It Has Been a While...

It has certainly been a long time since I've posted here. I'm not sure why I disappeared. I think mostly the problem was that I felt I didn't have much to share anymore. I also think that the vast improvement in my health also played a part--I wasn't identifying myself primarily in terms of my HIV. I think I have much to be grateful for.

For starters, my last checkup showed that my numbers are in excellent order. For an HIV+ person, two are important: the viral load and the t-cell count. When I was first diagnosed, my viral load was around 500,000 copies per milliliter of blood. A sick number. For the past several years now, the virus has been undetectable. It doesn't mean the HIV has been wiped out, just that the tests that are used cannot detect it. HIV has been shown to hide in reservoirs of the human body, but an undetectable test means the virus is being kept at bay. The t-cells are the cells that fight off infection. In the average healthy human, this number should be anywhere from 500 - 1500. My t-cell count at the outset was 185, which is technically AIDS. I am happy to say that this number was at 1590 a few weeks ago. I love it when my doctor tells me how she is always impressed by the recovery I've made.

This summer I've been playing tons of tennis. I joined the gay tennis group here in NYC and even played in two tournaments. I NEVER thought I'd be fit enough to do that, but never say never. I've had decent results, but more importantly, have made some of the best friends I've ever had.

Gosh, it feels nice to be typing away in blogger again. I think I'll come back soon and share some more happiness.

3 Reasons to Love January

1. Professional golf starts up on TV again! (I am aware that this could be a reason why I can't find a BF... I have never met another gay guy who gets into golf as much as I do.) Anthony Kim is such a cutie pie, too.

2. Professional tennis starts again! The Australian Open is probably my favorite of the Grand Slams. I get to see Australia, one of my favorite places on earth, on TV and it's nice to see that it's summer somewhere on this planet while it's freezing cold here in NY. And I relish staying up until 3am to watch the matches live.

3. The Golden Globes are tonight! I love movie award season for the sheer pageantry of it all. After seeing Slumdog Millionaire yesterday in Chelsea with Ed, I now know why people have been hyping it up and why it will win Best Movie at the Oscars. Revolutionary Road might be more in line with the high-minded tastes of the Academy voters, but hey, if Shakespeare in Love can win Best Picture, Slumdog can as well.

See You in the Hall of Fame

I have always loved Monica Seles, so it was particularly sad to read on Valentine's Day that she decided to hang up her rackets. Monica was the original power player in the early 90s, using two hands to come over the ball on both the backhand and forehand sides. Along with those fierce strokes were the even fiercer grunts that exploded each time the ball got whacked. After HIV turned my life inside out and upside down, I began to comprehend how Monica must have felt after she was stabbed on a tennis court by a deranged man in Germany in April 1993. In one instant, she went from being the top player in the world to a physically and emotionally devastated human being. For 27 months, she stayed out of the game. And though she had family, friends and fans supporting her, it was surely a time of withdrawal into an impenetrable vault. Monica eventually found the courage to come back to tennis, and incredibly won the Australian Open in 1996. But that was to be the last of her 9 Grand Slams. She was never quite able to recover her early top form, and the sporting world was cheated out of witnessing what could have been the greatest female tennis player in history. Without question Monica will find her way into the Hall of Fame. But for many years, I think she's already been in a place where no one could touch her.

Galactic News for January 3, 2008

Major activity was reported from all quadrants of the Earth today. In the Americas Galaxy, the Northern Alliance began its bizarre, quadrennial ritual of burning hundreds of millions of dollars to select its Supreme Leader. Although too early to predict a winner, the one called Barack Obama has emerged as the early head of the Democratic Faction while the Republican Assembly has voiced approval for the one known as Mike Huckabee. It is Obama, however, who is of special interest this year for a father who terraported from the Kenya Cluster in the Africa Galaxy. Speaking of which, telecameras pointed at the Kenya Cluster revealed a fifth consecutive day of rioting, looting, raping and killing in this normally stable zone, triggered by the announcement that the incumbent leader Mwai Kibaki had rigged the election there to retain his stranglehold on power. This terranaut was particularly shaken by the events as he had terraported to the Kenya Cluster eleven years ago to see its famed giraffes and elephants roaming the mighty grasslands--he could never have imagined this kind of violence between the Luo and Kikuyu who had made his journey such a memorable one. In the Hawaii Belt, a display of calming light colored the skies as its inhabitants kicked off a season of golf in Kapalua. More beautiful lights will flood the southern firmaments when the Australia Galaxy begins its summer festival of tennis in a few weeks.

A Time to Fall, A Time to Move On

With the autumn leaves scaling off at a quickening pace, I suppose it's only natural to find myself thinking about all the things I'm grateful for. Being HIV+ has not been without its positives. Perhaps one of the best things to have come about is that I find myself focused on the present. I take my medicines every morning and work out as often as I can. I enjoy the company of my family and friends. I try to learn something new about the world every day. I wonder about God and what heaven must be like. In short, I try to take care of myself physically, mentally and spiritually. But it's also apparent that I haven't evolved to the point where I am free of regrets. A lot has happened since I was deported from Korea for being HIV+. A huge tennis fan, I would have given anything to see Roger Federer and Pete Sampras playing their exhibition match in Seoul yesterday. I never got to take leisurely walks along the fantastic Cheonggye Stream that now runs through downtown (even though I surely earned the right to enjoy it after sitting in countless traffic delays because of construction on the waterway project.) I also never got to zip across the peninsula in the comfort of the KTX, the bullet train that's cut travel times in half and increased comfort levels at least a million-fold. I know some people will say that I have nothing to complain about as long as I've got my health. (My last t-cell count was 1399 and my viral load is still undetectable after three years.) So why is it I still long for the things that have been lost on the road of my past? I guess I've still got a long ways to go.

An Audience With King Arthur

A devout tennis fan, I have been going to the US Open every year since I came back to NY. For my money, nothing tops the evening sessions when the air has cooled down and the lights of Arthur Ashe Stadium create an intimate, expectant atmosphere. But I also feel a sad, heartfelt connection sitting in a place named for a man who died from AIDS. It makes you wonder. Do people remember that he won the US Open in 1968? The Australian in 1970? Wimbledon in 1975? Or is dying from AIDS what comes to the average mind when the name Arthur Ashe is mentioned? HIV is a powerful virus, sure to have a say in dictating the terms of death. That doesn't mean we grant it power in dictating the terms of life. I will keep playing tennis (for as long as my legs allow.) I will keep being curious about the world and my fellow humans. I will keep growing things in my garden. I will keep watching movies on Friday nights. (Go see Death at a Funeral--outrageous and hilarious!) I will keep searching for someone to love me. And I will keep sitting in Arthur Ashe Stadium, this time on the first Monday, thinking these thoughts. And I'll look out onto the crowd and wonder if anyone else is feeling what I'm feeling.