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Next came the "fury" phase of healing where you look like a longshoreman who has come home from a drunken pub brawl. The deep swirling bruises on my face and neck were like a lava lamp with an ever-shifting liquid interior that ranged from licorice black to angry purple, to a slow fade to sickly puce. Now matter how much I tried to smile or look neutrally indifferent, I still looked wild, sneering, and childishly sinister—like something only Maurice Sendak could dream up. I had resting beast face. My jaw and one tooth still jutted out to the left. The bones in my head and face still felt cracked in pieces, like a broken terra-cotta vase that had been gingerly Scotch-taped back together—with pins and plates. I worried things would all fall apart, so I wore this tight, little gray stocking cap because it felt comforting—as though it would hold all the still-loose bones in place until they grew back together. After this came the "phantom" phase, where you are just haunted with pain and odd facial sensations for what seems like an eternity, a glacial age. The doctors had said neuropathy or nerve damage might be a factor in my recovery. Think numbness, constant tingling, stabbing sensations, tightness, muscle weakness, and a lack of movement. That said, this was more than anyone bargains for as, one by one, your tiny electric nerves literally _do_ light up and start working again in the most unexpected ways. It's just the body healing, growing against itself, and the inflammation that happens in the wake of trauma, surgery, and regeneration. Still, it was like having a poltergeist living just under the surface of my skin, zipping around, making mischief, and occasionally wreaking havoc only to go all quiet. One day might find me waking to searing heat throughout my cheeks; another day my lips would be ice cold. Still, others might have me feeling like someone was actively stabbing knives into my whole face. My talking was still limited to a few hours, but if I overdid things, my face, jaw, and mouth would suddenly go on strike and clamp shut altogether, even after all the wires and bands came off.
Aside from the occasional conference call with work, not much got done. I ordered groceries online, communicated mostly on text and messenger with coworkers, and sent out the laundry. Friends brought things by and helped with errands, but I lived in a quiet mode I'd never really experienced before. It was a decidedly small and contained day-to-day existence. Despite the neuropathy, the really bad, bad news that had been repeatedly explained to me in the hospital was that the nerves on the right side of my face, which fan out like daisy petals from the ear to the center of the face, had been very compromised and all but severed. This meant that everything from the middle of my forehead swooping past my cheekbones and on down to my chin was paralyzed with little to no sensation. This would most likely be permanent. On the plus side, I would have no wrinkles or frown lines resulting from normal facial muscle movement as I could neither frown nor smile. I had "perma-brood." My right eye drooped—similar to how a stroke patient's might. I was most sad about this because having no expression made me feel completely geriatric and as if no one would ever really understand me again. My face was so much a part of my emotional life and well-being. I could still blink—but only slowly and not very frequently. To save itself from self-ruin, my right eye would involuntarily rebel against properly looking straight ahead and roll back into my head. Admittedly, I looked a bit demonic when it would do that, but it was super quick. Like a demon flash! A shazam! of electricity zapped my eye over and over again. At one point, Walter took a picture to catch it and there was (briefly) a question of whether they would need to sew my lid shut to prevent permanent corneal damage. Walter would nag. Was I irrigating it enough? Was I wearing my pirate patch every night? The answer was an unqualified "yes." I had practically bedazzled my patch as I needed to be able to go back to work pronto.
That said, this time of "getting better" seemed to stretch out interminably like clouds on a windless day, imperceptibly creeping across the sky. It simply didn't occur to me that I wouldn't get better within a few weeks. I couldn't comprehend any other story than getting better. I had always bounced back from my previous seizures, and I was doing all the right things: loads of facial pushups where I'd work at actively raising the entire right side of my face in total hyperbolic alarm over and over again, including my dead eyebrow up toward my right ear and forehead. I practiced making fish-kiss faces and whistling constantly. To get feeling back in my lips, I would walk around the apartment making farty noises with my lips like French men do when they're making excuses for not doing things like the dishes or taking out the garbage. I was also blowing big raspberries in every direction. In this way, I found that when something like this happens, you start to want to become the monster you resemble. And why shouldn't I? Maybe it's that ferocity that would help me lick this. I was gross, but I just needed to go with it. I would roar around the living room against my jaw wiring and, well, I liked it. "Let the wild rumpus start!" I would tell myself. This is how I would get better.
Though I was cognitively fine to return to writing pithy doodads and dealing with media partnerships, apparently I was still too horrific to be seen by our clients. After a few weeks I didn't have a black eye or bruising anymore. However, I did still have a pretty Jay Leno-esque chin—which looks fine on Jay Leno but was not so much what people were used to on me. I also didn't feel right. It was as though I was still trapped under the ice and muzzled with a kind of invisible duct tape. I was not entirely "out" to Jeremy, my boss in New York. Things were still too new and I worried he would feel betrayed by having hired an epileptic. It was an all-male, conservative crew. A squad of Don Drapers and I was Peggy—at least before this particular seizure I was. But now, I really _did_ scare the poor grocery delivery guy judging by the terrified look on his face. And it's true, my neighbor Pablo did _not_ recognize me in the hallway and asked me if I was new to the building, but I needed to work, to feel like some normalcy was still possible.
