sayitmeanit Death by Friendly Fire

Waiting Down Here

The Process of Giving Birth from the Heart

Death by Friendly Fire

Harmony Internally & Vivaciously + (HIV+)

Death By Friendly Fire

"Hello," Hailei answered in a deep state of grogginess.

"Hailei, what's up?" David asked.

"I'm out of it 'cause I took two pain pills for my back."

"How do I get to your house?" Silence. "Hailei!"

"Huh?"

"How do I get to your house?"

David saw an opportunity to "get lucky", so he struck out on a mission, thinking with the head that had no brains. Hailei vaguely remembers much of any of the events that took place that night. She didn't remember giving David directions to get to her house, nor letting him in.
Her memory was very fragmented, so she thought it all had been a dream. While trying to recall if her memory was a dream or reality, she thought she remembered David initially penetrating her without a condom and she thought she remembered asking him to put on one. So, she began to look around the house for evidence, hoping she wouldn't find anything thus, confirming it had been a bad dream. But, there in the front room, she found the remnants of a condom package on the floor. She went to David's job and confronted him behind closed doors. She asked him why he did such a thing when he knew she was under the influence of a drug. He responded with, "I always wanted to be with you and you were chosen."

When Hailei informed David that what he'd done was considered rape, he didn't understand how she could say something like that. He didn't consider what he'd done as a violation of her body, even though she had told him many times before that she didn't get involved with married men.

As my best friend shared with me what had happened to her, I could hear the intensity of her pain through her words. I tried desperately to convince her that what had happened was not her fault and that she was a victim of a rape, disguised by a opportunistic smile. Hailei finally accepted that fact, but she still felt there was no place she could go get support for an intrusion that society doesn't necessarily consider a violation. She knew that in this society, it would be difficult to prove she had been violated because women as well as men, would say, 'she knew what was going on', or 'she let him in, so she wanted it'.

That's where I question the distortion of society's viewpoint of what is considered a violation of a woman's body. It is still apparent that our society has a skewed perception of when a couple's sexual encounter deviates from being consensual to a violation.

Another issue that's raised in this violation is integrity. Hailei recalled David saying he really cared about her, but how could he? How could he claim to care about her when he didn't care enough for the woman he vowed to love, honor, and protect, to jeopardize her life by having unprotected sex with someone who was practically a stranger, even if it was for a 'quick in and out', as David told her?

Hailei informed me that she just wanted to forget about the whole ordeal because she didn't want to cause any problems and hurt David's wife. But, are we really helping our sisters by not telling them of the danger their husbands are putting them in or are we doing them an injustice?

African American women are being infected with HIV at an alarming rate because of deceit. By our men being promiscuous and not revealing their bisexual tendencies, they're writing us a death sentence when the only crime we committed was in loving them. They're not accepting the fact that AIDS is very real, it has no prejudices, and it will accept everyone just as they are. Men, and women, try to use their eyes to detect if someone is infected with the virus. But in most cases, AIDS is synonymous with 'death by friendly fire'. It starts out with the dance of romance by the tall, handsome creature I'll call Sdia. He courts and entices us with a farce of love that suspends magically in midair. So we put down our armor, while Sdia invades the essence of our being with shots that are of a deadly kind. Sooner or later, the image of love starts to fade. Our minds take control over the feelings of our hearts and we find that the sweet, sexy Sdia was AIDS spelled backwards. Then, it's too late!

It's a shame that the Davids of this world don't think to take extra precautions when they are unfaithful, when they know they're going to go home and climb in bed with their wives as if nothing different has happened. The Davids of this world should stop for a minute, before indulging in infidelity, and ask themselves one simple question, for these few minutes of pleasure, can my ignorance and greed possibly cause the demise of me and my family? It's a question worth asking and definitely one worth answering.

In closing, I've raised many issues, but the most important message I would like to convey to my intelligent, Nubian sisters, would be to open your eyes. Recognize that condoms are your constant friend when the love has come and gone. And when it comes to infidelity or promiscuity, release the denial that 'my man would never do that' and grasp the acceptance that 'my man just might'. And if by chance he does, hold on, my sisters, to reality. The reality of pain can give you the strength to climb over the highest hills of despair and pull you out of the lowest valleys of no way out. Our survival depends on the belief that our beautiful bodies are temples of puissance (power), shrewdness, strength, and the substance of endurance. We can't be all of who we can be if we tolerate the abuse of our sacrosanct temples. If we are to survive, we must believe that and we must make our men believe that and accept it as well.