Good evening WWWfollowers,
Well todays' comments (posted yesterday) had to be whittled down to one minute of public comment so I crossed alot out. Honestly, I wasn't as nervous in presenting in front of Councilman Tom LaBonge (pictured with me) at todays Los Angeles City Council "Arts, Parks, Health, and Aging Committee SPECIAL MEETING. My comment was geared toward the Department on Disability (DOD) AIDS Coordinators Office (Steve's position).
There were numerous presenters who totally humbled me. Until today, I haven't seen how able "Disabled" people can be, how empowering, intelligent, amazing...words cannot discribe how humbled and amazed to have witnessed what I did today. People who were blind finding their way up to the podium, people in wheelchairs, double-"disabled"able-bodied men blind and deaf up signing and having interpreters as their mouthpiece as these so called "disabled" people where very much ACTIVISTS, who were claiming services and so on and so on. Oh, and the patience and attentativeness Councilman LaBonge showed was stellar. My eyes have been openned...I saw more light today and I went toward it. POWERFUL STUFF. Made my little "kindergarten" attempt at public comment seem so minute, but I know it was just as important. Steve Simon, AIDS Coordinator, was there to coach us a little so that made it better. THANKS to RICHARD KEARNS for the texts of encouragement and the texts afterward. Thank you!!!!! SO MUCH, you don't even know.
Richard is one of my mentors and an activist I have seen and him at several seminars, events, AIDS updates over the years...since I think around 2003. Actually I got to meet him on a more personal basis back on Friday February 5th when he organized the HIV/AIDS Eldder Advocacy Summit & New Media traing. also co-hosted by Bill Rosendahl and the AIDS Coordinators Office. It was an amazing Summit, I met wonderful journalists, bloggers, activists who I never would have during that event and also this encouraged me to start writing in this blog. Thanks Richard- don't mean to make you blush...well sorta. LOL
Ok, on to Michael Gotlieb MD. I've known him also for a while since he and Eric Daar MD, Being Alive LA, APLA all held the HIV/AIDS updates for a while every few months at the West Hollywood City Auditorium....so what...2003 or 2004??? not sure, the years start to blur...you young bucks will understand as time progresses.
The reason I bring up Dr Gotlieb is because he was so approachable back at the 25th Anniversary of HIV/AIDS event at Plummer Park in West Hollywood. I saw how patient & caring, heard him speak, how knowledgeable he is and then found out then he is THE MICHAEL GOTLIEB the person helped diagnose 5 patients and then reported these to the CDC back in 1981. That was when AIDS was called GRID, Gay-related immune deficiency. Before then, to me he was just an AIDS Doctor presenting updates at the Weho auditorium. Funny how details of peoples' lives remain unknown, huh?
Well...now update to December 17th 2009. Three days after "officially" started this blog. I attended a "Keys to Treatment Success" hosted by Michael Gottlieb, MD back on December 17, 2009 at the Pasadena AIDS Center on Fairoaks Ave. I had the opportunity to question and he answered back for about an hour or so...I just picked his brain...neato, eh? One of the Pioneers of HIV/AIDS...if not THE PIONEER and lil ole me. I'm sure my questions seemed amaturish at best. Oh well. ANYWHO...after becoming comfortable I asked him if he had ever done any YouTube video presentations because people would really like to hear what he says...like from horses mouth...ya following me here? Well, at the time he looked at me (dressed in his usual black) perplexed, and said no...I don't think so. Well, I just found an interview uploaded to You-Tube 12 days prior to the December event. And if I link it right...here it is:
A Conversation with Dr. Michael Gottlieb
(Conversation with the living)
**Uhh...don't know the HTML coding to embed so justuse the above link to view, Thanx.:p**
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