By the time I did go back, I still had the phantom chin. It felt enormous, as if I'd been shot full of Novocain, and I still had these razor-sharp rubber bands holding my upper and lower teeth together, so I kept the chitchat to a minimum. My boss wasn't having it. I was told I should consider disability, but the thing is, I didn't _feel_ disabled. Everything worked in my head. In fact, on this new epilepsy drug that Delia had prescribed, which I still can't pronounce at all, I felt better than ever. I wasn't having auras. There was no "seizury" tinge to my days, no vertigo. The floor no longer throbbed like an immense alien heart. Gone was the supercharged electric buzzing in my brain. Best of all, I felt _awake._ There was no gauzy-gray veil to life these days. The cracks in the sidewalks and the wrinkles on people's faces were crisper than ever. _I_ was crisp and clear. Indeed I felt crisp on _the inside._ On the outside, however, I made people uneasy with my bionic face still swollen and full of titanium. But to lose my job finally was rough. They called me at home to cancel my contract. Budget cuts was the official reason, but I knew. I was so angry I could spit—except I couldn't. Crying just made my whole face ache even more. Dumb mucous membranes. How was I going to do this? It would be another year before many of the pins and plates could be removed, but it was clear that if I was going to be allowed back into the work world, I would need to create the illusion of greater symmetry and work like freaking Eliza Doolittle on my diction—STAT as the surgeons say.
SO, THERE I WAS NOW with the plastic surgeon's nurse taking pictures, awkwardly exaggerating my deformed self—so that I might qualify for a procedure that would move me an inch back over the line of social and corporate acceptability. To do this, I needed the right side of my face to behave a little more like the left side. Both sides needed to droop in unison. If I couldn't smile symmetrically and evenly with my current muscles and nerve endings being in disarray, I could still look mildly bored and disgusted in order to fit back in with every other bored and disgusted colleague I might work with. I'd reasoned that would pass in New York City. I thought perhaps if I went from a resting freak face to resting bitch face, humanity might have me back. At the same time, my jaw needed to relax to the right just a millimeter to keep from looking misaligned and shifty. There was nothing they could do about the swelling. My Jay Leno look would just take time to die down. In the meantime, I could hide it (partially) with the right haircut, tapered just enough to soften the jawline. Lastly, my eyes needed to appear mostly the same size and work in parallel with each other instead of the right one drifting up and looking dead. I would take a break from contacts and only wear my dark-frame nerd glasses from decades earlier. The glasses would distract. The rest would have to be improvised with Botox and fillers.
Now, you judge a plastic surgeon's office _not_ by the binder of "before and after" photos but by their staff. Does the receptionist look a bit too surprised to see you? Does the treatment coordinator appear a little too tightly pulled and windblown from her last complimentary tuck? How are the necks? And what of the other supplicants in the waiting room? Were they just there for injectables? Did any of them have any serious structural and symmetry issues akin to yours? Were there any drooping eyes? Was there a jaw out of whack anywhere? I tried to peek at the other patients behind their magazines. Most of the women and one man seemed to be there for cosmetic maintenance. The smartness of their dress made me think they were probably a little fussier about everything than I was. Oh, how I missed the luxury of being fussy about little things. I would have given anything right about then for a simple marionette line (the parentheses-style wrinkles around your mouth) that could be quickly and easily filled with some Juvéderm. To even be able to both feel and wrinkle my forehead would be like savoring a big piece of cake with the best frosting ever.
Coco Chanel once said, "Nature gives you the face you have at twenty. Life shapes the face you have at thirty. But at fifty, you get the face you deserve." Really Coco? I still have a few more years before I'm fifty, but did I _really_ deserve this? Yes, I was wearing my spazzy electric brain plainly on the outside now, right on my face. That much was clear, but did I really deserve this was the wrong question to ask, I know. The greater question was what was I going to do with this face now? Your face becomes an emotional map of your life. There is a wrinkle of regret, a side eye scowl of knowing a lie when you hear one, and the vertical lines above your lip from all those cigarettes you smoked with the other mothers on your mums' nights out. The smile lines from your marriage and what you believed was going to be a thoughtful, quirky life, well lived together. What happens when the map is almost entirely erased? Tabula rasa. Do you try to reconstruct the map as you and others remember it? Or do you draw new lines altogether? For my part, I just needed anything that looked like a map. That was my starting point: a basic human map with discernable human features, and then I figured nature could draw what it willed.
