I moved here to San Francisco in 1995. I grew up in the bay area, but moved out of state as a teen. My BF and I came out to San Francisco for a vacation, and it was my first time being back since I was 15. We both thought it was just magical, and there was no other place to live. Everything about it, the smells, the flowers, and the plants all reminded me of my childhood. Instantly, I had all these flashbacks and memories and it was just like, oh, my gosh, I'm home now.

It seemed like a place where you could live and pretty much do whatever you wanted to do, and be who you wanted to be, where there was a lot less pressure to do anything specific. There's so much beauty that you just don't have in other parts of the country, I guess, and that's what sort of drew me back here.

Basically, by the end of the visit, we had already decided we were going to move here. So we just set a plan, saved up, and within a year we moved out.

Our relationship ended on a very even keel. After we finally talked about, okay, the relationship's not working for such and such reasons, then it became easier. We actually lived together after we split up for about two years, and then a lesbian friend of ours says, you guys are just like a lesbian couple. Yeah, and he's still my best friend.

I discovered speed in 1999. I mean, I drank a little bit in college, but I had no sort of prior experience with drugs. I had been reading about it though. I'm always one of those people that before I would ever try something or think about trying something out, I would always try to find out information. I also check out what am I going to get myself into before I get in that situation, so I think I might have read a lot about speed for at least a year before I ever tried it. By that time, I had already been going out dancing, so I had done ecstasy a few times. It wasn't like trying something else would be hard--it was just like, oh, I wonder what speed would be like...

The first time I tried it, I smoked it with this guy I had just met online. I think I might have also tried some K that night as well for the first time. Of course, the K didn't stick with me. I was like, okay, tried that. But doing speed with this guy was really fantastic. We spent the next 12 or 18 hours together. It was really very intense.

 

After that first time I used very casually. For a couple of years, I would use about once every two months or once a month. Or five months would go by, and I'd do just a little, basically one, two, maybe three puffs off of a pipe, and I was high for a long time. Yeah, it didn't take very much, especially being like such a newbie--

In some ways, when I think about that early time, it is appealing. Now, because my use has become much heavier and much more regular, I'm using pretty much daily now, I think about the whole concept of harm reduction. There's no reason that you can't go back to that----not back to the place where you were, but as far as reducing the amount that you use, there's no reason why one can't really, but it requires a lot of will to say I'm just going to use maybe a couple of times this week. You know, I think if you wanted to reduce the amount of your use overall, you have to really, really be committed to doing it. I think if you're willing to make that commitment, then it can be done.

I think speed is a magnifier or a reflector of regular human emotion, and it amps the volume up to 8, 10 or 13. It just makes everything seem so intense. It just makes you feel alive or something. And you can have sex for a long period of time. You can meet a lot of different guys, sometimes within 48 hours. I've met five or six different guys, or been invited to a sex party, and have met some really interesting, amazing people -- but not just because I was high. Even if I was completely sober, I would have still found these things interesting about them. Every once in a while, I'll be listening to a song, and I'll be like, "Oh, my God, this is the best song that I've ever heard!" and then I'm like, "Oh, wait, that's the speed adding that." It's okay, it's good, but it's not that great. So that internal check--I always try to keep it close by.

I'm HIV positive so I normally choose to have sex with positive guys. In a lot of personal ads and profiles you'll see online, there's been a lot of "negative; you be, too", and so a lot of positive guys like kind of turned that around and said "Poz; you be, too", because they were feeling rejected by the negative guys. I don't want to shut off a category of people. I can have sex with negative guys, but I usually choose just to hook up with other HIV-positive men. Then, condoms aren't really an issue or something that we have to use. Of course, there are still STD's. Basically, as far as that goes, every two months I just go in to Magnet or City Clinic and make sure that I don't have anything, and if I do, I instantly get treated for it.

 

 

I decided after six months after becoming positive, I was just going to try to live my life as openly as possible, not try to pretend about things, and be as open and honest as I can with people. So I put that information out there, and you know, it's amazing, because sometimes you get responses from people who say, "Oh, I think that's really brave of you; I'm positive, but I don't feel comfortable putting it in my ad."

A couple of months ago, I was wondering if I would be able to fuck an HIV-negative guy with a condom, because I hadn't had sex with an HIV-negative guy in some time. I had an experience about a week ago where I did hook up with an HIV-negative guy, and I wore a condom, and I was able to get hard and fuck him. I had thought about it for six months, whether or not I would continue just hooking up with HIV-positive guys, because I didn't know if I could get a hard-on with a condom on and be able to maintain it. But it was kind of nice; it was like, "I just did that. And it worked!"

