STORIES

I met Jack Foster in the summer of 1974, waiting in line to see The Rocky Horror Show up on Sunset at the Roxy Theatre.

He and his whole crew from the San Gabriel Valley were fun, irreverent, crazy and gay as you can be.  Jack and I hit it off and started hanging out all the time.  We’d go dancing at Studio One, and raise the roof off the joint.  He became a bartender and worked at clubs all over Los Angeles, so we could get in for free.

We went to see Tina Turner in 1980, when she struck out on her own after leaving Ike.  It was one of the most memorable concerts I have ever seen, and Jack and I bonded over that like nobody else possibly could.

When he first got sick in 1986, he said the doctor told him “Yeah, I can’t eat hotdogs or be anywhere near birdshit.”  He goes, “What does that mean?”

And we laughed about it.  He kept his spirits high all during his fight against HIV and AIDS.  We talked all the time; he’d moved back home and lived with his parents back in the San Gabriel Valley.

The last time I saw him was at County Hospital when he was toward the end of his life.  It was a very sobering sight to see my good friend – who was so vibrant and funny and full of life – fading away.  I’ll never forget that.

I miss Jack, and he left me a vinyl Tina Turner record that his parents gave to me after he left us.  I still have it, and I still miss him to this day.