The Park Avenue plastic surgeon strode into the exam room with my chart. Dr. Henry was a bespectacled man in his early forties. Groomed within a molecule of his life, he had not a wrinkle in sight and yet he still looked human. In other words, he was not _too_ unrealistically good looking. This was important to me because I didn't need to look perfect. I just needed to _pass_ as unbroken enough for work, for my kids, for any sort of ordinary future. On the wall behind him, multiple Ivy League diplomas silently oozed credibility. He surveyed the chaotic landscape of my mug and then contemplated the X-rays, noting the amount of metal still lodged in my head. Of the paralysis on the right side of my face, the best they could do was to try to balance things out by paralyzing portions of the left side with Botox. This would also help my eyes to appear more symmetrical. They couldn't do anything about the fleeting moments when my eyeball rotated up into my head—that would just take time—but they could even out the droop across both eyes. They would need to do a number of strategic injections in my upper jaw, face and scalp. _No problemo,_ I thought. I wasn't afraid of shots after everything I'd just been through. I'd had my whole face taken off and put back on. Shots were easy. What I was most afraid of was pity, of not being able to support my family, of being a lost cause and being entirely unlovable in any shape or form for the rest of my days. I was more afraid of that than the seizures themselves.
To get the insurance to cover the symmetry fixes he was recommending, Dr. Henry reiterated that they would need to submit the photos we were taking today to prove the deformity was significant enough to warrant the procedures. Then, he paused a moment to counsel me that I was getting older and presumably wiser now. Given what had happened to me, I should consider myself lucky to be alive. I could have broken my neck or been paralyzed. Shouldn't I consider myself above and beyond such trivialities as symmetry? He told me I needed to get comfortable with the idea of inner beauty. I would have gasped if I'd been able. What the hell was happening here? The guy whose very industry had trained the world to value symmetry and classic external beauty norms was selling _me_ on inner beauty? Was this all some sort of sadistic prank? What was most annoying was I couldn't even raise my eyebrows in shock at his patronizing tone. I indulged in an invisible eye roll. In a world where one's face, beauty, and even identity are governed by laws that embrace order, pattern, symmetry, and simplicity, I still felt like utter chaos. I was a creature from _Where the Wild Things Are._ Yes, the splotches of yellow and purple had faded, but I was still misshapen on the inside and out.
Add to that, New York is a city of reaction, a city of critics, columnists, and great pontificators. Everybody, down to the very last little old lady at your optometrist's office who tightens the screws on your glasses, has an opinion. They all have a clear and pronounced reaction to everything and anything. Everyone here reacts. The more they like something, the more irritated and loud they get about it. Everyone except me. I had nothing. I couldn't smile. I couldn't fully frown. I couldn't look angry. My teeth still didn't meet when I would bite down. My words were still limited to a few hours a day before all of my face muscles became tired and I started to sound like a lush. I had no expression, no symmetry, no proportion, and no sensation, which meant I could easily burn myself if I didn't touch-test all of my warm liquids and foods. I also could never tell if I had food all over my face. When I would hang out with Ed or Holly, I would jokingly smear things across my chin, then gesture to my whole visage and ask, "How am I doin'?" because it was the only way I knew how to manage the awkwardness of all of these little moments.
And while things shifted slightly every day, the overarching healing process had been _so_ incremental in pace. I needed some agency in all this. _Not_ to be lectured. Where I'd felt mostly beautiful before (both inside and out) now I felt like Kirk Douglas. My "resting freak face" resembled a stroked-out male movie star with a droopy eye and an overly pronounced jawline. Not that there's anything wrong with that—strokes happen to the best of us. I knew I needed to get stronger, but I was still your average vain forty-something-year-old lady who just wanted to worry about simple things like crow's feet and not having overly surprised eyebrows. I admit it. I like shallow. Shallow is fine. Shallow doesn't require me to become a better person. Still, I felt like a living, breathing, Botox-nuclear accident. Now this good-looking doctor guy was lecturing me on inner beauty? (Cue unbridled shrieking.) The nurse came back in with the camera and we shot more deformed pictures. Yes, I was older and wiser now—probably. Yes, I was lucky to be alive—probably. Yes, I was well versed in the idea of inner beauty and had tried to instill that concept in my daughters, but guess what? Our world isn't versed in it. Our world is judgmental and discriminatory and full of douchebags at work. I still needed to participate in the workplace as best as I could. But most of all, what my sage wisdom was telling me was that it was still _my_ face. The one accessory I couldn't just take off. And I still cared about it and I wanted to feel better about it—even if it was a spazzed-out face. Plus, it's not up to Dr. Henry to school me on inner beauty. Because guess what? I was _already_ pretty enough on the inside and _plenty_ in love with myself, thank you very much.
