More to Me Than HIV

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More to Me Than HIV

First published in Gscene July 2020 For last years World AIDS Day I put together a public project of work joining other people living with an HIV+ diagnoses at Jubilee library.For last years World AIDS Day I put together a public project of work joining other people living with an HIV+ diagnoses at Jubilee library. For the project I spoke openly about my journey having being           Read more

More to Me Than HIV: GScene post Aug 2020

More to Me Than HIV is a project that aims to breakdown the stigma that has historically been attached to this virus.  When I saw my piece in last months Gscene to promote the More to Me Than HIV project, I was extremely proud, but a small part of me was filled with anxiety; but why should I feel this way? I have been on effective antiretroviral therapy since the Read more

More to Me Than HIV: first published in GScene July 2020

For last years World AIDS Day I put together a public project of work joining other people living with an HIV+ diagnoses at Jubilee library. For the project I spoke openly about my journey having being             diagnosed HIV+ 32 years previous. Back then there was no treatment and a lot of fear and misinformation concerning how HIV was transmitted. As such stigma was rife, Read more

lost and found

writing 101. day 16 Lost and found

 

 

Day Sixteen: Third Time’s the Charm

Today’s Prompt: Imagine you had a job in which you had to sift through forgotten or lost belongings. Describe a day in which you come upon something peculiar, or tell a story about something interesting you find in a pile.

For inspiration, ponder the phrase “lost and found.” What do you think about or visualize when you read this phrase? For an elementary schooler, it might be a box in their classroom, full of forgotten jackets and random toys. For a frequent traveler, it might be a facility in an airport, packed with lost phones, abandoned bags, and misplaced items.

On day four, you wrote about losing something. On day thirteen, you then wrote about finding something. So, today’s twist: If you’d like to continue our serial challenge, also reflect on the theme of lost and found more generally in this post.

By the end of Writing 101, you’ll have multiple posts around a theme; material you could thread together in a longform piece.

Questions to think about as you write your post:
What have you learned about loss over the years?
What does it feel like to find an object that was once important to you?
When can reconnecting go horribly wrong?
When are things better left buried and forgotten?
In your “lost and found” tale, tell us something larger — a life lesson, perhaps — about finding and losing something.

15 min’s free writing.

This is one of those odd pieces that I might revisit and see if something better comes from it…..

Lost and found.

In this job all kinds of things turn up, amount the usual stuff like an umbrella, silk scarf or a kid’s teddybear, I’m always surprised by the more unusual things that turn up, like a false leg, a wad of ten pound notes in a carrier-bag and a mink fur coat. But the most unusual thing to turn up here at the lost and found office was someone’s soul.

Now, in all the time I have worked here it was the first time I had come across a soul. At first I didn’t even notice it, it was only when I saw this dark shape shift at the bottom of the box that i even realised it was there. I was really cautious, because I thought it could have been one of those really big spiders that jump out at you and bite, so I put on my long protective gloves and got my ‘grabber’ at the ready. When I tried to pinch it, it let out a squeal and shrunk back down in the corner; it was only when I shone my torch on it I saw it wasn’t a spider, but I still wasn’t too sure what it was.
Sensing that I had to continue handle what ever it was with some caution, I put my grabber to one side, had the torch tucked underneath my chine and gentle reached down and picked it up. Although small and to look at it you would have thought it would have been as light as a silk scarf it was actually much heavier, like lifting a bag of sugar. As soon as I had both hands beneath it the dark edges began to glow. By the time I had lifted it up to my face the whole thing was a ball of twinkling light.
I guess you would have thought I would have been frightened by such an unusual sight, but there was something about it that made me feel calm. I was about to call out to one of the boys in the office to come and have a look when the light in my hand began to burn even brighter. That’s when it showed me it’s true meaning of what it was. With each burst of light I saw the life of a stranger. At first there was his birth, the light was at it’s brightest at this point which filled me with a feeling of long forgotten joy and innocence. Next came childhood with a mix of rainbow colours showing me so much love and laughter, this was followed by more muted colours with occasional the shard of silver and gold as the teenage years flew by. I wanted to call out for Jim to come in from his office to see me but I could not take my eyes of the life that was flashing in front of me
Next was a blinding burst of blue as the teenage years gave way to the excitement of being a true adult; almost blushed as the soul quivered in my hand while watching the spurts of red hot, white and blue.
Next came calming orange, a causal pink, my eyes became heavy as I was lulled into the tranquil emerald only for a violent rush of red nearly scolded my palms,but this was quickly followed by a burning brown which quickly diminished to a black then grey.

I looked around the back of the office and found a box, carefully placed the soul inside and placed the lid back in place before putting the whole thing on the top shelf.

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