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I KNOW THE FACE OF AIDS By S.M. Young

I have touched it, kissed it, comforted it, listened to its voice cry out in anguish, tried to find a hopeful word to soothe its fears, and wiped the tears from its eyes. I have lived it, buried it, loved it and lost it, but never will I forget it. The first face of aids was my younger brother who died in 1991 at the age of twenty-eight. No my brother was not gay; to answer the question that so many stupidly ask, as if that factor should somehow justify the person having the disease. Back then, in some way that train of thought may have led our young people to look at AIDS as strictly a gay disease. They never paid attention because they were led to believe that only the "gay boys" were dying. The only thing you needed a condom for was to protect you from having a baby and any STD could successfully be treated with a shot or a tube of ointment.

No one told my little brother that he would be fighting for his life, that he would be leaving his parents, his sisters and brothers, his five-year old son and his girlfriend because he had AIDS. No one told us that we would be standing around his hospital bed watching him struggle to breath, touching his handsome face and wiping the tears from our eyes as we said good-bye. No one told us that in a couple of years his girlfriend also would be dead. The next face of AIDS belonged to my dearest friend of twenty-five years, a talented fashion designer. Every Friday after work, we would hit the "happy hour" at our favorite bar, sipping our drinks, catching up on the latest gossip, sharing our dreams and our secrets like only best friends could do. The bar would be packed with the beautiful people, drinking, cruising and dancing the night away. You could always tell what season it was by the posters on the wall; come join us for the "Summer Boat Cruise", tickets being sold for the "New Year's Eve Gay-la" and my favorite the "Sunday Night Talent Shows". But all too soon, it would become the season of AIDS. Read More

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