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Tapestry,
1995.Tapestry
June 26, 1995
Tapestry's apartment, Lower Haight, San Francisco
James is one of his roommates
Tapestry: Coming out at 14, I went to a youth group and stayed for a long time. I was there from early '84 until early in '93. When I went back to Washington DC, one of the first places I went to was that youth group. To me, there's nothing more empowering than being told every day, you are the future generation. But in some sense it's an empty statement. They're telling a bunch of kids you're the future without providing the proper tools with which to live in that future.
So, ever since his death, in my own ways, I've been fighting to get information for youth out there. And, despite what a lot of people think, I think the best way to get that message out is through sex. In most people's lives, there is very little they feel they have complete control over. But sex is something where most people feel like they are in control. It's a situation in which I have chosen this person, this person has chosen me, and we're going to do things in our intimacy together in a place where nobody can watch us and force us to do something else. It's one of the last places where people, despite the threat of disease, can still feel free. It's important to get a young person, to understand his choices and where his boundaries lie, because that's a personal issue that everybody thinks about no matter what their age, a lot. The outside world is telling them, "you shouldn't do this, you shouldn't do that." You can give them the same information but give it to them as a choice, an open choice for them to make. When you can negotiate your boundaries around something so close and personal, you can apply that same philosophy to other things in your life.
MW: When you tested positive who did you tell first?
Tapestry: Phew! I walked out of the office, went home, got some food, and suddenly said, well, I guess I need to call Mom. I tried calling her and she wasn't around so I thought, well, who should I call next? I guess anybody I've had unsafe sex with in the past year. I called those three people. Then, I slowly made my way through all of my friends from the closest to those people I just didn't want to have hear about it in passing. "Oh, Tapestry's positive dear!" I've been in situations where things like that have come up and people can be so, "hahaha", and matter of fact. To me, that's appalling. I told most of my housemates within the first week, and by the second week they all knew. I told my job within the first week. I talked to my Mom that Wednesday, and to my grandmother Friday, and my aunt, great aunt, and a cousin. I got phone calls from people that I didn't think respected me, or my family. And the great part was that most of them weren't worried about me in the physical sense, but they were worried about my mental state, which meant a lot to me. Many times when people find out you're HIV positive they think about the physical. Are they safe from you? Are you dying? But instead they were worried about what I was going through, what I was having problems with in my head, not just my health. I never felt as if I was trying to convince them that I wasn't going to die and that I had a long life to live.
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