Listen: Kele Okereke

Kele Okereke (live at the BBC), EVERYTHING YOU WANTED

a good pop song grabs you like a pretty face: superficial enough make you want to ask his name; attractive enough to make you maybe want to make out.

then, as you spend more time with it, a good pop song becomes more than something to dance naked with. you listen and begin to see that there’s substance there, something that surprises you because all you thought you had was a pretty face.

and as you get to know it further, it means something to you you’ll carry with you from that initial chance meeting to where now it’s comforting as a towel just out of the pool.

and it changes flavors and textures with each new person you come across. because a good pop song changes and becomes something new even though the dance beat doesn’t ever leave you.

a good pop song grows with you, with everyone. most people take pop music to be something banal and to not be listened to, just heard. but, no. a good pop song makes you dance and sing and laugh and reminisce and long and happy and tears you apart and puts you back together in a new configuration that maybe still tastes like you.

[cross-posted]

Job

I'm having a little difficulty with myself.

So, in six days I'm going to my first real day of actual work. Landed a new job (finally!) that I want and I think I will be good at and will probably like. All of that went down last week, and earlier this week, while out for lunch with Ricardo, I got the call to confirm it. It was the best single moment of Tuesday, let me tell you.

So, we're driving back to my house, in Ricardo's car. And we're talking a bit and he shakes my hand and I thumb through my phone and he sees me and he kind of laughs and I know why he laughs. and I beat him to the punch and I tell him that, yes, this would be the moment...

...no.

Anyway, so I start my new job in a few days, and as we're talking, I say to Ricardo that for me it's about who you can't wait to tell things to, good and not so good. The first person you can't wait to talk to. He nods in agreement. And we get home.

I'm a cynical person, and I'm obstinate, and I'm a frightened little man.

Impossible

In various ways, lots of us, we're impossible humans: we're the main impediment in our lives.

Status Symbol +

Last month, Corey and I were at Highways Performance Space early in the morning, waiting for the tech/sound guy to get ready to help Corey rehearse for his show later that day. In the meanwhile, Corey and I took a brief walk through the small gallery there and saw the polaroids being featured there that month, THE FAIROAKS PROJECT: PHOTOS BY FRANK MELLENO. There were several photographs showing candid scenes at this bath house and aside from the obvious nudity and good heartedness of them, a few showed clear unprotected anal sex. Corey and I looked, he made a mention about how that culture was so integral to gay culture as a whole, but how it was how many men basically met their death that way, through unprotected sex which eventually lead to STDs including AIDS/HIV. Then, Corey and I briefly discussed whether or not the owners of such an establishment felt any sort of guilt for any of the deaths that came from that. We asked whether or not we should hold these business owners partly responsible for what happened to a lot of their patrons. Corey and I have talked about this a lot more since then. We talked about personal responsibility, and culpability, and our own experiences -- his in bath houses and mine in anonymous sex -- and how very much it seems that there will always be more of us getting infected with HIV or other STDs.

Over the years and my sketchy sexual past, I've had only one pregnancy scare, and I've had one HIV-positive blood test. Frankly, both coming rather late in my life (the former when I was 27, the latter three years ago), it could be argued I'm fortunate that way. Marginally. But until 2007, nearly all the sex I'd had since I was in my early twenties was without condoms and rather unsafe for me and whoever I was having sex with. There were several times when either men or women I slept with wanted to use condoms and I never reneged, I never argued. My own irresponsibility is that it wasn't ever me who made the choice to use condoms. I couldn't even tell you when it was that I used a condom last, how terrible is that? Probably back after that pregnancy scare, I think. This is all my own lack of personal responsibility: I'm very fortunate to have not developed something insidious through this part of my life and spread it about. And sometimes, since being aware of my own HIV infection, I wonder when I became infected for certain (I have a vague idea but only just a vague idea of it happening probably as early as late 2005/early 2006) and whether or not I had sex with anyone after that and unbeknownst to me, infecting someone else. What if I did? The possibility exists, but I don't know for sure. Anyway...

