got up this morning I went to my Quaker Meeting. Bobbie Smith and I were they only Gays there. It was a good silent meeting and I needed the time to meditate.

            Bobbie came back home with me for Sunday dinner. I fixed him some bean burritos and chips and salsa. He stayed for most of the day and in the afternoon we visited about various things happening in the community. He said Allan Peterson did move into the Covey Apartments, next to me. Oh Well.

            After Bobbie left, I took a nap until I was woken by a call from Richard Rodriguez. He had just returned with Mike Casey Jr, from Mike Casey’s funeral in Missouri. He said the funeral was last Tuesday and it was a closed casket as that Mike was so severely burned in the collision. I guess the crash happened just outside of Caspar, Wyoming as Mike was hurrying to Salt Lake to be with Richard.  I’m glad I was there for Richard to talk out his feelings. He said this is the roughest thing he’s ever gone through. My heart goes out to him.

            Terry Johnson came over to pick me up to go over to Dorinda White’s place for a little while. However by seven I had him drop me off at KRCL so I could tape a show with Jim Rieger that will air on September 6^th.  This week we had Richard Rodriguez talk about AIDS in the community and Rocky O’Donovan promoting the Gay and Lesbian Historical Society, I think. I get so confused after a while. It’s been two years now I’ve worked on Concerning Gays and Lesbians. Where does the time go?

Additional Material

·         -FOUNDATION HONORS MED III FOR ITS `SURROGATE FAMILY' ROLE Nurses in Med III at Holy Cross Hospital were honored Friday with an award from the Utah AIDS Foundation for their ongoing work with AIDS patients, said Linda Moore, Developmental Coordinator of the foundation. "Med III has become almost a surrogate family for patients," Moore said. "I don't think we (the foundation) could function without them." The Utah AIDS Foundation works closely with Med III in support of AIDS victims. Services provided by the foundation include a food bank, counseling, a buddy program and a hot line. Foundation representatives also present public information shows in an effort to educate people about AIDS. "We've spoken to high risk groups and to the PTA," Moore said. The program has been presented in public schools but always with parental approval, she said. For more information about these programs, call Moore at 359-5555. A grant of $23,954 was awarded recently to the Utah AIDS Foundation by the Insurance Industry AIDS Initiative. The funds come from 134 member companies of the American Council of Life Insurance and the Health Insurance Association of America. The money will be used to pay 50 percent of the salary of a social worker and nine months' salary of Two interns in social work. The names of 12 nurses will be on the plaque presented by the Utah AIDS Foundation to Med III during a dinner at the foundation offices. They are RN nurses Pam Bruce, manager; Tonia Martinez, Anne Stromness, Sharon Williams, Teresa Rosvall, Duane Dawson, Maggie Snyder, Sandy Garity and Cindy Tseu; LPN nurses Jayne Pilon and Kitty Bogler; and unit clerk Mary Evans. (Deseret News)

·          HOLY CROSS NURSES GET SATISFACTION FROM WORKING WITH AIDS PATIENTS  "You can't get AIDS from caring" reads a sign on the wall of a nursing station in Holy Cross hospital. To nurses working in Med III, the hospital's infectious diseases unit, it is a creed to live by. They work in the only hospital ward in the Intermountain Area created to deal specifically with AIDS patients. "They needed nurses who wanted to take care of them," said Pam Bruce, a registered nurse and manager of Med III. "The nurses here know they are going to be taking care of AIDS patients. They aren't forced or coerced. They want to take care of them." This confidence wasn't evident when the first AIDS patient entered Holy Cross in 1981, Bruce said. No one knew what AIDS was then and it is largely a "fear of the unknown" that has been reduced by education. "I became interested in AIDS. I read everything and tried to reeducate the staff that you couldn't get AIDS through close contact," Bruce said. "The risk to a nurse is really very small," said Tonia Martinez, also an RN. AIDS patients at Holy Cross have not been put in a separate ward because of any danger to other patients but because they have very specialized needs, she said. Other patients in the unit include those with hepatitis and meningitis. "A lot of them are younger people with a terminal illness," Martinez said. "Sometimes they don't have the resources of older people, like savings, and their social needs are different."  Nurses are constantly called upon to give emotional support, Bruce said, especially when the patient has no close family or friends acting as a support group. "When they're younger, the world is theirs. They may be beginning a career. Then they're a social outcast, and people are uneducated and afraid of them. They have to go on welfare and Medicaid. These are people who wouldn't know a welfare office if it was right in front of them. It's devastating," Bruce said. In general, caring for an AIDS patient is just like basic nursing. Nurses change bedpans, make beds and give baths without any special protection against the disease. It's not necessary, Bruce said. "If I knew I was going to touch any body secretions, I'd wear gloves," she said, adding that this is an ordinary precaution with any patient. For care of AIDS patients not involving body fluids, Bruce said she'd go in "just like this," holding up her bare hands. Different patients have their personal ways of dealing with the disease. On the average, a person will live eight years after contracting the virus before actually becoming sick and another two years before dying. During that time some read all they can about the disease to find out what will happen next, and some are so scared they avoid all AIDS materials because they don't want to know about the future. Some patients also choose to die at home and be in familiar surroundings, while others want to stay in the hospital where they feel safe. Holy Cross Hospital offers a program titled Continuity of Care for AIDS patients who haven't actually become sick yet. It helps them return to the community and educates them and their families about the ramifications of the disease. Social services, such as food donations, can be provided to patients who lose their jobs because of their disease. Through the course of the illness, patients and nurses become "a kind of a family." This makes it even more difficult when the unavoidable happens and a patient dies. "Sometimes a group of four will go at once. That's hard on the staff. But we get support from each other," Bruce said. "Some of the sad ones are when people are in the last stages (of the disease) and It seems that nobody cares." Why do these nurses want to work around a dangerous illness and become close to patients they know are going to die? "It's a spiritual thing for me," Martinez said. "It fills my own need to feel valuable and needed." "Some people think I'm crazy," Bruce said. "I get so much from these patients. I've learned a lot about myself and about life. I've become less judgmental about people's lifestyles and the ways people live. I value each day and each friend."

