Back in May of this year I moved my various sites to a new hosting provider and a new dedicated server.  The hosting provider was Angel Networkz, a small company which had a good reputation in the web hosting space.  Their prices were reasonable, they had good dedicated server packages available, and I had a friend using them who had good things to say about their service.  Seemed like a simple decision at that point…

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I ran across this quote today while I was updating the Random Thoughts database.  I'd like to dedicate it to Derek and the nuclear and extended families that he leaves behind.  This is a great sorrow.  May we have the courage to live our lives with the same passion and fierce determination with which Derek lived his.

Derek, your task is complete.  You have ventured on a dangerous journey and now behold the foothills of new lands.  It's time for you to rest.

Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace.

Victor Hugo

I received a call earlier this evening from Kevin, one of Derek's brothers, and I could tell from the tone of the message he left that Derek was gone.  While I was on the phone dialing Kevin's number, I received another call from Derek's childhood and best friend, Cos, which I allowed to roll to voice mail.  It too was a message indicating that I should call back as quickly as possible.

Kevin had not yet arrived at the hospice when I reached him on his cell phone.  He had needed to pick up his and Derek's father (we'll call him Bob), so he wasn't to the hospice and didn't have all of the details available.

What I do know is that Derek had spent his last day with his mother.  Kevin indicated that they thought Derek waited for his mother and, once he spent the day with her, felt there was nothing left to do here.

I got off the phone with Kevin so he could get Bob into the hospice and to Derek's room. I then called Cos.

Cos and Derek go way back.  They were childhood friends from very early on and grew up together.  Although they had grown more distant over the last eight years (while Derek was living in Dallas), they had always been best friends and cared deeply for each other.  This was evidenced by Cos' apparent tears when he answered the phone.

We talked briefly, me listening to him explain that he had heard just a few minutes before he called me.  Still feeling numb from the news, he was lost for expression.

We agreed that Derek was better off now, not suffering as he had done for the last two years.  We were happy for him.  We understood that he had taken advantage of the opportunity to clear the air with his family; he had been able to address both his sexuality and his disease with a family who only wanted to help, to be there for their loved one, to provide for him in his need, to spend the last moments of his life with him.  Derek had been able to resolve the last remaining vestiges of the secret life that had made him increasingly distant from his family.

We agreed on this.  We agreed again that his passing was an end to his suffering, the most important fact to remember, and that he no longer had to survive the downward spiral of his health.

As I sit here writing this entry, the numbness has settled over me like a fog.  I can feel it all around me.

I am touched by the memories that you leave behind.  I am glad that your family had the chance to know you — the real you that I have known for these past eight years.  I am sorry you had to suffer at all and am truly happy that you suffer no more.

I will miss your quick wit and your charm.  I will miss your sometimes child-like behavior.  I will miss your fierce intelligence.  I will miss how outrageously funny you could be.  I will miss your tendency to indulge your excessive preoccupation with politics.  I will miss doing things together.  I will miss watching you with The Kids and knowing how completely safe they were with you despite your taunting.  I will miss a great many things now that you're gone.

You fought the good fight and you fought it well, but now the day has ended, my friend.  Your difficult journey has come to an end.  Know that Mom was right when she said that there will always be a special place for you in our hearts.

I miss you.  And I love you.

Despite my best intentions, I have spent the last three months becoming increasingly angry about Derek's situation.  My anger is fueled as much by his condition as his family situation.  No, I'm not angry at his family — I'm angry about why his family wasn't involved earlier in his care.  Derek's health is failing fast and his doctors confirmed on Monday that he doesn't have much time left.  This is no surprise to me, but it's a tremendous shock to his family who all feel as though this is so very sudden.  It's not, as I've said before, since we've been dealing with his most critical health problems for the last two years (he's been dealing with general health problems for the last four years).  From their perspective, though, it's very sudden since they've only been involved for the last month.

Each day that goes by sees a greater decline in his mental condition, expeditiously destroying who he is and taking him away from his environment and those around him.  His physical health is rapidly declining as well.

Why am I angry?  There are many reasons.

I'm angry about the disease itself.

It's a horrible thing to watch someone whose body is used against them, whose body provides the very ammunition the disease needs to win, whose body strengthens the disease by fighting it.  It's upsetting to know that, in the last 15 years, I have watched three friends die from this disease and am about to see the fourth taken from me in the same devastating way.  The physical decline is horrific, but the mental decline is even worse.  You watch someone taken from you a piece at a time, and there's nothing you can do to stop it.

I'm angry about the feeling of helplessness.

I've spent two years of my life taking care of him, ensuring he was safe and cared for, managing his health care, meeting with his doctors, taking care of his finances and employment, and being there for him so he always had someone to rely on — the worst thing in these circumstances is to feel like you have to face it alone.  I sacrificed my own happiness and well-being in the process.

