I grew up on Sullivan Street in New York City’s SoHo neighborhood in the 1960s and 1970s. At the time, it was home to Italian immigrants, struggling artists and young gay men seeking a haven in the city. It was warm and loud and all mixed together.
It was full of life.
Even after I left home for postgraduate work in the early 1980s, I would often return to visit my mother. On each trip home, I noticed the vibrancy of my neighborhood starting to fade, with pain and fear creeping in. Fear of a disease — for which we didn’t have a name and knew little about — was growing.