Vivian Jones
Describes herself as "a colorful person"
Vivian pictured with friends on a cruise trip with ‘Women of Essential Pride,’ an LGBTQ+ organization.
“Yeah, I’m a colorful person,” laughed Vivian, “I love color!” Vivian Jones is a vibrant, lively woman who frequently visits the SAGE Center. Her life has been decorated with meaningful travels, time spent with longtime friends, and clubbing late into the night throughout the disco era. She’s a zodiac sign and astrology lover, referencing Geminis and describing a friend as “a Leo like me, I’m a Leo, so she’s very talkative.” Her clothing, sequined, bedazzled, and colorful, reflects her young spirit and positive outlook on her life. She told the students, “You can see the different changes in my hairstyles.” From era to era, her fashion, hairstyles, and lifestyle are always bold.
Throughout her life, she’s lived in all five boroughs. She described: “Well, I started out in Manhattan, where I was born in the Bellvue Hospital, and then from there I lived in Brooklyn, and I lived in Brooklyn til the 70s, I stayed in Queens for about two months, but Staten Island, I stayed for four years. Then I moved to the Bronx, so I’ve been in the Bronx ever since.”
While she loved living in each borough, each space carried its own hardships. Despite these difficulties, our conversation remained centered around the relationships and friendships she was able to appreciate at each stage. She has continued to carry each memory along with her in the form of the suitcase she brought along to the SAGE Center lunch. The briefcase held album after album of memories with the people she’s met through the decades. She shared a photo of Pauline Brown, her childhood best friend while she lived in Brooklyn. We reflected together on the changing landscape of Brooklyn, and she told us of her childhood in a Brooklyn neighborhood. She described, “when I came from Brooklyn, I came from a drug-infested area. Through the grace of God, I got out of there. I never got attached to drugs or anything. Everybody was so caught up with the drugs and everything, and I didn’t know what to do, and I started staying to myself, and my apartment caught on fire, and that’s how we got out of Brooklyn and got to the Bronx. [It was] one of those things where [you] had to get everybody out of there because it was crazy.” After discussing her experience in each borough, she smiled while explaining that living in the Bronx has been her favorite. Vivian shares a strong sense of belonging with the other elders at the SAGE center, which has provided a space to connect with her community. “My sister, my brothers, I’m close with them.” Vivian keeps close contact with her siblings. Especially as her mother turned 91, Vivian and her siblings make sure their mother is being taken with great care. “She’s [my mother] made 91, and my sister is taking care of her now. My brother lives there, and I’m the caretaker. And I just make sure that everything is going smoothly and taken care of because she has dementia.” While her sibling bond is strong, Vivian tries to keep in touch with her niece and her nephew who’s living in Turkey. During Vivian's life, her father was often absent, but he would manage to reconnect with her. “It was just that for some reason, when he went to find me because I was one of his favorites, so he’d always find me.” Despite the challenges in their relationship, Vivian's determination to remain connected with her father is evident. “Yeah, he didn’t raise me, but it's just that I knew where to find him when I went to see him.” Vivian shared a framed photo of her in her mid-thirties with her arm wrapped around her father’s shoulder, proving she still loves her father.
Vivian’s albums are filled with fond memories of the friends she made over the years. She shared her travel experiences with friends, cookouts in Van Cortlandt Park, and friends’ milestone birthday celebrations. She is also good friends with James Sander, a promoter who throws the best boat party yearly. She keeps in touch with most of her friends through phone calls and looks forward to their annual trip to Florida. Vivian knows a few tips about finding the right zodiac friends. “And do you know any Geminis? Most Geminis know how to talk. My Gemini friends, I can talk for two hours over the phone. I only get to talk to them every other month because I know that we’ll catch up.” Vivian finds the best conversation is to talk about anything without the gossip.
Vivian talks about them excitedly as she continues showing photos of her friends. Although few of her friends are no longer in her life, she still keeps them in her album because they help shape her life in some way. There was one friend whom Vivian talked greatly about, which is Avery. She says, “I don’t have a picture of Avery, but Avery was the one that helped me with coming out. He was the one that introduced me to the life of everything”. No photograph of Avery was needed because Vivian paints a loving image of her friend through her description.
Portrait of Vivian taken by a friend, a photographer.
“Yes, I am a dance queen, yes they called me twinkle toes.” Traveling and clubbing are two pastimes that consistently make an appearance in Vivian’s photographic archives, with each story of her adventures woven with the warmth of cherished friendships. Although Vivian has yet to travel beyond the North American continent, her catalog of places traveled is of considerable length. Traveling everywhere from Toronto to Cancun, Vivian has an impressive ability to recount the details of each adventure and who she shared her time with. A common thread running through many of Vivian’s travels is her fondness for the water. “I used to go to Atlantic City in, around the 90s, in the beginning of the 2000s.” When asked what she enjoyed about Atlantic City, she answered “I just liked being by the water, by the shore, that’s what I liked.” Vivian has also traveled to Puerto Rico, New Orleans, Toronto, and Florida, all places with access to the water. “Yeah, we stayed in Puerto Rico. We had our own hotel right there on the beach,” she recalled enthusiastically about her trip with ‘Women of Essential Pride,’ an LGBTQ+ organization.
Vivian and her father posing in a living room surrounded by artwork
Out of all the sites Vivian has traveled to, New Orleans appears to be the most documented of the bunch, including photos of the people she met and her participation in Mardi Gras. “And this is me in New Orleans, my first time riding in an airplane in 1990. Went to the Mardi Gras.” An abundance of photos with Vivian and friends sporting colorful beads and costumes can be found in one of her many photobooks, documenting her first trip ever. “You have to take the showboat. The show boat is very nice. They play music and dance,” she explained. As Vivian flips through old photographs, she reminisces about her dear friend Robin and their experience in the vibrant LGBTQ+ community of New York City. "She was one of the first ones that I met when I came out in the life," she says. She recounts some of their nights spent at their favorite clubs in the city, “there used to be a club called Bonnie and Clyde down on West Wall Street. Down in the village.” Limelight and Studio 54 were some of Vivian’s other favorite spots to party. She explained that she and her friends were wearing disco fashion before it became popular. Vivian had photos in her book of a fashion show she participated in that her friend organized.
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Despite the passage of time, Vivian’s zest for life remains undimmed. She continues to travel and has maintained many of her relationships with the friends she tells stories about. However, she has also made many new friends at the SAGE center. She met her current partner at one of her friend’s cook outs. Pointing to a photo, Vivian says, “This is who I’m with now. Me and Joe have been together for 11 years now, I mean 10.” In our digital world where connections are often fleeting, Vivian’s stories serve as a reminder to cherish the relationships and memories gathered throughout life, and the importance of analog documentation.