"Okay, smile now!" said the nurse. INDIGNITY ASIDE, I _did_ worry about my face rigidity, that the muscle might seriously atrophy and somehow become gangrenous. I supposed I could handle a crooked spaz face, but not a zombified one. I kept up with the exercises and kept checking in with Walter, my original surgeon who was right in the neighborhood. Something _had_ to work. Possibly brain-damaged by electricity and exhaustion, I could not make sense of _any_ other kind of story than this. I could not make sense of not getting better—of being able to smile, feel a kiss, and chew my food without pain. If I couldn't totally fix me, that would be tough. I would have to adjust, but in the meantime, I could still teach/show the people around me that I was _still me_ —still alive in there, underneath all the invisible duct tape and misshapen titanium bits. I guess this is the part where I should also tell you that the dentist couldn't fix my broken teeth until my jaw was free of the bands and wiring. I had a ways to go before any of this could happen, and I might be a less chatty girl for the time being, but _I_ was still there, I insisted. That was me on a good day.
On a bad day, a sidelong glance in the living room mirror would hollow out my chest with deep, muddy despair. I didn't want anyone to see what my overly electric brain had done to me or what heinous thing it had made me into. I felt such feral shame. On a bad day, the depression that set in after the job loss was such a brow-beating, fickle, vitriolic bitch. Imagine you have a very dramatic actress—like Glenn Close—playing a kind of emotional vampire on stage in your head. She waltzes onto the scene deftly manipulating, draining your every feeling, and then magnifying all your fears and anxieties without missing a beat. A bunny-boiling rage monster; that's what this depression was. My grand, grand mal seemed my life's defining failure. Sadness at this failure would well up in my gullet when I was alone, and nest there. It was a lump in my throat that I couldn't resolve or talk out. I had no words. And it wasn't just that people I knew didn't recognize me. Often _I_ didn't recognize me. Who was that melted, crooked-looking girl? And _what_ happened to her teeth? Was she born that way? Or was it an accident? Must have been a doozy. The human brain has evolved into such an efficient storyteller. I could see strangers working out in seconds that something was wrong with me, but I didn't yet have the voice, the teeth, or the social cues to convince them otherwise. I withdrew to my head for a time. I stopped trying to explain. I retreated socially and professionally. I stopped trying to be back in the world, pretending that everything was fine.
Can you be homesick for your face? Can you be filled with so much longing for the self you used to be that you just don't want to "be" at all? Was this the same notion of loss of identity or loss of self that therapists always talked about? The kind endemic to chronic illness, where everything you know about yourself vanishes and so you have to build a new, different life with new rules and habits? I stopped going out so much. I haunted my apartment like a little ghost. Had so much of my identity really been bound up in my appearance as a woman? How much had been tied to my job? To motherhood? How much to my crazy family—who were all on the West Coast and dealing with their own dramas? How much in simply being able to speak clearly and be understood. Identity is a slippery notion at best even when you haven't had anything serious happen to you. On a more practical level, in terms of working and making ends meet, would anyone new hire me now? All I wanted was to blend in and be "normal" by New York City standards, which you have to admit allows for a pretty broad spectrum of aesthetic and life choices. But there were days I felt I could never hide even in a city where I'd always felt relatively anonymous. Now perfect strangers would ask what was wrong with me. After responding a couple dozen times in my limited way, though, I realized that most people were not trying to make me feel bad. Usually, the opposite was true. Most people were just trying to connect and relate. A number responded with their own tales of how they had broken something or been in a car accident. There were also curious strangers who were just attempting to make sense of what was in front of them: a spaz, now both inside and out.
BUT THERE WAS WALTER once again poking me with small tines of a lobster fork. I had started to feel slightly more sensation in my cheeks on that week's visit. "I miss lobster and beef...and pie," I told him, wistfully in my sloppy brogue. "When this is all over, I am going to eat a _whole_ cow. Poor Bessie," I sighed. But now, Walter was not laughing at me. He was alternating between poking me with the lobster fork and squinting at a single, ghostly X-ray. Then he said, "You realize, the break was right at the nerve, kiddo?" He just looked at me, sorry. It was the same sorry, sad face of the EMT guy. Walter poked my lips again, and I wanted to tell him I _did_ feel something, but I'd have been lying. He put his hand over my eyes, continuing to prod at different intervals and that's when I wondered pretty much out of nowhere, what if my last kiss was _really_ my _last_ kiss? All these different things spun in my head. I'd imagined one day I'd look up, and blink, I'd be an old lady, but I hadn't imagined I would turn into a long-faced, lantern-jawed beast overnight. I avoided eye contact in public. I had to constantly remind myself to keep my lips together (which was still a challenge), so that I would not be perceived as a slacked-jawed, mouth-breathing idiot. Friends mostly treated me with white kid gloves—I could see they felt helpless to do anything. The best times though were when they would show up with something specific that would remind me of being me. To make speech therapy less tedious, my friend Billie got me a Shakespeare Insult Generator, which was a strange contraption of a book that provided hours of morally offensive phrasing that I could direct at my therapist. I could call her a loathsome-puke-stocking if I was in a particularly foul mood. Another friend donated some seriously amazing pro-bono dentistry and made me these insane margarita smoothies—with just a smidge of the good stuff on them.
