Positively in Love

Every once in a while, I have to stop for a few minute to reflect on where my politics are at a moment of my being. Anyone who knows me can tell you I am fickled; I am fickled with men, work, my future aspirations and my waist line. It should also make sense that I change or "evolve," as our president says, whom I'm also fickled with, on my personal politics.

I already claim the position of a Progressive because of it's meaning of consistently moving forward to whatever may be in my more blossomed self. It is also a political stance that isn't used much on national news. The Obama admin is labeled, and often feels comfortable, in Liberalism. Yet, if being Liberal is ALSO being in support of globalization, drone attacks on innocent Afghan residents, record levels of deportations and separating undocumented families- I'd rather not join in the pin-on-the-shirt game. But beyond what I call it, living and breathing what I believe is most revealing.

I can go on and on about what an anti-racist (really, anti-white supremacist) I am, but it doesn't hold much value if I consistently attack my white allies, bottle up my internalized racism and classism for my fellow undocumented Latinos & have a narrowed experience on who I love, the way I love and how I make love.

Quickly, the latter, it's not stranger to my friends that I have a tendency to date black men. Racism within sex can be perpetuated by arranging sexual experiences that manifest the kink image of a violent, aggressive & dominating black man.

Like wise, calling yourself a queer feminist doesn't mean much if you aren't inclusive of transwomen & transmen in your spaces of leisure & work, if you're not actively supporting and defending all forms of reproductive rights & if you're not creating spaces that celebrate different gender and sexual expressions.

Facing HIV is where I'm at now. I'm still negative, but my relationship with the biology and the spirit of it flowing trough the men I love has been fulfilling, painful and enlightening. The man that had ignited it was my dear friend Brandon Lacy Campos, who has passed away recently. I am not sure if he was the first man I meet with the virus, but I do remember being a preteen when my homo hormones were raging. He was, literally, an Adonis for a queer boy with self-image issues. When I reencountered him in my adulthood, he was even hotter than the mental image I had occasionally masturbated to as a 14 year old. But, he was also a wise elder, a scholarly father, a rockstar performance artist, a Che Guevara of radical sexual politics- a bit exaggerated, but that was how much I admired him. On actuality, he was a fierce blogger, a troubled & beautiful romantic, a badass director of NY's Queers for Economic Justice, and soon to be, a full-time struggling writer/poet. Still hella romantic to me, and he was an open advocate for someone living with HIV. While I was no stranger to his radiance of self-confidence, his ability to be write and speak directly of how the virus would/wouldn't falter his biological functions and spiritual being was uncanny, intimidating and attractive.

Brandon was a romantic and a freak. I never really liked the word, freak, whenever I heard used in a sexual context; it always used as feverous, sexually potent and willing with a kinky connotation, but that those were my conversations and encounters with Brandon. Brandon was a model, to me anyways, of true, uncompromising monogamy in a relationship, however, I reconnected with him on his bachelor tenure. When we did reconnect, he made it every clear that I peaked his arousal, which could've melted my genitalia from stimulation. After sending me pictures of his golden cock resting below his 12 pack (all still over-fantasized), he had then asked to bare, meaning, he wanted to ejaculated his divine sperm up my virginous tight rectum. After reading that request, I immediately froze.

I had recently gone through an emotional crisis of my own where I was convinced I had contracted HIV from a friend though a top we shared, just to later realized I hadn't contracted anything after a stressful month of not knowing, not wanting to get tested & eventually dragging myself in because of the guilt of knowingly spreading a virus to my beau of the time.

After my test result came back negative, I rationally mapped my desire for cum up the butt. Similarly to my friend Brandon, I had craved the closeness of skin contact and what felt like the holiness of natural, bare anal sex. But I had come my conclusion that gravity & my body had always expelled that semen in an unromantic toilet finale, so, my attraction to unprotected sex was probably for momentary gratification, like all kinks. When Brandon asked me, the idea of putting myself at risk of contracting HIV was erotic and fearful. Brandon seemed to live a fulfilling life- sex, friends, opportunities and all- despite living with the virus, and the idea of sharing anything with him, even a virus, was simulating.

I avoided him on my last trip to NY because of the nervousness of consenting to unprotected sex. Yet, here I am today consenting to unprotected sex with my HIV positive boyfriend.

Biologically, my boo has undetectable viral load, meaning that with the assistance of medications, he has null count of transmutable HIV particles in his sperm. Medical experts will tell you that it is not a full safe measure against HIV. Low risk is still a risk. But I am, ultimately, consenting to this. I want this. I want the kink of fucking dangerously and the potency he gets from having me want it how he would want it, but would be too afraid to ask for. Freak.

