AIDS Posada Serves to Raise Awareness and Funds

The loss of a loved one from AIDS is a heavy cross to bear. It has been especially difficult for Sue Quintana of Monrovia, whose husband, Joseph, died less than three months ago, leaving Sue to take care of two young boys. He was 34.

Paul Kirkpatrick, 44, of Pasadena, has seen about 20 of his friends die of AIDS over the years. HIV-positive since 1986, his condition is worsening.

Peggy Phelps’ son, Taylor, died in 1995, after struggling with AIDS for 12 years. Taylor, who at various times in his life was a road manager for rocker Neil Young, the president of a television commercial production company, and a breeder of llamas, was 41.

On Saturday evening, Quintana, Kirkpatrick and Phelps will join several thousand others at Pasadena’s ninth annual Posada.

The event is at once a conscience-raiser about AIDS, a walk in remembrance of those who have died of AIDS-related diseases and a fund-raiser for the AIDS Service Center in Pasadena.

Participants will walk a circuitous route along Pasadena streets from City Hall through the Playhouse district and back past City Hall. Organizers said they hope to generate $420,000 for the nonprofit organization, which provides free services for men, women and children with HIV and AIDS.

A posada is a symbolic reenactment of the biblical story of the search by Joseph and Mary for shelter in anticipation of the birth of the Christ child. Although it is celebrated throughout Latin America, it is most closely associated with Mexican customs.

“We took the Mexican tradition and adapted it in hopes that the community has room in their hearts for people who have AIDS,” said Sue W. Scott, executive director of the AIDS Service Center.

This year’s Posada will occur rain or shine, beginning at 5:30 p.m. and lasting until 9 p.m. Saturday. Registration, which is still open, begins at 2 p.m.

At the conclusion of the Posada at City Hall plaza, participants can help create a “living quilt” by etching chalk-written messages on the pavement to loved ones who have been affected by AIDS.

“It’s a healing time for me,” Sue Quintana said. “I made a commitment to myself three years ago that the year Joe passed away, it will be the first time I would walk in the Posada,” she said.

In 1992, the young couple learned that Joseph was HIV-positive when their application for life insurance was rejected. For the subsequent five years, Quintana was consumed with caring for her husband and family.

Sue and Joseph Quintana had been married for nine years when he died, leaving Sue to care alone for her two sons, Sam, 5, and Timothy, 7.

She said she has not grieved yet, but noted that this Saturday might be her time to release some of the pain of her loss.

“It’s especially difficult during the holiday season,” Quintana said. “I feel odd doing things without him. We’re going to be wrapping gifts and he’s not going to be there.”

For Paul Kirkpatrick, this will be his seventh Posada, but he said the event never loses its special significance.

“Each one gets a little more special to me because my disease has advanced,” he said. Six months ago, Kirkpatrick was found to have Hodgkin’s disease. He has weekly chemotherapy.

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Having lost his partner to AIDS in 1986, in an “ugly death,” Kirkpatrick learned soon after that he was also infected.

Now, he acknowledges that he is one of the few survivors of his friends. “I have maybe two old friends left,” he said. “It’s a strange feeling. I don’t feel so young any more.”

One of Kirkpatrick’s good friends was Taylor Phelps, who died two years ago. The two grew up together in Pasadena. “When he died, it turned me inside out. It was like losing my right arm. He was the last really close friend that I’ve lost. There’s not many more to lose,” Kirkpatrick said.

Taylor’s mother, Peggy Phelps, conceived the idea for the first Posada and is on the center’s board of directors. She said the Posada is an essential way to continue providing services for those affected by and infected with AIDS.

“The world has to know that AIDS still exists and is still a terrible, terrible problem,” Phelps said. “And if we didn’t have the Posada we couldn’t help people.”

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But the Posada is also a time to realize that although AIDS continues to be devastating, recent improvements in education and advancements in medical treatments have helped reduce the number of deaths and reported AIDS cases, Scott said.

In Los Angeles County, there has been a 56% decline in deaths in the last year. Between January and June 1996, 1,337 died of AIDS compared with 586 during the same period in 1997.

The number of AIDS cases reported also has declined over the same period by 33%, from 1,841 to 1,231, according to county records.

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Since 1992, effective combination therapy in which patients follow a regimen of protease inhibitors and other drugs such as AZT, has enabled people who are HIV-positive or have AIDS to live longer, said Peter Kerndt, director of the county’s HIV Epidemiology Program.

“Basically, it has dramatically improved length and duration of health,” said Kerndt. “We’re out of the stage where AIDS infection means [immediate] AIDS death.”

But Scott said the AIDS rate continues to increase among women, blacks and Latinos.

Scott warns that with these advancements in education and treatment, the current population of those with AIDS has not decreased, only the number of deaths have been reduced.

As more people live longer, she said, “There is still a great need for support services.”