I thought back to my last kiss with Loïc. In my imagination, I could still recall the nuances of it. There was nothing like a kiss. A kiss was better than the perfect warmth you felt at the first snow of the season, cool flakes falling soft on your cheeks, that I-cannot-get-you-close-enough feeling of yearning and satisfaction, of appetite and fulfillment, of holding someone's face in your hands. Taking in their magic as they take in yours. It was the wild rush of being consumed and consuming, of giving them the indescribable, extraordinary feeling of a deep, all-consuming kiss. I remembered my face in his hands. His in mine. The street corner in the East Village where we first kissed. _Never let that bit go,_ I thought now in Walter's chair. That was my very unequivocal New York opinion, my manifesto for this lightning strike, this seizure. Keep your last kiss close and ever closer in case you don't get to feel it again. Make certain your last kiss was your best kiss. Never take it for granted. Kiss your loved ones all the time. Before Loïc would leave the house in the mornings when we were still a we, I would kiss him like crazy—not just because I loved him or thought I loved him but because like any daffy Frenchman riding a bike in the city, he would wear one of those useless little Frenchy bike hats instead of a proper helmet. This made me crazy, and so I would say, "You realize you have a death wish?" and then force him to smooch and smooch and smooch until he would be legitimately late for work. But just in case he was hit by a bus and I never saw him again, I wanted him to feel totally, fully loved.
Walter uncovered my eyes now and told me plainly with nary a hint of drama that he needed to go back in again, rebreak my jaw, realign things, and address nerve issues. I wasn't healing right. But instead of peeling my face off my skull again, this time they would go in arthroscopically from the other side of my jaw, he told me, by my left ear. It wouldn't be nearly as bad as the first emergency surgery. You may wonder why I wasn't completely devastated by this news, how it is I didn't start bawling right there in the chair in front of Walter and his nurse. My epilepsy had changed the way I went about things now. I think after six years of seizures you get used to everything being so unexpected and always being such an emergency that you relish any opportunity to plan anything. Last time had been a total life-and-death crisis—an oh-God-what-do-we-do-with-her? crisis. This time was like a massive do-over. Everybody in life wants a do-over—I certainly did. If Walter needed a do-over to get things right so I could feel again, I wasn't going to be sad about that. I was going to be hopeful.
Still, I groaned audibly as I considered going through it all once more: ugh, the gnawing morphine itch, the incalculable vulnerability of backless nighties. No matter how you tie them, they always fall open and show the part of your fanny you don't like most, which for me was all of it. The simple trick I learned from the nurses, because I am clueless when it comes to being sick or in the hospital, was to always ask for two gowns. The first one you put on so that it opens in the back like they ask, so that doctors can get all up in there if they need to. The second gown you put on backward over the first one and wear as a robe. How did I _not_ know this? Then, there was the prospect of being wired shut even longer. I _was_ learning how to be a mute in the city and make it work. At least, I would be better prepared this time. I'd bring Bananagrams to play with Ed and the one cool nurse on the ward. There was always one. I'd sport better undies in the event of eligible doctors, maybe get a Brazilian wax that wasn't so spectacularly botched this time. I'd remember sour apple Jolly Ranchers and mints and sneak in better smoothies. Most of all, I would be ready.
To have my jaw broken again, however voluntary this time, seemed a cruel joke. I needed to stay funny right now because, oh boy, did I feel bad about my face. HOME AGAIN AFTER AN eleven-hour surgery, I had been shuffling around my apartment having escapist real-estate fantasies and looking like a drunk lady, wearing a jockstrap on my chin. The procedure had been more of an ordeal than Walter had painted it. I'm not saying he was whitewashing it or anything. It's just that my face hadn't responded well to the retractors, which were the implements the surgeons used to open my mouth to get fully inside to realign my jaw. The swelling, after having stretched my face out so intensely, was unreal. (I have photos, but they're scary.) Surgery felt like such violence. My whole body was exhausted from it. I was sleeping sixteen hours a day because it was the only time I didn't feel pain. That said, even if I was wired shut, unable to speak, and completely freakishly grotesque, I loved what my Percocet-addled brain was dreaming up: ideas about full-scale inner and outer makeovers—not just clothes, makeup, or hair—but an overall way of being.
The makeover is what the French philosophers called a "technology of the self"—a script or story through which we make sense of our identity. Maybe I needed a Frenchy makeover? I needed more joy to help break up this long slog of healing. Along with drinking Sancerre and cooking, I thought it might be wise to channel the French ladies. Their ideas on beauty might feel more authentic, more comfortable in one's skin, and less plastically pretty. I thought back to Jeanne Moreau in Luc Besson's film _La Femme Nikita_ and the scene where Jeanne teaches a scrappy street junkie, played so beautifully (and subtly) by Anne Parillaud, how to be a woman. Maybe this was how I needed to reframe things? Just what was their secret? French women seemed to do everything with an effortless _je ne sais whaaaaaa?_ sort of way—whether it was dressing, dating, eating, or resisting brutal fascist dictators. How might I repurpose a few of their tactics to adapt to this new face of mine? I brainstormed in my little kitchen with my jaw-strap.