Earlier today I came across this article, discovering that a German singer had willfully engaged in unprotected sex with man several times, resulting in his own HIV infection, and was found guilty of a crime. In California (according to page thirteen of this PDF guide), it is a felony for an HIV-positive person to engage in unprotected sex with a HIV-negative person without disclosing the former's status.

All of this bringing me back to Corey's and my conversation about the owners of bath houses: do they share a certain amount of responsibility for a lot of us becoming infected, obviously gay men and men who have sex with men in particular? I don't think so. Corey and I agreed in that these people who run these places, they know what happens within the walls of their establishments, and sure, they can put out condoms for their customers, but they certainly aren't either required to enforce safe sex as a rule in their bath houses.

Personally, even though learning I was HIV-positive wasn't really an easy thing to move through, I don't believe I can blame anyone other than me. Really. I chose to have sex with lots of people without even asking about using a condom. Was it their fault? Not really. I mean, first time a man wanted to have sex bareback, I could've said no but didn't. I never made it a point to be protected because all I wanted was sex. It didn't matter. It didn't register. It was a non-issue. And to my recollection, it wasn't ever a debate. So, while not easy, my current status is pretty much my fault. Regardless of any of my sex partners's statuses, it was my choice not to engage in safe sex. Because, you see, I'm a relatively bright individual, I've always been informed, I know the whys and whats that comprise safe sex...and I still chose NOT to do it.

I've never been to a bath house, but, as I posited to Corey then, if I did, I don't believe I would believe that anyone who I fucked with there would really care about whether I was infecting them, or they me. I think it's as base as that. We simply do not care. And if the people who're engaging in the actual sex don't care, I'd imagine those taking our money to come in and use their building to fuck definitely don't care either. I can't fault them for it. I can only fault those who still do it, but even then, my own authority and responsibility stops at myself and, to a degree, my partner. I can't chastise anyone who still engages in bath house bareback sex sessions, I can offer my opinion in the discussion, but none of us can interfere in anyone else's life.

Wonder what it means when people of all ages, men and women both, continue to engage in unsafe promiscuous sex as a whole? Because, like me, we all know the risks associated with barebacking, so what does it mean that we will continue to spread diseases among ourselves so freely? I'm talking about us rational, seemingly normal, well educated, bright, informed adults, we're the ones I'm asking.

I know I'm HIV-positive, and everyone who knows me also knows. Now, what my personal responsibility is is letting those I will meet know. This HIV status is my ever-present pregnancy scare.

(most recent HIV statistics for California, Los Angeles County)

Alive

We were sitting at the Beverly Center, just outside the H & M store, having coffee and talking. And as we were talking about HIV and AIDS and the lack of impactful presence and communication in the gay community, we also came up with the same lack in the minority communities, especially 'straight' communities. So, we're talking. And we reach a point, again, when we're talking about when we're old, in our sixties, and honestly I'm not remembering the details of that, but we both made the observation that us making it to our sixties (and beyond) isn't out of the realm of possibility, the likelihood of it had grown a bit slimmer. I think it was me, pointing this out.

For a lot of the first year since I first discovered my own HIV infection, my greatest fear was that I would automatically become sick, you know? I would be that sick best friend in a sitcom, in a hospital room, hooked up to machines, looking sallow and my skin would be as thin as rice paper. I spent months crying and not sleeping well because it felt as if when I would wake up the next day I'd open my eyes and I'd have a tube up my nose. My doctor, then, said this is what would happen, and I didn't want to believe him despite his experience. And now, in retrospect, as I've said to Corey before, I can sort of chuckle about it because, well, my doctor was dead on, and I, of course, am not in some hospice somewhere, immobile and dying.

But that's just it, isn't it? Corey and I have gotten into a bit of a habit of making jokes about us "having AIDS" and us "dying" and us being sick. And we laugh. I've said to him how funny it sounds to me when I say something and his response is he's dying. Maybe you have to be there. Anyway, so why do we make the jokes? I mean, we're not with one foot in the grave as they say. That's what my doctor, then, would say to me. And it's the cliche we hear that once HIV infection appears, it's not a "death sentence" but Corey and I make jokes and comments to the contrary.

