FOREVER YOUNG

This is a story I had to turn away from, to check my tears, to steady my emotions, so that I could read on. Even though much of me didn’t want to read on. And a part of me refuses to believe that the life story of fourteen-year-old Anthony Godby Johnson could be true. It tells me that the writing is to wise for its years, far, far too wise. And it tells me that although human nature can be base and cruel, that surely it cannot be so base and so cruel.

Our religions presume to teach us to value truth. But in the lives we lead, truth is often an unwelcome visitor. Society does not value truth because truth forces society to see itself as it is. Truth is brutal. Truth is clear. Truth cuts through all the bullshite and hypocrisy. It forces us to face ourselves, to be honest about who we are and about why we do the things we do.

From the moment we could think, we had to chose. We had to chose between what was the right thing to do, and what was the thing that was right for us. Because there can be a very big difference between the two. Making sure that our fellow humans aren’t starving to death while there’s plenty of food around is the right thing to do. Making sure that children are not being abused is the right thing to do.

Hundreds of people will have starved to death by the time you finish reading this. In New York, London, Tokyo, Munich and Dublin, children will have been beaten and raped. That is the truth, the unarguable truth. It is the kind of terrifying truth that is revealed in intimate detail in Tony Godby Johnson’s book …

Tony is fourteen. He is dying of AIDS-related illnesses.

Perhaps by the time you read this he will be dead. Tony contracted HIV, and went on to develop AIDS because he was a sex toy for his natural parents and their circle. “My parent’s weren’t peculiar looking, and they weren’t or welfare on uneducated,” he writes. “My father held a job as a civil servant; my mother could have been your next-door neighbour.”

Tony never had a bed; he slept on the floor in a small, attic-like room. He has spent New York winters without a coat. His parents deprived him of food for days on end, because he cried when they and their accomplices were raping him. When Tony was finally saved from these cruel people, as a result of phoning a nation-wide hot line, he was brought to a doctor for the first time. “They discovered I had fifty-four badly healed bones. I had an advanced case of syphilis.”

He fought hard, survived a stroke, and found new parents. His new “Pop” had answered his hot line call; his new mother met him that night too. These two people, a black man and white woman, who had been strangers before Tony entered their lives, would fall in love at first sight. They would marry and give him his home, his “tomorrow.”

Tony had two tests to decide his HIV status. They were negative. So he fought his diseases, his stroke and his painful lungs. He thought he had come through, that he could be a child for the first time, when a third test proved positive.

He thought of suicide again. But with the love and help of his new parents and several amazing friends, he decided to fight on, to celebrate the now. That Tony decided to celebrate every peaceful moment between his regular life-threatening illnesses is a celebration for all of us. His courage, his humanity, his sense of joy, and his deep and wonderful wisdom is a marker by which we would all do well to measure ourselves.

I finished Tony’s story exhausted. I feel drained as I write this. I’m battling with these words, hoping that they will somehow convey Tony Godby Johnson’s truth. His story makes me so angry and bitter towards humanity. And then I stop myself and realise that Tony represents humanity too. That although his natural parents embody so much that is base, evil and disgusting about us, Tony and his friends truly do represent so much that is good and decent and pure.

But which side of humanity is winning out? Because he is

HIV positive, and has developed full-blown AIDS, Tony is being treated as a leper by a very substantial section of the medical establishment and society. Doctors and other medical staff talk about him in his presence as if he wasn’t there, referring to him as a basket case, a piece of meat. They tell him not to touch this or that because he’ll contaminate it. Christian social workers come to visit him and tell him that they’re there to save him from his past sins. No wonder he has asked that he be let die at home.

Tony asks something of us. It’s not for himself because his life, his tomorrow, is drifting away. It is that we love respect and care for those who need love, care and respect. It is that we look after our children, our old people, our poor, and anybody else who is in need of help, including those who are coming down with the immune deficiency that we now call AIDS.

Is that too much? Is it too much to ask of a society which claims to be civilised to be true to the core values of civilisation? Is it too much to ask a society which claims to be Christian to be true to the core values of Christianity?

