We Decide
http://aumag.org/2018/12/20/facing-mortality-head-on/
Love this piece. Thanks, Hank. I respect your courage to write what is the forbidden city. The taboo around asking the question – IS IT WORTH IT – must still be asked even if (maybe especially if) jumping off jump off rock comes with how many vehicles of stigma are we condemned to have to endure or become Thelma and Louise.
For other people.
I, too, have arrived at many of the same conclusions you have. They are inescapable.
I’m sure I am going to hell anyway, how can that be any different from this.
I’m tired of being lied to by a medical community that has a punitive mean streak. I’m tired of declaring bankruptcy. I’m tired of having to decide: pills or food. I’m tired of Good Will clothes that stink like someone’s old decrepit cigars. I’m tired of being evicted because I cannot pay the rent. I’m tired of being told my pain cannot be treated because Cigna refuses to pay for it. I’m tired of filthy hospital rooms. I’m tired of no sleep. I’m tired of being told my anger is not warranted. I’m tired of losing everyone I loved. I’m tired of living in a democracy that is, in fact, one big concentration camp. Just put the tattoo on my forehead. I’m tired of being hungry. I am tired of eating out of dumpsters.
I’m tired of a community that, in fact, thinks AIDS is over.
But. I. Tune. It. O-u-t.
I can still write. I can still use a camera.
I can still love. They can make me eat shit. They can piss on my face. They can break all my bones (and have) and cast me aside.
But I am still here. Exhausted. But I can still love, and they cannot take it away.
All my bones are dying from Avascular Necrosis. Prednisone, used to keep my lungs from filling up with liquid, can itself attack your bones, and you will break them.
I am tired of pneumonia after pneumonia.
Is it worth it. A RESOUNDING are you kidding me – NO.
Change the locks before you take the pills.
Our bodies belong to us. We decide. We decide.
There is no such thing as a natural death. There is only death. We are all going to die. I want to be in charge of it.
Life is overrated. Pain will win. It always does. But I want to fuck it in the ass before I go. I want to burn the forbidden city with its stigmas and injunctions that civil society cannot speak of failure or death. I AM a failure, and I welcome death.
Nevertheless, I want some gasoline to burn the Forbidden City to the motherfucking ground.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to write about it.