So, we're talking, drinking our coffee, laughing and all, and I point out we may not reach to live our sixties. I say how the odds are against us reaching that age. I'm not dismissing the possibility that we could. It's the likelihood that I latched on to. Corey details for me some more of what he saw and heard at and HIV training workshop last Sunday, and something reminds me of something I've come to realize about me over the last three years or so. After so much fright and so much worrying in that initial year, I said to Corey, I think there's going to come a time when my illness will more than show, whether it is through the damage it'll do to my body, or if I do indeed end up in a hospital bed until the end. I've come to accept the possibility of that. I don't think I've reached any grand zenith of self-realization, but I'm trying to keep a sort of realistic perspective on it.

Corey, since the very beginning, has been the person I can talk to about being HIV positive (the phrase 'living with HIV' is so much more passive and inert and ridiculous), but it was the first time I articulated to him this thought. Yes, we can joke around about telling some social services person we need help because we have AIDS, but I'd not brought up before the idea that, yes, we could be in fact dying of AIDS. But I'm not all gloom. I mean, what I think I have allowed into my life is that the possibility for the opposite of living is present, and not in a fatalistic nor negative way. I think the realization of that is something that we shy away from. Even from when I was a kid, through the sex education classes, through college, and through the real world, I never once heard that, hey, you know, being HIV/AIDS positive raises the incidence for premature death, so, keep that in mind. Why don't we tackle that, why don't we hear that?

Look, I'm not saying we should linger on the more sinister aspects of being HIV positive, that's just unhealthy and morbid and really rather strange. But I don't think we should discount what it probably means for a lot of us. I know I'm not the only one. I think it's okay to accept, or recognize the presence of one last final emergency in our lives (hell, we all say a lot of time that we could get hit by a bus tomorrow!). I'm going to take my last pill of the day, watch a few more episodes of the same tv show on dvd I watch, and get up and clean house, and talk to my boyfriend and kiss him.

I'm alive, after all.

More Of Us

Yesterday, Corey texts me about a boy who got in contact with him after seeing this picture in THE ADVOCATE (Corey's blurb is number seven in the series). This boy recently found out he was HIV positive and when he saw Corey with his doctor, something clicked in him to reach out and say what he needed to say, I suppose. Last night, we're talking about it, and I say to Corey how this kid must feel, you know, seeing someone as healthy-looking as him and reach out because of what is currently going through this kid's mind. Corey says that it's happened to him before, several times. At one point last night, I naturally recall what it was like when I first found out what it was like when I first found out I was HIV positive. Then, about three years ago, I'd known Corey for about a year and only online (we'd started communicating via myspace because I really liked his writing there). Below is the email I sent him then:

From: Javier
Date: Oct 5, 2007 11:46 AM

hi corey...

i find it a little weird i'm writing you this email; we've not met and know of the other online. this is the twenty-first century, i guess.

i know you read some of the things i post on here and you've emailed me about a few as i have about yours, randomly, so i hope this doesn't come off rude or in appropriate but i need some advice, and really, i hope you can offer me some because i'm a little lost.

two weeks ago i went to the doctor about something i thought was serious but turned out not to be. a week ago today, my doctor calls me and tells me my blood tests show i'm hiv positive. went through a lot emotionally and mentally over the last seven days, and my initial visit with my infectious disease doctor this week's calmed me down a lot. but i still find myself constantly thinking about it, driving myself crazy when there is no need. just returned from another blood test, and i'm sitting here, trying to read the paper and i can't.

maybe it's not really advice i want or need. but, i guess, what i really want to ask is how did you get over this initial shock? how do you reconcile the news with your everyday life? my friends are a great and all (and i've yet to talk to my family about this), but lots of times i just feel like i'm bothering them (i don't know if this is the right word) with all of this.

any advice is welcomed. as i mentioned earlier, hope this isn't inappropriate in any way, but i'm kind of feeling a little lost right now. hope you're doing well, writing lots, and enjoying this nice friday. thank you for your time reading this.

j.

