Mark Kostopolus, 1954-1992

By Bruce Mirken
Director of Communications, Marijuana Policy Project

When Carol Tice and I were discussing whom to interview for our June, 1991 cover story for the "Los Angeles Reader" about the 10th anniversary of the AIDS epidemic, the name Mark Kostopoulos instantly went to the top of the list. Kostopoulos, a founding member of ACT UP/Los Angeles, was a selfless, fiercely dedicated activist who had done as much as any person alive to make things better for people with AIDS in Los Angeles. Among other things, he organized the week long vigil that led to the creation of an AIDS ward at County/USC general hospital, and desperately-needed improvements in county outpatient services for people with HIV.

In the interview, Mark predicted he wouldn't live to see the end of AIDS, and he was right. He died almost exactly one year later, on June 20, 1992. He died just as he had lived: fighting like hell all the way.

In a world that calls men "heroes" who sit in armchairs and order younger men into battle, Kostopoulos was the genuine article. He had his share of faults, of course; he could be stubborn, pigheaded, and at times controlling and manipulative. He was also one of the bravest human beings I've ever known. He threw himself into the battle against AIDS with a singleness of purpose unlike anything I've ever seen, and he kept at it long after it became obvious that nothing he could do would be in time to save his own life.

His ferocious dedication to activism undoubtedly wore his body down-I don't know how many times I saw him marching in the rain and cold or being manhandled by the police-but it probably kept him alive as well. Two days before his death, desperately weak and ill, he was watching the news on TV in his hospital room and plotting political strategy. He never gave up.

By accident, I happened to be the one who drove him to what turned out to be his last hospitalization. I thought I was just taking him to a doctor's appointment, but he was painfully weak and clearly in pain, and his doctor told him to get to the hospital immediately. We drove up to the entrance, and I offered to go in with him, but he would have none of it. As sick as he was, he insisted on walking in by himself, without assistance, and I knew I had to let him make this small gesture of independence. I watched with a knot in my stomach as he moved slowly toward the door.

That was the last time I saw him, and it was a fitting final image: stubborn, proud, and defiant as hell in spite of everything the damned disease had done to him.

Hail and farewell.

Donald J. Krintzman

By Barry Greenfield

AIDS entered my life on a June morning in 1981 when my buddy Donnie called from New York to tell me he had the 'gay cancer'. He knew it was serious, yet he was full of a real optimism that he would beat it. We didn't know Donnie had less than 6 months to live, we didn't know that for years to come calls similar to Donnie's would be all too constant, and for too many years, those calls would be a knock on the door of death. We didn't know anything.

Donnie's November 12, 1981 obituary began, "Donald J. Krintzman, director of marketing for the Joffrey Ballet, died at University Hospital on Tuesday after a brief illness. He was 34 years old."

We didn't know how often these non-descript words were going to hide the truth behind them, and that pieces of our hearts would be torn out every time we read these words. We didn't know these words were the harbinger of the shame, the fear and the hatred that would be connected to AIDS.

We didn't know that our community, energized by the "anything is possible" end of the '70s would be decimated, that the best and the brightest of a generation of gay men would be felled (to say nothing about everyone else), or that gay men and lesbians would come together in caring for gay men with AIDS, that we would show the world how, under the worst of scenarios, to give care to terminally ill people with love and dignity. We didn't know how ugly politics around AIDS would be-that thousands would die before President Reagan would publicly utter the word "AIDS".

We didn't know that nurses would refuse to bring food trays into AIDS patients' hospital rooms, we didn't know how knowledgeable we would become about diseases and infections and the drugs used to fight them, we didn't know that our gay ghettos would become full of young men turned old before their time. We didn't know AIDS would capriciously learn a person's muse, and then take it away, stealing sight from artists, turning writers' minds into mush, before spitting out their corpses.

We didn't know how conversant we would become with the nuances of the terminally ill, or how numb we would become to death; we didn't know we would learn to be grateful for a friend's death, bringing the overdue end to his suffering. We didn't know there would be days when we would have multiple choices of funerals to attend. We didn't know the power of the AIDS Quilt and how it could bring so many of us together in life. We didn't know anything.

That gloomy June morning 25 years ago when I learned Donnie had the gay cancer, I didn't know that today most of the men I came of age with would be dead. I didn't know that those of us who have survived would learn to live, laugh and love again. Today, we know what AIDS is and a lot more about life and death, and still, we don't know how to effectively keep people from being infected with the virus that causes AIDS.

