Remembering Than

By Gary North

Longtime journalist and bi activist

It will be 13 years this Sept. 1 since my husband Thanh died of AIDS, just short of his 31st birthday, and I've still not recovered from the grief.

He was a "boat person" from Vietnam (he always said the only boat he was ever on was that one-"I'm a city boy," he explained; he grew up in Saigon), and I have struggled ever since with the belief that America killed him by ignoring AIDS as long as it did. In some ways I hold Ronald Reagan directly-and certainly indirectly-responsible for his death.

Thanh (pronounced "Taun" as in "laundry" or "faun"), was a pixie and a sprite, a delightful young man whom I met in a whimsical way, and we hit it off immediately. But within months of our nearly five years together, we realized he might have been infected not long after he landed on these shores.

Maybe it was a language barrier that made him unaware, or maybe it was outright denial- he swore he wasn't infected, and I think he truly believed that-but it wasn't until I confronted him in early 1989 about getting tested-which he repeatedly swore he had done-that we discovered he was HIV positive-meaning he had already been infected probably seven years.

His health seemed fine, and he thrived with experimental medicines until just seven or eight months before his death; the last five months were fairly grueling. When he went, he went fast-I think in the end, he willed it.

Four years later, the first AIDS cocktails proved their worth- four years too late for Thanh, but just in time for many of my friends and acquaintances. And maybe me: Thinking he was not infected, we had unprotected sex; given what I know about polio and what we still don't know about AIDS, who knows if some part of the virus lies dormant?

By the time the cocktail had come around, I had already lost at least two other lovers and many others, too many to recall now.

And so on this anniversary of the first report out of L.A. and the CDC, I think back to all who have gone before us, all who still suffer, all who still live with the infection, and how we are all not much better off than before-before 9/11, before more wars, before Rwanda and Sierra Leone and Darfur, before the politics of divisiveness infected our nation, and before a virus brought a screeching halt to the gay rights movement for a while and diverted our energies.

And so we muddle on. Sadder and wiser, but with guiding little angels on our shoulders. Mine is named Thanh.

Remembering Daniel Warner

By Julia Salazar

The first time I met Daniel Warner he had brought his German Shepard to work. He was heading up a project called West Hollywood Cares (famous for the first "Safer Sex" campaigns in the country) and I was working for STOP AIDS in the offices now occupied by Benvenuto on Santa Monica Boulevard. Our offices were next to each other, with an open door between us. We were the same age and we bonded over lunch at Mark's early on. He was depressed about losing so many of his friends to the epidemic. I know I cheered him up that day and that would cement a friendship that would last forever.

Daniel would go on to become executive director of Shanti and we would stay in close touch. Gradually, his body became ravaged by Kaposi Sarcoma and he wanted his death to be on his terms. Daniel wanted to be conscious when he died. He was living in San Francisco by then, and I flew up to see him a couple of times. His spirit always seemed so loving and so bright. I was going through a bad break-up at that time and Daniel taught me it wasn't the worst thing that could happen. I had a lot to learn and Daniel taught me that love was a verb. I adored him even when his body was unrecognizable.

Daniel said he was going to take his own life on his birthday with help from some anonymous friends. He wouldn't tell me who because he didn't want me involved. He had weeks to live, maybe a month or two. He died at the age of 35.

After Daniel died, I thought about him almost every day. I started writing bits and pieces of writing based on our friendship and working in the AIDS epidemic. Those writings turned into a novel called Natural Disasters. The book was finally published this year. It is my way of remembering him, of keeping him alive in my heart.

Six years ago, my partner and I adopted twin girls. We named the oldest one after Daniel.

I am 49 now and sometimes when Dani sits on my lap and I ask her who she is named after. She rolls her eyes and says, "Daniel." She doesn't know who he is just yet. She's seen a picture. But sometimes just before bed she listens to my stories with interest and knows that mommy cared about someone she is named after.