_Flirt routinely as a matter of course._ It's in every French woman's genetic makeup to flirt with anyone who shows up on her doorstep _—quel charme!_ I do so love this expression. I'd guessed I might find such a tactic helpful when I felt misunderstood, was the recipient of disapproving glances, or possibly mistaken for being mentally ill or tipsy. To me, flirting was all in the eyes. If I couldn't smile with my mouth, maybe I could smile with my eyes? Or practice looking quizzical? I was getting better at blinking and directing my gaze with purpose. _Insist on highbrow core pieces._ Given that I was now a spaz inside and out, I realized I needed to pay attention to all the key trappings of normalcy—including what I wore. It wasn't enough to zip out to the bodega in my torn-up jeans and old Jack Purcell's. While getting better, I couldn't risk having another seizure being mistaken for someone on drugs or mentally ill. I needed to lose the baubles and anything that might read as anything but what I was—a regular nerd-lady with a good eye for shoes and tailoring. French women have an innate gift for recognizing quality and buying things that last. Bye-bye fast fashion. Hello investment pieces that I would be happy to die in—or that would make anyone immediately intuit that I wasn't a hobo.
_Sip your red wine._ Limiting alcohol is pretty much always advised for people on the electric spectrum. Everyone has a different seizure threshold. French women never drink to get drunk; they savor a glass or two of something sparkling or deep crimson in the face of the crushing anxiety of trying to heal, stay witty, find meaningful work, and support a household. Seeing as how I was always a huge cream-soda fan as a kid, this was a fairly easy swap to make. _Embrace imperfection._ So there are still a few vapid, superficial perfectionists in your family and outer circle who immediately assign blame for your appearance and current indeterminate health status. They say things like, "She wasn't taking care of herself or she needs to get more rest" as though I were the cause of my epilepsy and my subsequent asymmetry. The street fighter in me says, "No it's just your dumb DNA, you weenie." Sometimes, a seizure is just a seizure. So let it go. French women never get their elegant knickers in a twist over the small stuff or small people. I would (when back at work again) make a donation to the Epilepsy Foundation in my detractors' names and call it a day. They would get a bit of mail now and then, all while learning a ton about what so many of us with neurological differences deal with day in and day out.
_Maintain an air of intrigue._ This one was harder for me as I am such a goofball with zero filter, but it was so worthwhile. Simply put: don't give it all up at once. I didn't have to explain what had happened to anyone. I felt explaining would put them at ease, but it's a load of hooey. French women know that withholding selected pieces of information is beguiling. When some douchebag executive bro tried to gaslight me, either I'd have some choice zingers at the ready to make him (or her) feel like a ridiculous asshat while diffusing with humor or I'd have fully mastered my look of mocking indifference with a signature question-mark brow. _Take off one thing before you leave your apartment._ Did I really need to bring a rape whistle, mace, and a stun gun with me every time I left the house? The truth is most likely yes, given the shocking normalization of violence in our culture against women, LGBTQ people, immigrants, and the differently abled, but in terms of my own sanity, I needed to chip away at some of the defensiveness I'd been carrying around with me since the diagnosis. Besides, it's much more chic to carry a smaller clutch in the evening or to dispense with the chunky statement necklace so that the dress can shine on its own—sans distraction.
But again, even with all the sage Frenchy wisdom, I still cared about my face, and no amount of me becoming a better person was going to change that. What? It's my face! 16 Gotham Girl, Interrupted THERE'S A JOKE the famed Russian dissident Masha Gessen often tells: "We thought we had hit rock bottom...and then someone knocked from below." I thought I had hit rock bottom when I broke my mug, but then something else knocked from below. It was big, crazy, feral grief. Grief over everything: my face, a sense of beauty, job, parenting, being a professional patient, and losing Loïc. You name it I was losing it. How was it manifesting itself? As extreme fatigue. It was as if my fears had begun to fossilize as pain across my entire body. In my panicked mind, I wasn't getting better fast enough. It had been four months since the last surgery and there was no bouncing back on the schedule that I, or anyone around me, needed. I still wasn't _myself._ My friends Arabella and Billie were staying down in Tribeca at this hipster hotel where all the drinks had wrong-sounding finance bro names like the dirty pickle martini and the Moscow tool (served in a penis-shaped copper mug). All the appetizers looked painfully crunchy and gluten free. Billie arrived first. Arabella had arrived on a separate flight and was on her way in from JFK during rush-hour traffic.
