The first thing Tom noticed about the man who is now his husband was his impressive presence in front of a crowd. They met at an event organised by a local Aids activism group in 1989, where Chris, now 56, was working as an outreach coordinator. “I owned a feminist bookshop in Fresno, California, where we were both living,” says Tom. “I was volunteering at the organisation and went to an orientation session. Chris was doing a presentation. I watched him putting a condom on a banana as part of safe sex awareness and that was it for me.”
They hit it off as friends, but when Tom asked Chris out he declined. “I was his supervisor and I’d made the decision not to date volunteers,” he says. Over the next few years, their friendship continued to grow through their activism, as they fought for LGBT rights and support for people with Aids. Through groups such as Act Up Fresno, which influenced public policy on HIV issues, and Queer Nation, which fought homophobia, they attended more than 30 direct action protests together. “I was once arrested in Sacramento in 1992, after the governor of California, Republican Pete Wilson, vetoed a LGBT rights legislation. Thousands went to protest,” says Tom.
