weather crisp and clean
7:20am
no dreams
slept about five hours
light sweats, but didnt have to change clothes...
dream - I'am standing in a forest. there is a blue hue to everything. there is snow coating everything. I'am standing there. the is a light dusting of snow coming down.
there is no temprature here. niether cold nor heat...I outstetch my arms into the air to feel the dust of the snow. i feel really great. there is peace and quiet and joy tranquility.
I look up to the sky and say:
"oh god, it's so BEAUTIFUL..."
I awake rather violently as if pulled through a portal in time.
I sit on the edge of the bed and then remember my life: the itching starts but it is moderate compared to two weeks ago, so this is my solace. it's not as bad as it was...
I have some coffee, smoke a few cigs and download ivy's - "worry about you."
off the net from the i-tunes store.
I decide to go back to spellman to show the nurse the actual result of my TB test and hope that it is still readable and that i won't have to have another "implant."
and then wait again.
I'am waiting on a file that would allow me to apply for public assistance to help with my rent, food and living exspenses.
my doctor says that he wants me to go back to work. I thinking that I will but only when my vital energies are replenished and the time is right...
when matthew visited and made his house call he looked at the TB test and said
"oh yeah - thats not a good sign..."
I was worried.
I arrive at spellman around 8:30 and the place is empty but the floor is open so i walk through the main door off the waiting area to see if the nurse who injected me is around, she is.
she remembers me actually and gives me a warm, "how ya doing?"
she is an older black woman wearing blue scrubs - in her fifties, kind and steady.
"ok baby - you just sit down there and let's see."
i sit down and pull up my sleeve, she gazes at my wrist and inspects it.
"Very good! ok i'll just give you a copy of the result and your on your way..."
she returns with a zeroxed copy of the test result: a circled "NEGATIVE"
I walk around the corner of the clinic to Ms. morgan's office to see if shes in her office. the door is closed but i knock lightly.
i hear through the door - "i'am on the phone!"
repeated kinda of like when you were younger and living at home - your sister was in the bathroom doing only god knows what
and won't let you in...but what ever she says she's doing shes doing something else...
i can tell shes not on the phone because shes not talking...
she opens the door three minutes later. and walks out of her office. she seems to light up a little when she sees me - "oh hi."
but then walks past me kinda pissed off...
I realize that maybe she got a little talking to from doctor K - at my request, since she insisted on calling the Tb test an "implant."
phillip K. dick fans - take note.
heres a copy of your "minority report."
"implant"
your now being tracked through a special hiv database...if a cock slips up your ass -
an alarm will sound off:
warning warning - unprotected anal sex...warning...
this warning signal will notify the central offfice computer immedialtely. at which point a mild shock via wireless technology will be administred to your anus...
back to ms. morgan
i try to hand her the copy of the result and begin to apologize for not coming back fri because i forgot, but she turns away to lock her office door.
"i have a meeting right now - you can come back in an hour..." she throws at me kinda flat and harsh.
now she has on her "clinic face" so to speak. abrupt, numb and well clinical...
"Well," I look down and say, "is there anyway you could just hand me the file now? last thursday you said everything was ready to go..."
"No." she repeats.
this my punishment i can tell.
she locks the door and walks down the hall through another door.
I wonder what Ive done wrong in the total of 21 minutes over two weeks that I've been in her office. three visits roughly seven minutes each time: she acted like i was something to be endured.
my guess is that she's maxed. burnt out and fried from being in the trenches of social work at
the spellman clinic but it's hard for me to believe a woman as beautiful as her could ever be so angry and sad.
the spellman clinic is not the happiest place on earth thats for sure...
basically it's for homeless vagrants with hiv living in poverty without insurance. most of the pateints are minority uneducated addicts. societies throw aways.
ms. morgan, I gather from the twenty minutes I've spent with her, is a white woman in her late thirties. the general aura about her is akin to sandra bullocks character in the film "crash."
comes from money or "hubby" has it.
highly educated perhaps even over educated.
she resembles a J crew-esque model. striking black straight hair. thin tall body.
smart outfit of black pants and tight white silk blouse. pale skin and brown eyes. which look vacant far away and hurt...