Last night, Corey says the kid who reached out to him, I'll call him W. And I'm re-reading these emails from long ago and wondering if right now, somewhere in Oklahoma, there is a kid who's feeling just like I felt in October 2007. Of course there is. After I found out my diagnosis, I began keeping a blog for that here and I began posting pictures on flickr as well.
Also, last night, while about to call Corey on the phone, I got a direct message on twitter that said (sic, to be sure): "so i know this is completley random but I was going thru ur tweets, and pics on flickr and was wondering howd you tell ya mom about ya status". It came from a flickr and twitter and facebook 'friend' who I don't know (I'll call him D). We've exchanged comments on pictures I think, and a couple of tweets, but that's it. So, I answered and got back on the phone with Corey. But later that night, as he answered me back and I got a better idea of why this boy was reaching out to me (a latter direct message says, "...ya pics kinda let me know im not the only 1 in a relationship so its reassuring. yall like a hallmark card"), I began to think more as Corey and I had said earlier of the impetus we get to reach out to strangers in regard to something so life-altering.

Corey and I were talking last night and came up with that in this circumstance all we can do is be ourselves and be honest with these kids, which is what Corey was for me years ago. Corey even went further and said that there really wasn't anything that we could say that was the wrong thing and I agree with him. All things considered, after finding out you're HIV positive, what could another positive person say to you that he shouldn't? And I thought a little more on it when Corey said that me, now being the one someone reached out to, could be seen as becoming part of something bigger. And I think that was the feeling I got after I exchanged messages with D. As we talked, I pointed out to Corey that W and D both had not revealed their statuses to more than a couple of people (parents, and boyfriend & best friend, respectively) and us individually, and this, in turn, made me dig out the email I posted above because, well, the case was the same for me then. I wonder if Corey's was as well.

One of the most striking things that we came up with in conversation last night was how it simply keeps on happening: Corey said how at a recent performance he attended, a performer said in his piece how exes revealing their new-found HIV positive statuses showed him how it felt as if it were still 1983 at the height od the AIDS/HIV epidemic, and Corey and I did not disagree with that sentiment. I made the observation to Corey how I think I'm a bright guy, you know, and pretty decent, but still I got infected. Likewise, I said, Corey did also. A little chuckle between us both, but it's pretty much true: never once in my life did I ever think I'd sit here, typing away about this, but I am because of the choices I made or didn't make along the way. For me, until 2007, having sex was something I did to pass the time while intoxicated or bored. It's never really been the most important thing in my life, but when I was in it, I never considered the risks of unprotected vaginal or anal or even oral sex. I was an adult making dubious choices and when I was thirty, well, I discovered this bug in my blood. And I remember being so shocked then, obviously, but objective hindsight tells me, "Fuck, Javier, what the hell did you think would happen?"

Honestly, I think had anyone I knew at the time said to me to protect myself and avoid multiple sex partners and all that I wouldn't have listened anyway. It's the arrogance of the human being. And, even now, I don't fault anyone for anything because I made the choice to have some man fuck me bareback when I knew all the consequences it entailed. And of course it's a little late for blame-gaming. Curiously, I still believe it's a matter of choice with us adults, who we have sex with and how, and the greater responsibility is for oneself and not count on others to look out for us. So paradoxical, this, since I want folk to be safe, but am not so forceful in that belief.

So: W and D are part of this whole of us HIV positive men of color. I'm not out to castigate and chastise but to listen and hopefully help. Because I remember exactly how each of these two boys are feeling right now. I remember how it felt to hit the send button in that email to a stranger of whom one of the things I knew was his HIV status. Because then, like W and D, all I wanted was someone to listen to me and tell me something. Anything. And like W and D and Corey and I, there will unfortunately always be more and more of us who need US.

Of course, we will always be here.

On!

Yesterday, Corey had his one-man show debut at Highways Performance Space in Santa Monica. He talked about himself and God and Love (I'm not sure if he meant to be heard as capitalized Love but probably), and the interconnectedness of everything, and sex, and sexuality, and even the television show DYNASTY. For those of us who know him, aside from the obvious affection, I think it was a bit more of insight into the man than I think we might have known. I know it was for me. And at the same time, personally, I find the way he thinks and feels and believes about the world a little fascinating, so seeing it performed in such a lyrical way and with such humor, and in such an occasionally brutal way, it has a bit more resonance. There was a part in his script where he went through a list of five (six?) men who've shown him different types of love and/or how to love, and I wasn't sure how it might play out, and he pulled it off (which, I think could be an entire show in itself with some development)! I'm very glad I was there to see it, all of it, from beginning to end.

