Community in a Time of Crisis: Yale, New Haven, and HIV/AIDS, 1981-1996

"While Yale Daily News reported on Yale and New Haven in the throes of confronting the epidemic, in mid-1990s Hartford, a house on Bartholomew Avenue provided a home to people living with HIV/AIDS. A man who lived there, symptomatic at the time, asked to play my friend’s guitar. His fingers scraped over the frets. He gasped through a verse, like Blues on vinyl. Between the guitar and the Victorian fireplace behind him, his skinny body was almost lost. That was the last time I saw him."

The artwork was inspired by Mr. C, whom I met on the inpatient floor at St. Raphael’s Hospital. He was diagnosed with AIDS in the 1980s, and he was on the initial AZT trial. He watched his friends die, one by one, until almost everyone he knew died. Even though his HIV is well controlled now, he is suffering from debilitating dysautonomia due to HIV. He mourns silently daily, like an angel who lost one of his wings. “Never that which is shall die,” whether it is the good, the bad, or the ugly.
 

Destruction and loss were ingrained in the genetic code of the HIV virus, forcing the 4H communities to seek succor from those around them. The Yale School of Medicine cultivated an environment rooted in support and swift action. New Haven took the hands of the vulnerable during one of the deadliest and transformative chapters of health in the United States. This project depicts the scars left behind by the virus tightening its hold on the marginalized while highlighting the efforts of the Yale and New Haven community in lifting these populations out of the depths of the HIV/AIDS crisis.

The AIDS Memorial Quilt still stands as one of the most impressive memorials to those who died of AIDS in the 1980s and 1990s. Over 30 years later, still relevant, still missed. In memory of those who died of AIDS and in respect of those who cared about them. These panels were selected based on relevance to New Haven and CT; designs that could be replicated respectfully (by this artist) with acrylic paintings and names and wording that would fit on a 4x6 inch panel. Including: Block 4860 Fred Cline Pierce (1959 -1991), Block 2758 Virginia. Block 593 JoAnn T, Block 3058 Michael Lee Jackson (1961-1992), Block 2123 RC (1945-1986), Block 3523 Gene Marcial Jr., Block 5207 AIDS Project Hartford Remembers, Block 3920 New Haven Peer Educators, Block 0210 Clayton, Block 0183 Zanny Poelker, Block 0600 Dennis James “Doreen” Doiron (1951-1986), Block 3242 Gail Anderson (1954-1985), Block 0927 Jonathan M Twigg, Block 0865 Bill Dickson (1956-1987) 

My first gay friend was Roland. It was 1971, we worked together, and I invited him for a date. He told me he was gay. I didn’t know the meaning of  the word, my small-town world was narrow.  He schooled me and explained the prejudice he faced, also coming from a small town.  He found freedom in NYC and moved there to be where he could feel accepted and free to be himself. This was post Stonewall Riots and there was steady influx of people I met, like my friend, coming from all over the country to the mecca of acceptance and wild behavior. I visited often and spent many an unrestrained night in the drag bars.  Oh! The excitement, the liquor, the drugs, the lights, the makeup, platform shoes, extravagant costumes! the drama and the fun of dancing endlessly to the resonant red chakra jarring bass of the music! I loved soaking up the stories of the people I met, many heartbreaking for the lack of acceptance and love for who they were, or the pain of having to keep their true selves hidden or face rejection and being down right ostracized from their loved ones and community.

Roland told me about the St. Marks Baths where he and his friends spent a lot of time not just for socio-cultural connecting but for sex, mostly unprotected, and where he believed he caught the virus.  I spent less and less time in the city but I kept close contact with him and several of the other friends I had met through him. I became a nurse and I think it was 1981 in my American Journal of Nursing there was an article on Kaposis Sarcoma which to my mind became the harbinger of the discovery of HIV/AIDS in the 1980s. It was an ugly opportunistic cancer and marked anyone with it as being infected. It was a tumultuous, horrendous decade. Roland joined The Gay Men’s Health Crisis and I supported his work there.  Friend after friend was diagnosed with the HIV virus which quickly became AIDS with understanding sketchy and treatment, what there was, not readily available. Misinformation and scare reigned. My friend came home, sick and needing support which he was lucky enough to have from his family. Only one doctor in New Haven had the knowledge to and would treat him. Society ostracized people with HIV/AIDs. It made me physically ill.  I traveled often with Roland to NYC, St. Luke’s AIDS ward to sit at the bedsides of friends dying with the virus. It was painful to watch, a horrible disease process to the end. We talked about recent positive memories, avoiding talk of rejecting families and all of us were one in support.  We had small get togethers naming and noting the friends who had passed.  

None of the group of people I knew survived it neither did my cousin Donald or my high school friend Randy.  As I sat at Roland’s bed side, and he lay dying, he made me promise, (and it was easy to make this promise) to do whatever I could to help end the scourge of HIV/AIDS and support people living with the virus. I hated the idea of fundraising but I joined the board of AIDS Project New Haven (CT’s oldest AIDS service organization) becoming the chair of the board for several years with fundraising being my reason to be. I created, worked on committees, and chaired galas, parties, wine tastings, bowl-a-thons, drag shows, Thanksgiving pie sales, ornament sales and bi-yearly fundraisers at my retail business to support Caring Cuisine, providing meals for people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS.  I floated the idea of an alternative 
therapies program to be added to our services and Ellen Gabrielle, the ED ran with it and we started to offer massage, reiki, and acupuncture.

I remain so proud of the work of the agency to teach and support clients, of the near peers going into non- traditional places to test and get people into treatment sooner, “providing holistic relationship based care empowering people at risk of or impacted by HIV, substance abuse, mental illness.” The virus has become understandable, treatment convenient and effective, viral load undetectable.  
Prevention through education and advent of PrEP, a whole new way of thinking. I think about the historical landmarks of this movement: the APA destigmatizing homosexuality, LGTBQ rights finally recognized, same sex marriage, adoption, disposition of the military’s don’t ask don’t tell, gender equality for all identities.

How far we have come my dear friend. Thank you for the gift of that promise as I believe I have and will continue to fulfill it in your name and all the others who left with you.