It was my first time seeing my friends since the accident. In truth, I'd overprepared and practiced talking so much that by the time I got to the hotel lobby at six that evening, my mouth and the surrounding muscles were already closing for business. The net effect is that my speech sounded vaguely like a deaf person's speech—not that there's anything wrong with that—it's just not what people were used to hearing from me. I still had a shitload of pins and plates holding things together. I needed a Spanx for my face, but I missed these women so much. I had to see them—even as broken as I still was. It was a warm-ish day in fall, but the subway downtown was still so hyper-air-conditioned, I had to wear a turtleneck. When I walked into the lobby, I immediately spotted Billie at the front desk. She was charming her way into a bigger room—one of her many gifts. She was thanking the desk clerk as I called out to her. She turned and grinned "Jonesy!" Oh, here was someone both fabulously extraordinary and functional and all at once. Could her normalcy just rub off on me for five seconds? It was all I needed, I thought—the sympathetic magic of Billie.
She didn't seem to react to my appearance as much as my words, which were still off-kilter. As we slid into place in the hotel lounge, seats were filling up with gross finance bros. My mouth and gullet felt like an echo chamber with all the vowels bouncing around the inside. I sounded like a sea lion, but I tried to pretend I didn't care. I was just glad to see a friend from home. Arabella was still on her way and texting from the cab, but I knew what she was asking: "Is it really that bad?" and there was Billie texting back in between trips to the loo. "Oh, it's bad!" Not that she was judging, except she was. It's okay. At least she just doesn't do that very New-York-lady-thing, which is _a total trap._ It's when you ask a girlfriend if you should have something done to your forehead, neck, or eyebrows, and she lies to your wrinkly, tired face and says, "I don't even know what you're talking about! Your [fill in body part] looks amazing to me!" Not with Billie. She asks for the truth and she tells the truth. No filter. "Yes, you could do with a thigh lift," she tells you while studying your bare legs and it would mostly be true. Neither she nor Arabella is the type to beat around the bush, and boy if I wasn't the bush right about then. I felt pitied—and it was the worst darkening feeling—seeing them trying to make sense of me for the first time. I could see them renegotiating the angles they had known with the ones that were new. I ordered a "What _She's_ Having," which seemed to be just a splash of rosé with club soda and a twist of lemon, and we caught up on the latest West Coast gossip, discussed various divorce proceedings, affairs, and which teenagers had come out to their parents as pansexual—a perfectly reasonable choice. Why cling to binary anything these days?
I tried to maintain an upbeat attitude, but as the night wore on, I could feel myself sinking. I was like a ship with twenty-five-thousand-pound keel, but instead of self-righting, I was just dragging everything down alongside me. I knew going home that night in the cab I was not the same. Nothing was the same. We'd been at Mezzrow, this underground jazz club on West Tenth Street, when I couldn't deny that things with me weren't right. Mezzrow is a place that bills itself more as a "listening room" than a club. Frequently sold out, it really only has a front row and is probably the most intimate venue you'll find in New York City to see and hear amazing musicians. Two eleven-hour reconstructive surgeries and multiple other procedures after my big seizure in the coffee aisle and I still wasn't back to me at all, inside or out. Being there with Arabella and Billie drove this home for me—hard. They were flirting and exuberant and carefree. Both had a way of making friends with the entire world no matter where they went. I wasn't ready for that and I knew it. It was as if I was still wired shut in so many ways.
I walked into my apartment on the Upper West Side, both girls at their dad's, and I despaired. I wasn't going to get better. The seizures would _keep_ happening. I would keep breaking things. There were my girlfriends off living their normal, full, rich, kooky, working lives with husbands and vacations and joy and there was me: permanently disfigured, scared, exhausted, jobless, speechless, and joyless. I still felt like I was dying. _This is where little blondes check in...now here._ I thought. This is my ending, I thought weeping in my kitchen. I still felt so muzzled. Every waking second, the neuropathy had my face feeling like it was wrapped tight in duct tape. I'd tried to demonstrate the feeling to Ed one night out at dinner by squeezing his chin really hard with both of my hands, and even though Ed is a huge, tough unicorn with a superhero-level threshold for pain, he never tried to pretend to understand: "So, that's what it has felt like all this time? That must be the worst!" To which I'd nodded and said, "Yes, it is!" and explained that this was why it was making me so completely bonkers. I could never ignore my goddamn mug. I'm sure the people in the restaurant thought we were the biggest weirdos, but who cares? This is New York. It's why you move here to begin with. It's the one place on the planet that gives you permission to be exactly as weird as you are because you fit right in with the rest of the marvelous, struggling crazies.
