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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 1, 1989)
lust out • • • • • • • • .......................................................... • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • O N T E NTs Co-Publishers Renee LaChance ami Jay Brown Letters ............................. 3 What's going on h e re ___ 4 Between the Lines ........... 5 Editor Jay Brown Calendar Editor % Grace Entertainment Editor Just News ........................ 6 TheTribal D ru m ................ 10 Profile ................................ 11 Bringing Sharon Home ... 13 Out About Town .............. 16 Eating O u t.......................... 19 Just Entertainment ............ 20 Cinema ..............................22 Music ............................... 24 The Amazon T ra il.............. 25 Just Youth ..........................26 Classifieds..........................27 Sandra De Helen Staff Reporters Anndee Hochman. K.C. de Gutes Advertising Representatives J eff Fritz, LaVerne Lewis, Chris Maier, Littlejohn Keogh Production Director Renee LaChance Creative Director E. Ann Hinds Typesetting Em Space Proofreading K.C. de Gates Graphic Inspiration Rupert Kinnard Distribution P Diana Cohen A E G T ^ N O Contributors Lee Lynch Dr. Tantalus Harold Moore Frank Macomher Nancy Vanderburgh Abby Haight Glen York Michael MacKillop Jack Riley Michael S. Reed Char Breshgold Eleanor Malin Just Out is published on the first day of each month. Copyright 1989. No part of Just Out may be reproduced without written permission of the publishers. The submission of written and graphic mate rials is welcomed. Written material should be typed and double-spaced. Graphic material should be in black ink on white paper. Deadline for submissions is the 15th of the month preceding publication. Out About Town is compiled as a courtesy to our readers. Performers, clubs, individuals or groups wishing to list events in the calendar should mail notices to Just Out by the 15th of the month preceding publication. Listings will not be taken over the telephone. Display Advertising will be accepted up to the 17th of each month. Classified ads must be received at the office of Just Out by the 17th of each month, along with payment Ads will not be taken over the telephone. hditorial policies allow the rejection or the editing of an article or advertisement that is offensive, demeaning or may result in legal action. Just Out consults the Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual on editorial decisions. Views expressed in letters to the editor, columns and features are not necessarily those of the publishers. Subscriptions to Just Out are available for $ 12.50 for 12 issues. First class (in an envelope) is $20 for 12 issues. A free copy of Just Out and/or advertising rates arc available upon request. The mailing address and telephone number for Just Out are: POBox 15117 Portland. OR 97215 (503)236-1252 Grief, hope and luck I ' d p r o b a b ly even \ Dray i f th a t w a s som e th in g I b e lie v e d in BY C H A R ! 1 M : B R E S H G O L D wonder if anyone really needs another sad story. And do I need to tell one? I don’t know anymore. I look at pictures of myself from last summer, just five months ago, and I think 1 was more hopeful then. I look at pictures from The Quilt, and I think “ how could I have been hopeful?” Maybe I was just distracted. A friend died last month. My friend, my girlfriend’s best friend from college, one of those friends you meet when you are twenty and full of angst and optimism and silliness. I knew Larry for nine years. It’s still hard to write that in the past tense. It should be: I’ve known, he is, he will, as in, “ he will get well,” “ when he gets well.” But he won’t. He had a good life I think, although 30 years is a ridiculously short one. His sister said at the memorial service, “ He really loved his life and his friends.” He did and there was a lot of love around him in his year of fighting this disease. And he did fight. He was angry and at times very hard on the people who loved and cared for him. He listened to Louise Hay and went to self-healing workshops and tried to be positive. But he was sick, capital ” S ,” sick. He was nauseous and in pain and had little energy. Here I am with this damn cold I’ve had for weeks and I’m ready to slit my wrists; when will I get well? Then I think of others for whom it goes on and on and on. That’s where I get stuck. I get depressed because I have a cold, or I’m sick of my job, or 1 have writer’s block, and then I’m around someone who hasn’t gone out of the house for three months except to go to the doctor and I think. “ Oh yeah. I remember how lucky you are. Your cold will go away, you will write again, at least you have the energy to go to work.” Then I really do feel lucky for about five minutes, then I get depressed again and then I feel guilty for not feeling lucky. Talk about mishuggenah. I’m grieving for me who has lost someone to argue and shop and laugh with, for my girlfriend : H III F 1 f « f I i who lost her oldest friend, for Larry’s family and friends who cared for him so lovingly even when it was hard and he wasn’t very nice to them. So many people were affected by Larry’s death — hundreds, friends and families and co-workers and hospital workers and friends of theirs. I multiply that by the thousands who are sick, will get sick, will die. and I try to be optimistic. I say ” PWA,” and “ Living with AIDS. I send money and volunteer and demonstrate, and I’d probably even pray if that was something I believed in. It was six o clock on a Saturday night when we got the call that Larry had died. At six-thirty, we were ex Pei hng seven people over for dinner. We held each other and cried and then wondered if we should cancel this evening. Can we do this, we wondered. We didn’t cancel. We had a wonderful sad evening o f stories and jokes and hugs and good food and wine. It was a special group of people made even more special because o f the circumstances. Larry would have fit right in. Tears still come at least once a day, when I iron a shirt, or see a man in two-toned cowboy boots. Then I look at the photos on the refri gerator or hanging in the hall — Larry laughing — and they make me smile and then I really do feel lucky.