she belongs more at bergdorfs feeling sorry for herself, having lunch alone and flipping through fashion magazines so she can list all the clothes and things she wants to buy to keep her boredom and pain at bay...
she is gone - to her meeting. you have to wait or come back - sorry.
ok she's brutal. a real ice queeen.
i return to the front desk to try to schedule an appoinment to come back and get the file i need.
theres two older black women behind the scheduling desk and one black "queen" in his thirties wearing green hospital scrubs. i get the feeling he wants everyone to think hes a doctor because it's kinda of obvious that hes not. his eyes light up and hes very animated using his wrists to point to everything the way that only a true queen can - mind you - and speaking about this and that and telling the other two women how it all is...honey. know what I'am saying???
the other two ladies, both black, one kinda heavy with big hair and gold and rings everywhere, and the other slim with cropped hair - maybe a bit older and more reserved...both in pink clerk like smocks.
i stand at the desk which is more like a barrier and rises to about my chest and peruse the long wall of files to the right which takes up the entire wall from ceiling to floor.
the number of files are uncountable:
all standard uniform 8 1/2 by 11 standard cream colored files.
some with green tabs, some with red or blue.
some with yellow.
each and every one no matter what color or race or ethniticy or sexuality is a person in the city that is positive.
i try to get the queens attention but she looks right past me and goes on about something that happened in starbucks last week to the older lady on his left.
it's obvious shes used to his rambling commentary and pays it no mind...
nodding her head on occassion to placate him... uhmmm.
the other heavier woman is standing, rings off, and coating her hands in hand cream.
she looks up,
"It will be about five minutes." and points to the chairs and points her finger as a command for me to leave her area and sit.
i shake my head and sit down.
it's around 9:15 at this point and the elevator door around the corner from the
front desk is opening bringing the days visitors. one a skinny fast moving black quuen with a small paper bag sits down, then gets up and checks the bathroom door
and then sits back down and pulls out a cup of take out coffee (not starbucks)
and putting some newspapers on the floor and unzipping his jacket all at the same time. he sips his coffee and looks right to me and begins talking like weve known each other for years.
now -- Ive been in nyc more than twenty years and can spot a retired drag queen from a mile away. the guy's gender is male but to a trained queer caberet haunter like myself, he seems to be surrounded by stage lights and a torch song in the back ground. hes got overly long eye lashes and a rounder face than most males. his complexion is a litle greasy but clean and shiny, as if he just washed with noxema.
he begins speaking and sipping the coffee and kind of moving about in his chair.
"i've been positive for nearly 17 years...
you gotta - kinda be your own doctor here.
I tested positive in 96 and at that time my t-cells were over a thousand. at that time they were thinking - ya know, if your positive, get on the meds - hit it hard and fast...
now theve brought the floor down from over a thousand t-cells to five hundred and then down to 250 where it is now...
these days you go on meds around 250 but then - and youd get sick from the meds - i've been dealing with this a long time and you learn things about how your body works. if you think you wanna take the meds every other day and it feels right then thats what you do...
"i think of my 37 t-cells...god bless every single one" I nod and widen my eyes.
like - "Oh i see."
"you know they were giving "ensure"
(a protien drink for weight gain)
by presricption but then they caught somebody selling it on the street, and then they took it away. i mean i could use that for my weight...thats not right that one person ruined it for everyone....'
i nod again.
then seee that the heavier pink lady one with the jewlery has disappeared from the front desk and the older one is not occupied with a task other than still kinda listening to the queen who is now talking about what she ate for dinner last night. (spare ribs with rice)
on the far right i stand in front of pink lady number two. "Yes baby..." she says.
"hey, can i get an appoinment to see ms. morgan in a few days?"
"Why don't you just wait till after the meeting?" she asks.
"Well i don't wanna wait. i don't know why she has to attack me everytime i see her...
i mean if you do something to make her mad well ok..."
i realize that i'am kind of acting out a little like everyone else and speaking through the vicaden. I'am whinning and tired and spaced out. i just wanna go.
pink lady 2 is looking through the computer files and then pink lady number one returns to the front desk from around the corner and realizes that i side-stepped her instructions.
"here ya go - weds at 3:30 - se ya then - she hands me the appoinment card.
i introduce myself - "Hi I'am dirk."