For as long as I've known him personally, Corey's always talked about having his performance stand on its own without being integrated into anyone else's work, or as a part of a whole. And this was a great way for him to do this with, really, minimal risk. It was such an unreal trip for me, the entire process, along with a bit of artistic, if not professional jealousy.

A few weeks ago, while I lay on his bed, Corey ran through a few of his lines for me a couple of times. The first as rote memorization, and the second with such emotion and passion and flair, I was definitely interested to see the remaining of his script performed. I was very impressed then, and also yesterday when I saw the whole thing materialize. It's one of the things I've always been curious about Corey, seeing him do his thing, what he loves and is passionate about. And from the initial invitation he received to perform his work to the very last applause yesterday at the theater, it was all such a wonderful experience for me as a tourist in the indie theater community. It really is remarkable to see how creative folk work, you know. It's that idea of seeing how Corey went from idea to show, and that was very impressive for me to witness.

Not until his friend Kacy said so afterward did I think a post-show discussion would've been rather interesting, but I may be biased.

Aside from the practical aspects of the work, what did I see and hear and feel? I saw lots of courage and sadness and happiness. I felt a little uncomfortable and teary and joyful. It's very rare that anyone I know who's creative in any capacity affect me in various ways with their work, and even at the very beginning, when Corey was first talking to me about it and I wasn't sure how it would work, but Corey managed it. I'd like to think that I'm pretty objective. I also have said to him I don't think I'm the audience for his work (he's said otherwise). But it's the special skill of a performance to penetrate even those of us who're mostly rebar and stone. The deeper spiritual themes in his piece notwithstanding, I'm very happy to see all of this happen to Corey because he made it happen. At no point did he ever stop to think he wouldn't do it, or wasn't capable of doing it. Even at his hardest point, I don't think that ever crossed his mind. And that is one of the most astonishing things about Corey that I've seen so far.

Slanted & Enchanted

A lot of people have said to me over the years that things in life happen for a reason. Things must happen in a certain patterned way for life to revolve as it should. Most of these people are probably rather insane. I know of two who aren't, and the reason why I think they aren't insane is because there is an odd type of logic as we talk about certain things. One of them is my best friend and we had a long telephone conversation today. The other is my boyfriend, Corey.

Recently, I told Corey how everything I was reading or watching contained the name Didi. Watched Don Roos's excellent first film THE OPPOSITE OF SEX and in it Didi is the central terrible harridan of a lead character portrayed by Christina Ricci. As I was reading Don DeLillo's COSMOPOLIS, Erick Parker's art dealer lover is named Didi: an older woman who makes time for her young lover because he is more fascinating to her than attractive. Then, Corey lent me his copy of DRAWING BLOOD by Poppy Z Brite wherein Trevor Black's younger brother's nickname is Didi, but he dies at the beginning of the story so there isn't very much there about him anyway. In brief conversation over this with Corey, as he does when I talk to him about lots of things, he pointed out the very different outlets by very different creators about very different things all seemed to have found their way into my current state and obviously something clicked in me. I said, as I often do, it's just coincidence. Corey said to me that's several very specific coincidences. He may've laughed at that point.

Didi is Cynthia's nickname. Cynthia is a girl I think I know.

Late last winter, I realized that the girl from fall 2006 wasn't even around anymore. In various capacities. I'd lost the closest friend I'd made since moving back to California. Previously, of course as I found out, she stayed away from me for the very retarded reason that her boyfriend was feeling a bit insecure with me in the picture. And last winter, as she started seeing someone else, it got to be a very familiar scene. I'm leaving out the few tough talks she had with me and I with her about our rather strange dynamic. Keep in mind also that I'm leaving out a nearly ten year age difference. I've written before that it simply feels as if I was wrong in choosing this person as my friend. In a very unfair and selfish and irrational way, had I known what would happen, I wouldn't have pursued anything beyond a working relationship with her. So strange that folk that you're not romantically or familially (sic) linked to can hurt you.