 

28 August 1989 Monday

It was the first day of school and I was up at 5:45 to get ready. I caught the seven in the morning Centerville bus and I was at Orchard elementary by seven fifteen. Thank goodness today was only a half a day and the children were gone by 1:30. The first day didn’t go badly; just a lot of getting to know one another, explain rules and procedures.

            I have thirty-four students in my class with fourteen girls and twenty boys. Right off I can tell I can tell I have a good group of girls. They are really sweet. I have about five boys however who are going to give me real trouble that I can see right now if they are acting up on the first day.

            Anyway after the students left, I did some lesson planning and running off ditto copies for the rest of the week. I’ve decided to teach health and science myself rather than do a unit with Mrs. Day and Mr. Unger who I don’t know that well. I don’t want to have to be going from classroom to classroom learning their students’ names. Besides, keeping thirty four children of my own settled down is hard enough without trying to remember the names of all the other Fifth Graders too.

            When I came home, Terry Johnson called me and said he had a really bad day. He went and had some teeth extracted because they were killing him and the fucking dentist cut through a maxillary artery. Terry didn’t know it until after he woke up home and he was bleeding everywhere. He went to the emergency room and had stitches put in his mouth.

            Anyhow I spent the evening with him over at Dorinda White’s house just to hold him and be with him. I was supposed to have been at a community center meeting at the Metropolitan Community Church tonight but Terry is a higher priority right now.  Bobbie Smith is going to find out how it went for me.

 

29 August 1989 Tuesday

In many ways, today was more tiring than yesterday as it was a full day. I was right about these certain boys. They will be a handful for sure. But it’s not really their fault. Who the fuck came up with putting thirty-four ten year olds, all jammed into one class?

            Anyhow I didn’t see Terry Johnson today. He’s not feeling well at all. His grandma is putting him out and he is discouraged that he has nowhere else to go.

            I didn’t go to Unconditional Support tonight because I was so tired from school and also I think Bobbie Smith needs to put his personal stamp on the organization without me looking over his shoulder.

            I just stayed home and cleaned house. I did watch "Roseanne" on the tube.

            Shawn Hughes and Eric Christensen dropped by for a while to visit. I guess they are on speaking terms again. Kids!

 

30 August 1989 Wednesday

When I came home from work, Terry Johnson called me and we visited. He said he has to go to the hospital next week on  Friday the 8^th of September for the doctor’s to check out the cancer on his kidneys. He also said he is going to move into the homeless shelter which made me go berserk. He kept saying it’s something he feels like he has to do. I said if you feel that strongly about it there’s nothing I can do or say. There’s no reason he can’t come stay with me except his stubbornness. I have a good couch but he’s being obstinate and driving me crazy.

            Anyway I went to the Gay and Lesbian Historical Society’s meeting tonight and there was a small turn out but the subject was interesting. The discussion was mainly on Rocky O’Donovan and Liza Smart’s trip to Berkeley California and the presentation they gave at the Berkeley Gay Historical Society.

Robert Smith was at the meeting and he brought two big containers of peanut butter and grape jelly for me, the sweet thing. He knows I am out of food in the house until I get paid.

Bobbie also said that Troy Lunt is moving out as his roommate into his own place. So Terry and I are going to look at Bobbie’s apartment at Del Mar Court tomorrow night. His rent would only be $135. I don’t want him staying at the homeless shelter but I am powerless over people, places, and things. But grant me the courage to change the things I can.

 

31 August 1989 Thursday

I worked from seven until eight thirty this evening for Back to School Night and I am completely exhausted from such a long day. Completely.  I met quite a few of the parents of my students but I am now a tired boy. When Terry Johnson came to pick me up after “Back to School” night he told me that he had passed out at work and had to be taken to the emergency room where they discovered a tumor on the back of his head. If it’s not one thing it’s another. I’m so afraid I’m going to lose him and I am just beginning to understand how deeply I care for him.

 Terry is going to spend the night tomorrow. He said his cousin Dorinda White is going into the hospital tomorrow for her phlebitis. I got paid today and cleared $850 for the month. Well good ol’ August is a wrap.

Rocky O’Donovan had a letter to the editor published in Tribune today in response to Paul Began’s nasty letter that was printed on the 19^th.