Regan Hofman has been HIV positive for almost a decade. Before today, she anonymously wrote a monthly column for POZ. This week she’s on the cover and tells all.
My art teacher in high school died from AIDS. His name was John Bubb. He was really wonderful. I remember a lot of the students came up with the most absurd rumors about him but I think a lot of us who were closer to him suspected the truth. Toward the end of his life, he was absent a lot and students would say things like, “John was in Vietnam and he still has flashbacks that make him unable to cope with every day life.”
John must have felt so lonely before he died. I’m sure some of the other teachers knew, but the fact that his secret was kept so bottled up makes me kind of sad. It wasn’t until the funeral did the secret really come out. I wrote my name on a piece of the AIDs quilt with a note that read:
“John Bubb wore the best socks.”
He really did wear the best socks.
On a similar note, Tobyjoe writes about V3 (a new hope in mitigating the spread of HIV.) Stop by if you know what’s good for you.
I just got tested myself for the first time. Although deep down I knew it would be negative, there was still a part of me that was a little relieved.
Great interview. Great post. Thank you.
John Bubb was a great guy. I wonder if more people knew about his condition if he would have been forced to quit teaching. That would have been sad.
Had he worked at the actual high school, he’d have been “let go” for sure. The AP was a different story, don’t ya think?
I think of John Bubb every World AIDS Day. He was amazing.
I found this post while searching for John’s piece of the quilt. He really did wear the best socks. I knew him during my “formitive” years, you know, from 10 or 11 on. He was a dear friend of my mother’s (the whole family really), and we miss him dearly every day.
Not living every day as a secret is a noble thing.