I can never say I would recommend this to anyone. I don't. It wouldn't be right of me to say that a Progressive must do anything, but it fits for me. Sex isn't the foundation of our relationship, but it is a reality of our love life. I enjoy his company, his kisses, his laughter, humor, his manners, his closeness and he's hot! Sex is a plus. I can't say that the idea of dating him is apart of my kink, I don't think it is. Dating him humanizes him from just being my sex object. It gives him personality and it links me in a way that lasts long after I shower and shit lube out.

Friendship, inclusion and intimacy is where I'm at with people with HIV. It's rather easy to dehumanized people with the virus, HIV has always been used as an accusation by gay slut shamers. We forget that monogamous, black, immigrant & young women are today's most likely new cases for HIV contractions. While its not an identity like color that immediately surfaces on the skin, we are living in interconnected world where words, hate & ignorance run like fire. Progressive doesn't have to mean opening your panties to positive men, like I had, but it does demands an evolving inclusiveness with respect, dignity and a little love.

Gay Hispanic vs Queer Latino

When I started first grade, I remember one my barriers from full play pin games was being to communicate and understand the rules from my fellow classmates. Although I only knew scarce bits of Spanish, English quickly became my primary language and I became the master of the "'you're it" line. At the beginning, I was only identified as Mexican where most of my classmates, regardless of race, were Americans. By the time I reached the third grade, I was my own blend of American-of-the-streets and Mexican-at-home. I identified with my classmates and teachers much more than my own parents, whom regularly worked beyond the time the school buses returned us home. When I started taking standardized test, I began to identify by the bubble option that I was told to fill with my #2 pencil.

Standardized exams were being pushed by the US Department of Education, backed by the Clinton Administration, to use blanket exams to compare the education and progress of students. These "End of Course/Grade" test became a standard by states to see if students were unqualified to advance to next grade. The Bush Administration later used these same test to punish "under-preforming" teachers and schools. The basic information of these test also used race as a comparison between students. Of the options, there were African-American, Asian, Pacific Islander/Eskimo, White or Hispanic.

So, I became Hispanic after my teacher came by and made sure the seven year old students were bubbling correctly and not drawing ducks and horses on the paper exams. Although there was no "Other" option, my classroom had three other kids that looked similar to me, also with Spanish last names; together, we began our trip on the Hispanic train. We were all of Mexican nationality, but the diversity of Latin American became more ubiquitous at our Catholic Church, which the other four Hispanics attended, when he had visiting pastor from Costa Rica.

Later in the years, there was the evident racial clicks limited to whites, blacks and Hispanic that comprised of descendants of Mexico and Central-America. This continued till I attended a historically black high school and my identity was, simply, other. Similarly, I began to wondering how much "other" I was when I began to notice that I was more different than I was willing to let on.

After I was outted as gay by a flamboyant opera singer, I began to be part of a circle of gay boys. I later attended a safe space where I met other girls and I saw myself as part of something more than just gay.

The rest of these kids were also more than just gay or lesbian. There was diversity in shapes, bodies, colors and personalities. While many of them did not want to be called gay, they expressed that they were simply different. I later saw this identity with another name, queer. Queer became a form of expressing complete inclusion yet difference from heterosexuality. All non-gender abiding straight folks were foreign in my own identity. I identified and saw my linage connected to transgenders, lesbian, butch gay men and genderfucks. Queer sometimes has a progressive connotation, it also seemed different from lgbt and gay labels. Hispanic also didn't seem to fit in my name tag any longer.

Hispanic originally had meant, for me, a connection to brown faces with Spanish-speaking parents. Bring Hispanic no longer matched when languages was blurred and faces came from too many colors. The "Spanish" label was also unfavorable in my family because of our inherited despised. I easily preferred Mexican/Mexican-American/Chicano as a specific culture and historical base of my family, but when I lived in Florida, it only separated me from others. Puerto Ricanos and my Caribbean classmates were astonished that I was of Mexican nationality, many had never met a Mexican so pale skinned. I knew much of this cultural shock was due to an exposure of Latin American diversity yet I also connected to them better than some of my past Mexican community members. Latin America, which I saw as anything south of Canada and the US, was the vast land that connected us. Latin America had historically hosted European migrants, slave trade and indigenous.

All that historical baggage watered the seed of a diverse colors and accents. In the same way queer had separated me from heterosexuality, Latino also was what separated me from a different history of transnational migration. These identities are more water than soil, they change and adapt to where I am, whom I speak with and in what language I speak. Sometimes, it is intended to show my different shade and sometimes it is intended to show my place in a spectrum of colors.