There is something magically beautiful in something that can never be.<\/p>\n
I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not talking about reading all of Ulysses in a night or not finishing a box of cheesy bread. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m talking about the past in the most nostalgic, clich\u00c3\u00a9d, Midnight in Paris-esque way. Tragedy drips<\/em> from this impossibility like water from a roof\u00e2\u20ac\u201dslowly forming a puddle that will soon submerge my foot as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m running late to a meeting and which will leave me cold, numb, and sad for the entirety of the day. That is my impossibility. That is my art.<\/p>\n This never-can-happen thing, however, was just within my grasp by a few years. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not ancient Egypt, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not revolutionary France, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not even the roaring 20\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s.<\/p>\n 1980\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s America in the midst of the AIDS Crisis is my impossibility.<\/p>\n [Sidenote: Do not misunderstand me though. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not nostalgic for a time when I most likely would have died. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not nostalgic for a time when I would have seen my best friends and lovers suddenly die in front of me. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not nostalgic for a time when the government refused to say the word \u00e2\u20ac\u0153AIDS,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d nor for a time when AIDS only \u00e2\u20ac\u0153affected\u00e2\u20ac\u009d men, nor for a time when the AIDS only \u00e2\u20ac\u0153affected\u00e2\u20ac\u009d gay men, nor for a time when AIDS was seen as a punishment to gays. This is not my nostalgia.]<\/p>\n My nostalgia is for community.<\/p>\n I had the opportunity to watch \u00e2\u20ac\u0153United in Anger,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d a documentary by Jim Hubbard. It played at the Michigan Theatre and was an amazing way to spend my first time in that space. Now, as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen many a film on AIDS (having taken English 314: Culture of Aids, with David Halperin) I was prepared to cry. To shout. To literally shake in my seat. To want to light the world on fire. To love like I will never be able to love. And this movie made me feel all.<\/p>\n It put me in the action and perspective of ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) in such a fresh way. It showed me how the group started, transformed, and how they were able to achieve their goals. And the film even did more than that. It showed me a sense of community. These people faced death everyday; they faced active discrimination and a government that did absolutely nothing. And to see a group of people protest is one thing. To see a group of people do a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153die-in\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in St. Patrick\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Cathedral is another. They didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t care if anyone liked them (because in my opinion, had they been liked they would have been doing something wrong). ACT UP was ruthless in their attempts to save their own lives and the lives of those they loved.<\/p>\n This is my nostalgia.<\/p>\n I long for the period when identifying as a gay man meant so much more. It meant community, it meant family, it meant weird and different, it meant being tied to a disease that would kill you (even given the fact that sex doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t cause AIDS but HIV does). And it meant action. It meant anger.<\/p>\n What I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m trying to get at is: gay people weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t fighting to be assimilated into a heteronormative culture dominated by the belief that gay marriage is something interesting to fight for. They weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t fighting to be normal. They were fighting for survival. And in doing so, they created a way of life that is beyond my imagination.<\/p>\n I crave a community that is tied together intrinsically and I will never have it. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m lucky to live in a time where there is vast knowledge about HIV prevention and where antiretroviral drugs are not only effective but also accessible. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m privileged enough to never have to experience sheer terror and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m thankful for that. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m so lucky that I can feel safe.<\/p>\n But still, there is something so artful in something that can never be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is something magically beautiful in something that can never be. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not talking about reading all of Ulysses in a night or not finishing a box of cheesy bread. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m talking about the past in the most nostalgic, clich\u00c3\u00a9d, Midnight in Paris-esque way. Tragedy drips from this impossibility like water from a roof\u00e2\u20ac\u201dslowly forming […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2904"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2906,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904\/revisions\/2906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artsatmichigan.umich.edu\/ink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}