Patrick Jay Miller

By Paul Lerner

Former marketing and outreach director for Los Angeles Shanti, and communications director for AIDS Project Los Angeles

I remember Patrick Jay Miller, who died on August 24, 1991, at the age of 26. He was a vibrant, joyful, beautiful young man who died much too suddenly and much too young.

I also remember all of the people who fought not only against the epidemic, but also against neglect and indifference - and succeeded in changing AIDS from a deadly and stigmatized plague into a disease that many people can live with and manage for decades. They changed the world.

Jesse Mitchell

By Ron Oden, Mayor, City of Palm Springs, California

Jesse Mitchell was my first adult homosexual friend. I pause and smile when I say "homosexual" because Jesse was a married man with three children, and Jesse was as gay as the day is long. He was tall, dark and handsome in his own way, and when he walked into a room, he absolutely lit it up. Though at the time I dated women primarily, my friendship with him made me question my sexuality. It was kind of understood among family and friends who Jesse was and everyone just loved and accepted him and thought "that's just Jesse."

Our lives took different paths. I went into the ministry and lived on the East coast for the next 12 years and we weren't in touch very often. Just prior to returning to California, I heard that he had been very ill with a rare strain of hepatitis. I visited him when I returned to California and he shared stories of many of his escapades, and told me that he was afraid and knew that he was going to die. People were just gaining knowledge about AIDS then-in the late '80s-and it was still shrouded in lots of mystery.

Jesse was the first person that I knew and loved who died of AIDS. I think of him often ... his laughter, generous and giving spirit, and his zest for life. The impact of his life and death have had a profound effect upon me as a person, as a minister, as a husband, father, and politician, and in many ways continues to remain a guiding factor in trying to help or to save lives of those impacted because of this terrible disease.

Timothy Miller

(2/10/48 to 1/26/94)

STOP AIDS Orange County

(back row - behind the "P")

By Denise Penn

Tim Miller was the director of the AIDS Response Program of Orange County. The Orange County Center received state funding to offer AIDS education, and began The AIDS Response Program in the early '80s. Tim began as the program specialist, and was responsible for bringing San Francisco's innovative community-based HIV/AIDS prevention model "The STOP AIDS Project" to Orange County in 1987.

The project was based on organizing and empowering gay and bisexual men to reduce risk through building a sense of community and making a personal commitment. Our work extended beyond education-we help change behavior, create personal commitment to safer sex, build community support for each individual.

During the late '80s, when HIV/AIDS blacklisting legislation was originated by Orange County legislators and discrimination was rampant, it was truly amazing to see what Tim accomplished. He was a passionate advocate and often pissed people off. But at the end of the day,over 8,000 were reached with prevention education by STOP AIDS Orange County, which has evolved into the LIFEGUARD Project. Gay and bisexual men and women developed a sense of pride and purpose and lasting relationships were formed.

Some are pictured here at a retreat which took place in 1988. Also pictured: the late Michael Anthony, (third from the right in the front row); founder of the Orange County Design Alliance to Combat AIDS (DACA) in 1989, raising funds to help local HIV/AIDS organizations. He died a year later and his partner, Bart Story (front row, behind the P), continued the work he began.

Remembering Paul Monette

By Herb Hamsher

How to wrap one's mind around "a remembrance" of Paul Monette on the occasion of 25 years of AIDS. For so long much of Paul's energy was on just hoping he would make it to the age of 50. And now the bloody disease that on one hand took him from us but on the other hand catapulted him to another stratosphere not only as a writer but as a human being, has gotten half way there on its own. Is there anything that more clearly demonstrates that we live in a world that is upside down?

"Remembrances of Paul" was the functional name for the AIDS Ride that the four of us (Judith Light, Robert Desiderio, Jonathan Stoller, Herb Hamsher) did. Paul died in February of 1995; we did the Ride in June of that year. Fixed on each of our bicycles was a pin with a photograph of Paul. Every peddle stroke for 580 miles, there he was looking back at us. We couldn't help but flash constantly from memory to memory ... meeting him after reading Borrowed Time and feeling like we had been connected forever; having dinner with him and Stephen (Kolzak) and beginning what rapidly became an expansion of our feeling of family; living through the agony and the anger of Stevie's illness and dying; having the party for him when he won the National Book Award for Becoming A Man and seeing him in his crown, sitting on his throne; suddenly having to confront with Paul the reality of its being "his turn" to be the sick one; meeting and embracing Winnie (Winston Wilde) and discovering the infinite flexibility of our feeling of "family"; sitting on Paul's bedside reading out loud his newest manuscripts and not being able to understand how he could be getting so ill and still be so productive and not only a genius but one of the sweetest people in the world.

