Mad Atoms

I have an unhealthy fear of contracting herpes.  Obviously no one in their right mind enjoys catching a disease, but my quest to avoid the herpes virus has reached a level of paranoia.  I know people who have it and they say it’s not that big of a deal, but that’s only because they don’t hear the shit I say about them behind their backs.  You see, not having herpes gives me the right to make fun of the people who do and I never want to lose that right.  I also don’t want cold sores on my face and or penis. 

People with herpes don’t want you to know they have it, that’s par for the course with any STD.  These aren’t dignified diseases.  You don’t hear me going around bragging about how I beat crabs.  Anybody with a decent immune system can keep herpes a secret eleven months out of the year, but let’s not kid each other.  You’re going away before that herpes does.  Even the most advanced treatments devised by modern medicine simply mask it, allowing carriers to walk among the innocent.  I admit that the people like me, the people who share my attitude, don’t do anything to help matters there.  We demonize herpes, talk behind backs and give no sympathy.  So I understand that you try to hide it, I get that, but hiding it is precisely the issue here.  Herpes doesn’t want to be hidden.  Herpes wants the world to know that you have it and it has you, and to be honest with you I have to agree with herpes on this one. 

I’ve spent my entire adult life jumping through hoops to avoid this plague of man.  And let me tell you, it hasn’t been easy.  This is a clever enemy, a worthy fucking adversary.  You could be talking to a guy who has a raging case on the base of his shaft and be none the wiser.  The real problem is that herpes is the last thing you want to talk about while in the throes of passion, but that’s precisely when the topic needs to be broached.  Few things are more difficult than working herpes into the conversation when you’re about to ram your tongue down somebody’s throat.  It can be tricky. 

Here is my approach.  I usually start by saying something like “before we do this, I have to tell you something…I have herpes” and then she will be like “I do too” and then I say “I was lying, now get the fuck out of my room”.  Harsh?  I don’t think so.  Not when the alternative is being a 90 year old corpse with a herpes sore the size of a dime peaking through whatever kind of make up they smear on dead people while my little grandkids cry out “what’s on Pop-pop’s face?”  No thank you.