You know, I couldn't make it through editing your story without a few tears falling, and I couldn't read it again just now without crying.

Brad, Howie, David, Clay ... those are just the first names that pop into my head when I think about beloved friends taken by HIV/AIDS.

To me, their lives and the time I spent with them feel like yesterday. Usually, I can think about them with joy. I even wrote a novel that features Howie as the hero, in a fictional world where he was going to live.

Stories like yours bring home for me the reality that for most people today HIV/AIDS is a history lesson in a classroom. Can anyone really appreciate how Ryan White advocated for people living with AIDS while he was just a small boy? How he embraced the gay community even while fighting unfair stigma? I don't know that anyone who didn't survive in the moment can understand what it was really like.

Stories like yours matter so much. Thank you for sharing it!