They go on and on, literally infinitely. He is never out of our hearts and never far from our minds. The photograph that was outside his memorial is still on our wall where we see it innumerable times every day. It is impossible to look at it without the twinge of sadness and loss. We always miss him. Never does it fail to rekindle the flames of righteous anger that Paul thought we should all feel in relation to the way our government and our country responded to this disease, to us.

- Herb Hamsher is a manager/producer.

A Talent for Empathy: Remembering Paul Monette

By Mark Thompson

It's not always easy to say what it is exactly that you miss about a person. Maybe he was the best lover, or cook, or friend. Perhaps it was in the way he told a joke, smiled, or could keep a secret. But I can say with certainty what it is that I miss most about my friend Paul Monette. It was the passion of his intelligence and the way that gentle, but determined force lit up rooms wherever he went.

Paul didn't take prisoners the way some famous writers do, nor did he suffer fools gladly. He was a dynamic public speaker, but Paul also listened to people patiently and well. And it was this profound capacity for caring about what others said, thought, and felt that was his greatest gift.

Such empathy can never be accurately measured, but fortunately for us Paul left behind many tangible markers of his wonderful talent. He is best remembered, of course, for Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story. Perhaps the finest "coming out" story ever written, the 1992 memoir won the National Book Award, our nation's highest literary honor. Then there are the many other volumes of novels, poetry, and non-fiction books to consider. All in all, a majestically rich and varied body of work that captures the heart and soul of the gay experience as few others have. It would not be hyperbole in the least to say he was the best gay writer of his generation.

This distinction did not come easily or early in his career. Paul was only 49-years-old when he died a little over a decade ago of complications due to AIDS. He would have been 60 this year, and one can only imagine the quality-and quantity-of fine and principled prose he would have produced during this time. While Paul met his muse almost from the beginning of his life (he always wanted to be a writer), it was only during the last several years that he found its authentic voice.

AIDS was the horrible, catastrophic wake-up call that would finally shake him free of the self-conscious constraints of English Lit. The furies of grief, indignation, and anger came calling, and he opened the door. Borrowed Time, a harrowing memoir of a lover's death, Love Alone, a collection of elegies for that lover, Afterlife and Halfway Home, novels of scathing indictment and rage followed in quick succession. Each, in their way, was a groundbreaking achievement.

It was a singular pleasure to know Paul during those final years. We were both members of a gay and lesbian writing group, and I can still recall the delicious sense of anticipation we all felt when Paul began to read another few pages from a new work in progress. One day he and I sat down together for a lengthy interview about his inner life; what made him tick as a man and as an author. While not particularly religious, he was in fact a deeply spiritual person. He was in obeisance to the pagan gods of love and beauty, and of the sun. Like the ancient Greeks, he believed God was in the wind.

"It's been my experience that gay and lesbian people who have fought through their self-hatred and their self-recrimination have a capacity for empathy that is glorious," he said. Added to that is our capacity "to find a laughter in things that is like praising God. There is a kind of flagrant joy about us that goes very deep and is not available to most people."

I could not help but think about these words the morning I stood by his gravesite watching the first shovels of earth thrown in. Tears of loss and remembrance were welling up fast, but then I thought I heard a familiar sound. Anyone who ever heard Paul's gleeful laugh would never forget it. Some people go through life thinking it is a dreadful curse or something that can be abused. Paul loved life so very much, and fully embraced it in as many ways he could. His laughter was always in celebration of that.

"So look, kid," the voice behind the laugh seemed to say, "Lighten up a bit, would you? You've got things to do, so get to it." That was Paul, through and through, always the one reminding us to live our dreams, to "fulfill our forays," in the words of his literary hero Walt Whitman.

It is the quality of work and of the friendships we leave behind that serve as our greatest testaments. On both accounts, Paul Monette will always be immortal.

For more information visit: www.Monette-Horwitz.org.