San Francisco's Bold Response - 30 Years Later

30 years ago in a little church tucked into the Bay Area peninsula redwoods, Steve and I exchanged wedding vows. Two months later, the CDC reported the first case of AIDS a few miles north in San Francisco. The city did not succumb to attempts to discriminate and ignore. Community leaders responded with a determination and persistence that has made the San Francisco AIDS Foundation a worldwide model of innovation in education, prevention, treatment and care for those vulnerable to HIV/AIDS.

“The Foundation began, in its early days, to teach people they could fight for their lives" -Art Agnos, SF Mayor 1988-1992

In one week, I’ll join 2000 cyclists and hundreds of volunteer crew in commemorating the 30th anniversary of the beginning of AIDS with a renewed commitment to sustain the fight that ends the epidemic where it began, brings hope to the vulnerable and breaks down walls of discrimination and stigma that keep us from caring for one another.

Thank you for honoring the courage and tenacity of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation with your donation to their efforts, either directly or by sponsoring my 500+ miles of pedaling, past that small church, down the California coastline.

Service in Action

This is Calvin. He just finished his first cycling century (100 mile ride). He did it for AIDS research. Next month he leaves for a 400 day deployment to Afghanistan. Then he'll come home and retire. Something tells me he won't be pulling out a rocking chair.

Emory Vaccine Center

The AIDS Vaccine 200 benefits research taking place right here, within the Yerkes National Primate Research Center.

Sound Sleep

Having only had about 2 hours sleep the night before, I slept like a rock last night, in an extra-long twin size bed on the campus of Emory University. Apart from my teammate, not another soul was in the pristine 4-story, sustainably designed freshman dorm yet all around us was an air of hope – Emory School of Medicine, Children’s Healthcare, Biomedical Research, School of Public Health, Emory Vaccine Center, even the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention). Reminds me a bit of the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance triad and several other major research hubs around the world.

Personally, I could never spend my days bent over a microscope, attempting one new idea after another over an entire career with the very real possibility of never quite reaching your ultimate goal but thank goodness there are others who do. Thank goodness there are scientists and researchers and students with inquisitive minds and an optimism encouraging them to find successful applications for any important step along the way toward improving the quality of any human life.

In a few hours I’ll walk to the Emory School of Medicine to check in for the AIDS Vaccine 200. I’m incapable of curing AIDS, but sleep soundly knowing I can do one small thing to support those who are.

Pull Up the Lawn Chairs, They’re at it Again

It’s the season of remembrance for Puget Sound Riders co-founders - Jon, Mary and me. It’s the subtle underlying motivation that binds us together year after year to get out in the rain, sacrifice weekends, trade in our PTO and ask every person crossing our paths for money – the memory of a brother lost to AIDS.

Mary Harding and I met in a crowd of 1000 cyclists standing at Vancouver's Science World waiting to begin the 1997 Ride for a Reason to Seattle. The picture taped to her jersey led me ask to whose memory she was riding. As she spoke of her brother Peter, I noticed the dates under that picture and answered, “He died 6 days after my brother.” Mary and I began our first AIDS ride together moments later. Next week in Atlanta we’ll ride together for the 13th time in the AIDS Vaccine 200.

Jon’s brother, Donald David Fehrenbach, led by example, riding as a Positive Pedaler in 5 AIDS rides. DD picked up a discarded teddy bear, promptly dubbed Roadkill, on one of those rides and made him an annual companion up and down the California coast. After his death in 1998, Roadkill continued tagging along on AIDS rides across America in DD’s honor. In 2000, when Jon took on the role of Puget Sound training ride leader in his first cycling event, Roadkill donned new hiking boots stuffed with mylar and joined the newly founded Puget Sound Riders on the Alaska AIDS Vaccine Ride.  This June, I’ll join Jon for my first time on DD’s California ride, the AIDS/LifeCycle.

Our brothers were the athletes - DD cycled thousands of miles, Bret's bike was his transportation all over the world and Peter walked coast-to-coast calling attention to poverty in America – we were not. And while we’ve all become stronger cyclists, age is constantly working against us. Precisely why at roughly this time every year one of us will begin painting the picture of 3 proud siblings cracking open a cold one, pulling up lawn chairs on puffy clouds above, shaking their heads with a knowing smile and, while their language would likely be far more colorful, shouting out to all who’d hear, “This ought to be good, they’re at it again!”

Dedicated to the memory of our dear brothers:
Bret M. Granato July 21, 1959 - May 5, 1995
Peter T. Harding October 5, 1955 - May 11, 1995
Donald David "DD" Fehrenbach - June 3, 1949 - April 10, 1998