In 1985, after a friend asked him to help plan a luncheon for three elderly people, Cordero, a free-lance computer programmer, decided to devote himself to the old people—visiting them, entertaining them, lavishing attention on them. "It changed my life," says Cordero, bedridden in his small Burbank cottage. "There was so much wisdom there. Their friendship helped me accept my illness and taught me a great deal about spirituality and love."
When Percy Washington turned 102, Cordero introduced him to Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, Washington's idol. Cordero arranged for Lottie Hicks, 103, to ride on a float in the annual Tournament of Roses parade in Pasadena, Calif. Setrak Boyajian spent the afternoon of his 105th birthday in the park, pelting a dog, flirting with a 19-year-old, watching the sunset. For each one—he has helped about 100 Cordero has printed a bookmark with a history of his or her life. Cordero's living room is a shrine to the aged, filled with letters from the White House and politicians. Photos of his elderly friends, many of whom are now dead, smile down upon him.
It turns out that such devotion flows both ways. When Cordero was first hospitalized and found to be HIV positive in November 1990, the old people showed they cared as much about him as he did about them, phoning and visiting whenever they could. "I wish I could give you a big hug," says Rachel Cohn, 102, who calls often. "You're my love." Cordero's lover, Marcelo Simon Van Dam, died, at age 45, in his arms last November of AIDS, and Cordero himself has been in and out of the hospital with debilitating AIDS-related illnesses several times. Still, thoughts of his old friends keep him going. "I have to keep fighting for all my 'kids,' " says Cordero. "There are so many more things I want to do for them."
Cordero has come full circle. As a young boy growing up on the rough streets of New York City, deserted by his father and with his Puerto Rican-born mother, Carmen, busy working two jobs, he looked on the old folks in the neighborhood as his surrogate family. "Some of them were old enough to be my great-grandparents," he says. "They'd look out their windows and make sure I was home. They'd tell me, 'Study, study, study. We believe in you.' "
He has proved their belief was well placed. Cordero and his mother moved first to Chicago, then to Puerto Rico, where Cordero attended college and taught himself computer programming. Jean Priestman, a nursing-home supervisor who helped found the Centenarian Committee, says that Cordero has "involved himself in [the old people's] lives. He has great affection for the centenarians, and they for him." She adds, "It's like soul meeting soul."
ELIZABETH GLEICK
DORK BACON in Los Angeles
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