Gotham Girl needs your help

Unfixed support

Every once in a while I discover a voice that stupefies and delights with a fire-cracker, super-human intelligence. This was my first experience of Alisa Kennedy Jones after stumbling upon her newsletter The Empress—jaw-on-floor in awe while simultaneously dying from laughter. And then I learned more, and discovered the human behind that voice is a giant heart with out-stretched arms, inviting all of our messy lives and messy bodies to learn, create and celebrate alongside her.

And I want you to fall in love with her too. But that’s not why I’m here today. At 40, Alisa developed a severe seizure disorder that left her unable to speak, relearning to talk all over again. Then, because this is what geniuses do, she wrote a bestselling memoir called GOTHAM GIRL, INTERRUPTED about navigating life with epilepsy as a single mom.

She was managing it well (the new-normal-kind-of-well) when life as she knew it turned into a Marie Antoinette cosplay. Yes, she still has her head, but it’s hanging together by crocheted threads.

She writes:

But without getting too French Revolution-y on you, two days before Thanksgiving I nearly cut my own head off during a conference call—which,

a) you wouldn’t think is even possible, but with a Grand Mal seizure and a deadly enough coffee table, SO totally IS

And b) where moments ago, you were being witty and urbane on a work call, now it’s two hours later... And you wake up face down in a pool of blood with multiple facial fractures, deep lacerations across your throat, and a dislocated Picasso-esque jaw broken in 5 places. Your teeth are cracked gravel, and your whole apartment looks like a scene from Dexter.

Your Flokati white shag rug is ruined, but it saved your life by acting as a giant, fluffy tourniquet soaking up all the blood from the gash to your carotid.

Yes, you are a gash of a person—saved by superior decor. Go figure.

And then, as if things couldn’t get worse, she received an eviction notice when she finally returned from the hospital. You can’t make this up.

So I’m throwing a lifeline to her today, with hopes that all 800+ of you will join me, to wrap this wildly good human in a blanket of support, in whatever way you can, or are inspired. Your offering isn’t just an investment in her own well-being but also in the legions who benefit from her undying energy and creative wisdom.