How we treat those who are going through the experience of living with, and fighting against the effects of AIDS, will define what sort of society we truly are. Our behaviour and attitudes are our living, breathing constitution – the only one which really matters.

“I’ve cried because people have not realised that even with AIDS I am still Tony, that nothing can interfere with that. I like Whoopi Goldberg — especially when she plays a singing nun — and get hysterical at Bart Simpson and his attitude. I can cook pretty well, and I play a decent poker game. My favorite color is purple, and I love cats. I’m a lousy video game player but I can sing old songs and I’ve played Felix and Nathan Detroit in school plays. I know Spanish curse words and enjoy showing them off. Sometimes I’m afraid of the dark.”

• A Rock And A Hard Place: One Boy’s Triumphant Story, by Tony Godby Johnson, is published by Little, Brown and Company. Price: £12.99.

TO COINCIDE with World AIDS Day 1993, a number of voluntary HIV and AIDS organisations throughout Ireland are joining together for the biggest street collection yet.

Dublin AIDS Alliance, Cork AIDS Alliance, Limerick AIDS Alliance, AIDS Help West, Body Positive, Cairde, AIDS Helpline Dublin, Irish Names Quilt and the J. C. Helpin’ Hand Fund will be co-ordinating their efforts, and street collections will take place nationwide on the following dates: Dublin, November 25th, 26th and 27th; Galway, November 27th; Cork, December 7th and Limerick, December 1st.

The campaign will include a multitude of events around the country to raise awareness and much-needed funds. Needless to say, your support would be greatly appreciated, and those who wish to volunteer as collectors can contact 8733799 (Dublin), 021-275837 (Cork), 061-31661 (Limerick) or 091-66266 (Galway).

Some events already confirmed for Dublin include a “Spitting Image” fancy dress night at Fifi’s nightclub on Sunday 21st November, with prizes for those who most closely resemble their favourite hero/heroine/garden vegetable/whatever. Admission £3.

Eight panels from the Irish Names Quilt will be on display in Tower Records from November 25th to December 1st, and free condoms and Red Ribbons will be handed out during the week. On November 27th, the Head Gallery, Ormond Building will host a sparkling club night called ‘Madra Mór’, featuring the very finest DJs from Belfast, Cork, USA and Dublin, along with a major dance act. Doors open at 9pm.

Meanwhile, in Cork, Paul Stafford presents his play Over The Rainbow at the Triskel Arts Centre on December 4th, and Michael O Súilleabháin, supported by the RTE Orchestra, performs at the Everyman Palace on December 5th.

Radio Limerick 95FM hosts an AIDS-related chat show and phone-in on December 1st, and there will be information stands and flag days all around the country in late November and early December. Other events are in the pipeline, and you are urged to lend your support in any way you can.

Useful Contacts

AIDS HELP WEST Ozanam House, St. Augustine St., Galway. Tel. 091-66266

AIDS HELPLINE DUBLIN Tel. (01) 872 4277

AIDSWISE Olympia House, Dame St., Dublin 2. Tel. (01) 6712680

BODY POSITIVE 24-26 Dame House, Dame St., Dublin 2. Tel. (01) 6712363/4

CAIRDE 25 Mary’s Abbey, off Capel St., Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 873 0006

COMFORT AID 52 Lr. O’Connell St., Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 872 4098

CORK AIDS ALLIANCE 16 Peter’s St., Cork. Tel. (021) 275837

DUBLIN AIDS ALLIANCE 53 Parnell Square, Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 873 3799

IRISH FAMILY PLANNING ASSOCIATION 5 Cathal Brugha St., Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 8727776 and 58 Synge St., Dublin 8. Tel. (01) 6682420

IRISH NAMES QUILT 53 Parnell Square, Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 873 3799

JC HELPIN’ HAND FUND 53 Parnell Square, Dublin 1. Tel. (01) 873 3799

LIMERICK AIDS ALIANCE, Ozanam House, Hartstonge St., Limerick. Tel. (061) 316661