Despite all the sacrifices, though, and all the hard work, there was ultimately nothing I could do to save him.  The best I could hope for was to manage the illness as best I could to ensure some level of quality in his life.  Even now the futility of the situation continues to manifest itself.  His body has given up the fight, no longer able to maintain even some level of health.  His immune system is gone.  And now his mind is being directly attacked from two directions.  Again, his body is being used against him.  How can you fight that?

I'm angry about the sadness.

I'm sad that Derek will be leaving soon.  He's been a close friend, roommate, confidant and part of my family for the last eight years.  There is a hole in my heart and my life that Derek once filled.  He filled it with his wit, his charm, his sarcasm, his intelligence, his friendship, his caring, and his child-like discovery of who he was.  There is nothing that can ever fill the void he leaves behind.  There will be other friends like Derek, but there will never be another Derek.

I'm angry about what might have been for Derek.

Derek's only 37.  He will not see 38.  He will not enjoy more holidays with his family (made worse by the fact that he missed the holidays with them last year because he was hospitalized).  He will not celebrate another birthday.  He will not be able to enjoy more time with The Kids (made more angering since Derek loved them so much).  He will not be there for his family as his parents grow older.  He will not live through the birth of another niece or nephew.  He will not find true love.  He will not see himself successful in his career.  He will not look forward to retirement.  He will not celebrate his parents' anniversary again.  He will not laugh at another joke, smile at the charm of another movie, cry about some emotionally hurtful event in his life, or remember how much his family loved him and were there for him at the end.

I'm angry about his family's loss.

Because Derek is gay, he didn't feel that he could tell his family everything that was happening.  This is society's fault because it is society that has taught us all that being gay is morally wrong and unacceptable.  How can a son confide in his own family when society is constantly telling him he's bad — bad because of who he is?  He didn't choose to be gay; he was born that way, yet society tells him it's his fault and that he's an evil person because of it.  So he spent two years being very sick without the support of his family.

And society tells us that having AIDS is a bad thing.  When you're diagnosed with cancer, there is no stigma that causes people to fear you, to think that you did something wrong to deserve the disease you have.  On the contrary, society pities you when you have cancer.  But they revile you when you have AIDS.  So Derek felt shame in sharing his disease with his family, in allowing them to help in his time of need, because he feared the rejection he might experience.

Because of both of these problems, his family lost precious time with him.  They were left out of his need and only allowed to participate at the end.  They lost time.  They're losing their son.  And society doesn't care.

I watch his family members struggle with the truth of it all, the suddenness (from their perspective) of his decline, the impending loss.  I hear their regrets, their lamentations, their sorrow, their anger… and I understand where it all comes from.

I'm angry about feeling guilty.

I feel guilty about going on with life when Derek cannot.  I feel guilty about not doing more even though there was nothing else I could have done.  I feel guilty about not calling his family sooner even though I couldn't (I had to respect his wishes).  I feel guilty about being angry just a few months ago, angry that I had sacrificed so much to take care of him over the last two years.  I feel guilty about not being able to share The Kids' lives with Derek (since he was such a big part of their lives until two years ago when he was hospitalized).  I feel guilty for my health and well-being.

I'm angry about society's indifference.

Being both gay and HIV-positive, Derek is one of the forgotten sons of America, one of those our society so readily labels an outcast and tosses aside so so much refuse, one of those who, according to society, somehow deserves this terrible fate.  I'm angry that society is so blinded by their bigotry and hypocrisy that they wallow in the deaths of those who aren't like them.  They will find themselves with the blood of millions on their hands and will wonder where it came from, blinded by their own hate and intolerance.  They are directly responsible for the limited time Derek's family has had to spend time with him and care for him since it is they who forced Derek into the shadows.

And society is responsible for the survivors not being able to talk openly about their loss, having to hide it from most of those around them because it is AIDS and because of the stigma of that and of his homosexuality.  He is an outcast of society, so his family and friends must suffer in silence, they must weep in the shadows, they must hide their loss.

If society responded to AIDS the way they do cancer, we would be spending far more money on it than we are.  We would have better treatments, better options, better care, longer lives.  But, instead, we have the stigma of a gay disease where those who have it deserved it, those who have it aren't worth saving.  It's a shame, and it angers me.

I'm angry about being angry.

This is a time of loss, a time of caring for loved ones and helping each other through what is a terrible event in life.  Yet I am angry, and that angers me more.  I'm angry because our society doesn't care.  Our society is so full of misguided religious fervor that tragedies like this are called "God's justice" and are overlooked, promptly becoming just another statistic in a report on some government officials desk.  Those who are left behind continue to suffer because of society, but society doesn't care.  I should be focused not on anger but on sorrow, on caring for Derek and his family.

Yes, I'm very angry. And I have every right to be.