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Donald Trump Cancels Gay Men’s Chorus at Kennedy Center
Think that’s not a big deal? I have some history to share!
I’ll never forget the first time I heard the words, “Gay Men’s Chorus.” My late husband Lenny and I were visiting his old friend Alan in San Francisco, spending a couple days with him before starting a week of cat sitting while he flew to London to say goodbye to his family.
Alan was in the late stages of AIDS, and he fretted that he wouldn’t be allowed on the plane if he looked too ill. He didn’t know what he’d do if U.K. health authorities quarantined him upon arrival, as they sometimes did with people living with HIV/AIDS. Long story short, he was able to spend quality time with his parents and siblings before he flew home to San Francisco, where he lived about a year longer than he or his doctors expected.
But my story today isn’t about Alan dying, it’s about Alan living … and singing like an angel.
It’s about Donald Trump silencing artists like Alan. Right now.
Alan was in his mid forties when I met him, handsome and stylish if you didn’t notice that his slimness approached emaciation. He hid that well with fashion choices centering around tweed, a rumpled academic look that matched his status as a professor of history.