If I am invited to someone else's place, and a couple of other people are coming over, I'm not going to be asking as people are coming in, "Hi, my name's so-and-so, and, what's your status? Are you HIV--, I'm HIV-positive; what are you?" So I just go with the understanding that in that situation it depends on who the person is or who the host is. I might even ask the host, are you just inviting positive guys over, or will there be people with mixed status? If it came to the point where someone wanted me to fuck them, then I would bring it up at some point if I could. There have been times in a group situation where I haven't asked, and maybe I topped someone. That's happened before. I'm also, like, aware when that does happen that I could be putting someone at risk. Part of me says that, and then the other part of me says, "Well, that person shouldn't jump on top of my erect cock, you know, without the knowledge." HIV-negative guys say, "Well, I thought he was negative," and HIV-positive guys say, "Well, I assumed he was positive."

In other situations, I would maybe just avoid, topping, or I just wouldn't top without a condom, for instance, like at Steamworks or something-- If you actually hook up with someone and, have like a little room, there might be discussion, but if there's not a whole lot of privacy--there's not so much dialogue. No one wants to say the wrong thing to ruin the mood for everybody, so everyone is sort of on a one-track mind--sex, you know, and you just sort of go with the flow.

Becoming HIV-positive was really traumatic for me. For three or four months, I was really depressed. A couple of weeks after I found out I was positive, I was unemployed and so it was really easy to just fall into this really deep depression, and I did. At some point, I just had to pick myself up. Since I had such a difficult time with it, I know that a lot of other guys go through that, too. I would just like to ease the potential suffering of other people and not let anyone get infected cause of me.

In my 20s--and it's not just because I was negative- but in my 20s, I was very insecure. Now, I'm at a place in my life where I feel good about myself in a lot of ways. I'm satisfied that I'm attractive enough, and--well, I'm not going to get any more attractive. At some point, I sort of became comfortable in my own skin, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. I think that's maybe a life process, and HIV definitely had a big sort of part to do with that. So as I became more comfortable with myself and who I am it became easier to communicate with others, to just be open and honest with other people.

If you want help with dealing with your HIV status, there is a lot of support, but you have to reach out for it; it's not going to be handed to you. A lot of people expect that, or think that it's going to happen that way--like everything will just be dropped in their lap. HIV-negative guys may think, "Oh, if I just became positive, then I would get all of this free stuff." It's not like that. So I think I would say, as far as saying something to positive guys, that help is out there if you want it. Read, learn, explore about yourself and about HIV. Find out as much information as you can. And in the process, you'll learn about yourself.

I've been single now for a few years. I would like companionship, sex, and someone to share my life with. I would also like some sort of stability, because I lately find that, as far as dating or hooking up with people with speed involved, it's like a wild card every time. Sometimes, it's a really good experience; other times, the people I meet just have really bizarre, freakish behavior in one way or another. Everything seems fine for the first 30 minutes, and then three hours later, they let little things slip out. You get to know someone if you spend 18 hours with them having sex. I realize that it's my responsibility if I invite someone in. Ultimately, if something crazy happens--if that person does something unexpected--that I'm the one that invited him in. It's part of the risk I take.

I definitely don't like to hook up if a guy has been up for a long time. You know, it's hard to get that information out, because people are going to tell you whatever they think you want to hear. Some people are much more up front and honest. A lot of people, though, if they're afraid they might be rejected, they're going to say whatever they think you want to hear.

Guys who have been up awhile just need sleep, and that's really the only thing that is going to help out the situation. I've never found myself in that situation, where I've been up longer than 48 hours. I know how horrible, horrible, horrible that felt, and what would be the reason to keep going? Because you can't get higher. You can't. You just can't. It's not going to work. It's like, it's depleted; you have to rest.

So I guess I'm able to know when to stop--and I don't know what that's about; I don't know if it's that instinctive internal mechanism that I have or that I had; I don't know if it's something that I learned as a kid or, some sort of survival skills. How much is too much, or when is it time to just say enough is enough? I guess I know my own limits. I guess I hold onto my wits. I'll let them get kind of far out there. Push it as far as I can. I'll go right to the edge sometimes, and then be able to pull back. Because who knows what's over the edge?