Not everything has been bad. In fact, we've had lots of terribly great times. Great talks. Experiences. And even when I've been at my worst, I've managed to get a smile from her and vice versa. Ah, but we that could make things different, would be even?

So, all of these signs as Corey might say, right? I've not spoken to her in months. Over the last year, since a last trip out to Las Vegas, I've maybe seen her five different times? We live fifteen minutes apart. She goes to school five minutes away. It makes me wonder if she, like me, thinks that I'm not a very good friend. I wonder whether or not she thinks I'm not worth the effort as a person. Perhaps she's too much involved with whoever her current boyfriend is to not include me. Here I am going on and on, sort of putting the onus of our fractured relationship on her shoulders, I'm forgetting to burden my share of it. I do that. I wouldn't mind hearing it. But I won't.

In a similar way to how Corey and I were talking about her then, I had a brief conversation about her with Golden the other day. Maturity and age and friendship were themes, and in the middle of it I remembered something Corey said to me a few months back about when folk get married, each individual's friends fall into the background or disappear. I wonder whether it's that, you know, if it's what Corey said in a way. Do some people function this way? I know I do not and will not.

As recently as this week, Corey's had a conversation with an old friend with whom he had a really strong friendship which ended, not unsurprisingly, over a "misunderstanding." As he and I were texting about that late last night, it brought back to the forefront what I'd written weeks ago about my own old friend. Still, didn't finish those thoughts. But here I am writing all this histrionic melodramatic drivel instead, aren't I? This is why: Corey's having a one-man show in about a week and he sent out a Facebook even invite over it and I forwarded it to the people who I know who live in southern California, Cynthia being one of those on that very short list. This afternoon, Corey says she'd accepted the invite to go to his show. They've never met, and she and I have not had a friendly conversation in quite some time. Corey said to me it could be a sign that she wants to reconnect. Golden intimated the same thing. And as before I am skeptical.

But that's all I get.

Anyway, this rant is over. Or is it an observation?

Round Two

Yesterday I went for my second doctor's appointment for 2010. Honestly, it seems as if it was only a few weeks ago, not months, that I was there, imagining how far away July was. It was February then.

So, I talk to my doctor about the loss of my job, and the aches in my knees. He talks to me about a couple of things that I wasn't so much expecting...well, one I knew. I gained a substantial amount of weight since last I saw him. That's a given. Something that I see while trying to run, and daily in the mirror. The other thing isn't so easy to tell because I feel perfectly okay. My doctor says my cholesterol's climbed somewhat, not alarmingly, but enough that he suggests eating better. And he says my liver seems to be working a little more than normal. He says it could be my body's way of fighting the weight gain, and it's affecting the my liver. He asks me whether or not I've been taking pain medication regularly and he asks me whether or not I've been drinking regularly, even if not to excess. Everything answered, he says it's nothing to really be concerned with, but he'd still rather see what's going on with my liver so he says he'll schedule a liver sonogram just to see what's going on.

Of course, the way my brain works - and, honestly, the way it seems to go with doctors and me - I'm already waiting to hear about some liver damage. Perhaps something a bit more substantial? And even though I am not prone to weird delusions or hypochondria, I've this feeling that, well, something else is going to come up, whether serious or not. My joke and my older brother's is that, what if all those years of heavy boozing are now showing themselves, now that I'm sick and gained weight and have severely cut in my physical activities. It's a joke, did I say?

It wouldn't be surprising if it was *something*. I really hope there isn't anything further to be made of this that can't be resolved by better diet and more exercise. Nevermind physically, but the way things this second quarter of 2010 have been, I don't think I could take more emotionally.

* * *

Finished watching Spike Lee's 25th HOUR just now. Perfect film based off a perfect novel. Perfectly cast and acted, the script is particularly brilliant (David Benioff wrote both, the source novel and screenplay), and the direction and cinematography are also perfect. The thing I like the least about it is Terence Blanchard's score, not that it is bad, but perhaps a bit too melodramatic for the movie. Anyway, perfect...

What Is...?

...hot?

...inunderstandable?

...important?