"hi dirk - I'am marge."
"ok marge thanks for helping me."
"all right."
i hit the elevator.
elvis has left the clinic.
mantra:
>>my vital energies are replenshed in safety.
I come home. the apartment is warm.
I download some more music off the web.
my internet connection has piggy backed onto a wireless connection and the speed increases to about three times as fast...
i down load:
"i'am on fire" by bruce springsteen and
"Is that all there is?" by peggy lee
i fall a sleep.
I have a dream I'am in a bedroom.
it's not a room i've seen before.
two windows covered with white shutters near the ceiling. the walls are white. the bed spread and shets are blue. there is a long series of sliding shuttered doors along the left of the bed.
I realize that I have an errection and pull my pants off and begin to suck my own dick...
suddenly i realize someone is watching me...
I wake up...
1pm
I take a bowl of shredded wheat for my first meal and a cinnomon bun swathed with butter.
I take med course number one - the hard stuff.
morgan calls
she is checking up on me. asking how I've been. then she goes into a dicussion of stephan deforest. a guy who is sober that we both know. she has had a crush on him for almost a year now even though she's known him for more than ten.
she seems to want to sort out the intricacies of their dynamics and the fact that deforest refuses to ask her out even though shes been very forward in wanting to see him.
I happen to know that deforest, a straight guy to all appearances, actually on occassion prefers
ah...
black transvestites to white women...
i listen to morgan but I don't say anything "like your wasting your time..."
she senses my detatchment and sudenly shes yelling into the phone,
"Fine i won't bring it up again. forget i ever mentioned it - ok?"
she hangs up.
my libido annouces itself.
perhaps the dream opened it up again...or turned it on. this is a good sign - maybe.
i think i'am gonna go outside.
I go to the post office for stamps. I ask for ones with fish. theres no stamps with fish so I go for the "curious george" ones instead.
I get a pear-spirilina juice at the juice store.
I get some riooboos tea and a box of "emergen c" vitimin and mineral drink. they have five flavors. today i chose lemon lime. the strawberry is awful. the orange is ok and the cranberry so far is the best.
in manhattan everybody drinks these things. you can usually find them for 69 cents at any "Bodega" check out counter.
I also buy some white sage. the apartment is about due for another clearing.
the idea comes to mind. why not get some gay porn??
although blockbuster doesnt rent porn of any kind "the video cafe" in midtown has what time out magazine called - the most formidable gay porn section for rent in manhattan...and its just two blocks away...
"Boot Boy"
scene one - two studs loungue by a pool. well muscled and hairless. wearing speedos ad grins and a few tats. they spy the pool boy...and
ah you know the rest...
I spank one off and fall a sleep.
5:35pm
i wake up and the front room is flooded with
afternoon heat from the windows being open.
the sun against the window panes and the closed windows just baked me while a sleep.
i wake up from the heat in my body.
my immediate thought is: psychics say that all dis-ease shows up in the aura.
if you clear it out of the aura - will it clear out of the body?
I make a large pot of rooibos tea - three rooibos to one mint tea bag should be a nice mix.
I allow the tea to steep and then burn some white sage. the sage comes in a smudge stick. i light it and quickly the apartment fills with smoke. there is movement of all the energies.
they do this at catholic services. the preist walks thru the isle dousing the auras of the congregation and then to the front door where supposedly all the "evil" goes outside.
all the evil goes "outside."
this is another reason to NOT go outside.
I check my landline phone messages.
message one fom jules:
you should go outside...how are you ? call me ?
call number two: from cameron: an eastern medicine student that was treating me before the hospital, illegally of course, since he doesn't have his license.
more on cam later...
his message is: you should go outside...
call number three -
gwen - a devoted "Jack tv" fan. and fellow co-worker from ricos.
i want my "jack tv" she screams into the phone - call me.
call number four: morgan.
say's shell stop by later...
I put on some real pants for the first time in two weeks as opposed to sweat pants and decide to walk two blocks to "daisy mays" ribs and BBq and get some lunch...
sweet tea....
lunch is great! i eat most of it and keep the rest for lunch tommorow.
