Since 1981--the beginning of the epidemic--about 40.4 million people have died of HIV/AIDS, according to the World Health Organization. Another 39 million were living with HIV at the end of 2022.
These are staggering numbers, especially when you consider the emotional and economic ripple effect across all the families and loved ones of the victims, who have suffered along the way.
Tonight--on World AIDS Day--I will join other members of the Phoenix Gay Men's Chorus at the Parsons Center in Phoenix. We will sing as part of a vigil that will remember those lost ... and provide encouragement for those who live with HIV every day.
We will be surrounded by the quilts you see here--just a sampling of those created in the 1980s and 1990s--which pay tribute to victims of this horrible disease.
Ironically, this is also the space where we rehearse every Tuesday night, as we continue to prepare for our holiday concert, December 16 and 17 at the Herberger Theater, and a weekend of holiday musical fun and inspiration.
Still today, the quilts prompt a sense of sadness and reverence for lives snuffed out. For people we will never know and never meet. For people we loved and lost. For the beauty they brought and the art they never created.
From my spot on the back row of the tenor two section, I captured fellow members of the Phoenix Gay Men's Chorus--surrounded by AIDS quilts--rehearsing on November 28, 2023.
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