Fungus

As an HIV+ person, I have trouble with fungal infections. the last time I needed treatment, I came home from the pharmacy with a garbage bag full of boxes each containing a "single dose treatment for vaginal fungal infection." Each package was one pill on a plastic tray with a cardboard cover, and elaborate information brochure and its box, plus cellophane and a prescription sticker. I had 28 boxes.

This time I asked, is there another way? "Yes," he said, so I took it. Big mistake. I had a really bad reaction that could have been foreseen had he checked my record. As it is, I am in day three of recovery at home. To pass time, I watched a BBC TV series I had recorded and got out my pile of unread New Yorkers….

1. Watching Maxine Peake and, for that matter, the whole cast of BBC's The Village is hard but worthwhile. The relentless challenges of Tom and Grace, the injustices of wartime and prejudice are very hard for me to watch. But the writing is spectacular and the acting is superb. Maxine Peake, who also shines in Silk, is an acting treasure.
2. The Jan. 26 New Yorker contained an illuminating article about the history of gay rights. It moved me so, when I finished reading it I kissed the photograph of Magnus Hirschfeld. The article lauds and references a book by Robert Beachy called Gay Berlin: Birthplace of a Modern Identity.
   
   Mr. Hischfeld, a (straight) German physician, founded the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee, the first gay-rights organization. His gay activism seems to have been instigated by the suicide of a young German gay man who felt coerced into marriage. He believed homosexuality was not behavioural, but congenital and that human sexuality was fluid. He also believed in feminism through exposure to the thoughts of lesbians the he interviewed who were diverse in their identities and revealed different feminine ideals to him.
   
   He later headed the Institute for Sexual Science, a museum, clinic and research centre where he offered sex advice to couples, advocated for the mineralization of divorce laws and birth control and collaborated on the first primitive sex-change operations.
   
   
3. The Feb. 9th New Yorker, for me, is a doozy. There is a terrifically interesting article about the use of psychedelic drugs in terminally ill patients. Long known for its insightful spiritual qualities, psilocybin is helping people accept their death in extraordinary ways. It's too complex and full of too many medical terms to effectively summarize here, but I will do anything to take psilocybin when I am dying.
   
   Also in that issue is a story about Lin-Mauel Miranda. I am in awe of this man who was the composer, lyricist and star of In the Heights (ITH). ITH won four Tony Awards including Best Musical and Best Musical Score. I idolize him. He has a new musical that sounds brilliant opening on Broadway about US President Alexander Hamilton. It sound delicious.