I come home and ponder taking a shower for the first time in about five days...
because my skin is so sensitive I have only been taking ashower when absolutely necessary...
I've got about two more days before my arm pits begin to emmante the man smell...
but some guys actually dig that....heheheh
i'am feeling better and have begun to hydrate and pay attention to my water intake. todays intake is good and i don't feel so slugish...did you know your brain can actually get dry? and cloud your thinking?
meds course number two the easy stuff out of the way...
i can feel the life coming back into me.
the virus is dying. I'am not dying.
must have been the porn...
I return some calls - drink some diluted sweet tea. take some vitamins and decided to check out...
porn number two:
a pre-condom classsic.
it's interesting to note the changes over the years in gay porn...
for those of you who rather not read the next journal entry: please warned some of the descriptions that floow are graphic.
ok ... porn number two - my guess is that it was filmed in the late 70s.
scene one after a disclaimer states the nature of pre-condom films is is no way an endorsement of unsafe sex practices...
yada-yada-yada...
the film opens with a classroom and the teacher explaining the days lesson to the students. the first thing i realize compared to the film i watched this afternoon is the production values have come along way in 20 years...
in this second film the lighting alone wouldn't make the cut in todays market...
theres shawdows and dark areas on the set which actually dates it conspicuously...
i can guess by the clothes of the students half male and half females that the time has to be around the late 70s. the knot size of the teachers tie and the fact the he even wears a tie puts this around 1977. the collars on the shirts are wide and the knots were large windsors that were in vogue.
the jeans were also worn ultra tight on the guys and girls alike. today the guys wear baggy pants and the girls go for ultra utra tight...
the scene begins without sound panning the classroom and the students. then the bell rings and the class is dismissed. one of the female students lingers after class to ask the teacher something. she is wearing a pink sweater and come on to the teacher but he blows her off. then the sound kicks in...
here comes "Johnny" askin for help with his homework. the teacher is putting his things into a breifcase and johnny grabs a magazine that slides from under the teachers papers onto the desk...it seems to be a magazine.
johnny opens the magazine and the camera shows there is photos of sex but the gender is not indicated, seems like someones getting a blo-job in the photos but you can't tell if it's supposed to be gay or straight porn....
johnny throws the magazine at the teacher - like - "what the hell is this?"
and then johnny grabs the teachers crotch.
they go at it on the desk...
johmny is the aggressor - actually rimming the teachers butt which is unshaved and the camera angles are very tight on this rimm job which makes it kinda unattractive...up close rimming in todays porn is always done or mostly down on hairless asses and is not the scene dujour... so its telling that back in the 70s they really wanted to show this.
the inter course scenes are quick, with many different positions and yes - no condoms.
heres another thing about vintage porn.
the films were usually five to seven vinettes with different actors and different stroy lines spliced together.
today they cast several men and bring them through a story line two to three in a scene at once and then into what is usually a final orgy scene...but all scenes are connected to the same story line...
scene two in the second porn is a jail cell blo-job scene and fucking through the bars gaurd giving it to the prisoner...kinda boring...and funny. one minute the actors are dressed, the next they are both without clothes and getting it on.
all of the actors in film 2 are really skinny and hairy also compared to the beefy and smooth aesthitc of today's porn.
the 70s film is a tad raunchier also - showing a dirty shanchez in scene one - a guy gets fucked and then sucks the cock that was up his ass - theres cum drinking also and tops guys shooting loads and then reinserting the cum covered cock into the bottom's asshole...
theres also only two scenes and no trailers of coming attractions which i always found hotter than the actual length porn. the trailers are three minute basics of the next film rpoduction...coming attractions.
lets face it porn gets redundant but thats not an apology.
I don't spank one off nor even get aroused by porn two...
i go back to cable and log onto the i-tunes store to look for some more music downloads...
I decide to skip the shower for another day.
the bathtub brings back a few bad memories of the day I almost electrocuted myself.
i take a "french whore bath", just putting cologne under your arms and call morgan back to see if shes up for a walk.
the weather is slightly cool and damp: almost foggy which if the truth be told is my favorite kind of weather epecially for walks at night. it gives the city a more dramatic feel to it seeing the buildings wrapped in mist and the lights through it...
I've alaways love that about manhattan.