But there were no words for the dark emotional despair I felt that night after seeing Arabella and Billie again except that I knew now that nothing was ever going to be the same for me. I was always going to be a broken spaz; there was no hiding it. There would never be anymore "passing" as normal or a non-spaz or neurotypical. And I just wanted to sleep through the rest of whatever that meant. So, I did. Or I tried to, except I woke up feeling so bad and so terribly hollowed out. I was buzzing so electric with an aura, I thought I might set the whole building on fire while throwing my guts up beside my bed. With my jaw still growing back together, each hurl felt impossible, like I was having another baby—but this time through my mouth. _Bad, bad, Leroy Brown. Baddest girl in the whole damn town._ You might have guessed by now, but I'm naturally a little heavy on the Thanatos. I've always sought to hide my underlying Goth tendencies—the result of the early loss of my one true love, Jim Croce, who died in a plane crash. My fuck account was running so low after so much loss I worried I would have to start giving out IOUs for new ones, that is, "Dear so-and-so, IOU because I totally give a fuck about what you think and what you feel, and so on."
I can't remember who came up with the concept, no doubt some thinker before me like Hannah Arendt, but in this black moment, my despair seemed like the most extreme manifestation of the ordinary. Standing in my kitchen, crying over how one can of coffee and one electric moment had broken my whole life. Looking through old photographs of myself before was a kind of endlessly boring and repetitive exercise whereby I found myself always straining toward the woman I used to be. It felt sadistically futile. But suddenly you look around your kitchen and your life with its jutting refrigerator and jutting chin and realize everything is destroyed and that nothing will ever be the same. That clarity is terrifying. Your nostalgia for what _was_ is so strong it becomes deadly. There is a peculiar disturbance in the brain, I believe, when something profoundly familiar appears in a strange context. It usually happens right before a breakdown. My everyday world had become so tinted with the dark sheen of despair that my girlfriends' shiny, jubilant normalcy had proven almost too jarring. I had reached a kind of reckoning wherein it all came flooding in, how much I'd lost. Under the surface of things, I had changed irrevocably.
I couldn't risk another seizure there on my own, and I didn't want Arabella and Billie to feel like they had to babysit me on their big weekend in the city. They had tickets for culture and shows and things. Ed was closing up his summer cabin in the Berkshires and Holly had her daughter home from college. I also didn't have enough confidence in my new meds yet to "werewolf" myself on my own. I _had_ to go to the ER. I couldn't risk breaking everything all over again. I WRITE A VERY SNARKY weekly rant called _Gotham Girl._ As part of my trying to get better, I'd started to focus mostly on New York's incandescent weirdos. I love them. I love this city, this capital of neurodiversity, because it's a place that lets all these differently wired people be how they are and it accepts them. This is a place where a nun, a drag queen, and a hard-boiled detective with Tourette's syndrome can all mix it up and usually be fine. But things were not fine. I had gone into the ER, trying to do the responsible thing because I was worried I was going to have a seizure, and it had all gone sideways. I had said the wrong thing, in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and now I was sitting in a mental hospital with my closest girlfriends.
"What on earth did you say to them, Jonesy?" Billie sat back in her chair and surveyed the expanse of the cinderblock day room in full-on WTF mode. "I said...I didn't necessarily want to spend forty more years having seizures. I don't think that's unreasonable? I was actually trying to do the right thing, and now they won't let me go home." "Oh, for fuck sake—I'd totally kill myself! It makes perfect sense," Billie proclaimed loudly. The nurse looked over now. "Not helping!" I whisper-yelled now. "You can't say those kinds of things in here! They take it all very, _very_ seriously." Here they'd both flown back from San Francisco for a big girls' weekend and now I'd gone and ruined it. I spotted their couture through the small wire-hatched window in the door. They were both dressed to the nines in Alexander Wang and Phillip Lim, ready for a big night out. Billie is tall, blonde, and fearless. Her charisma is an unparalleled weapon. She's the Obi-Wan Kenobi of British female charm. Arabella is willowy and fiery with rich, auburn, shoulder-length hair. The cut is always perfect. She has volume without frizz. Her gladiator pumps could kill you in a millisecond—so tall and sharply heeled. She is also one of the most generous people I have ever encountered.
"Besides, my family lives forever," I continued. "I'm the healthiest spaz on the planet." "Well," Billie said, "I'd be fucking insane if I'd broken everything. Did you tell them you don't actually want to die _right now_?" "Of course I told them I don't want to die! I went to the ER because I thought I was having another grand mal. I just didn't want to break any more bones, but the doctor there was practically Doogie Howser and twelve. I think I scared him. I doubt if his testicles have even descended yet." "You sound so... _normal_!" Arabella piped up. She was momentarily focused on removing all the individual staples from the stack of _US Weekly, People,_ and _Vogue_ magazines they had brought me. Apparently, tiny staples were not allowed on the psych ward because they could be turned into objects used for self-harm. I had no interest in harming myself. I just wanted to go home. "I know, right?" I whispered. "I think it's the total fear coupled with the intense muscle relaxants they gave me to prevent the seizure. My face isn't going into lockjaw mode the way it usually does at the end of the day. But there are people here in serious difficulty."
Arabella asked, "Will you be out in time for the opera opening?" "Um...I'm not sure?" Oh God, my girlfriends were party-hopping, psych-ward socialites. How was _I_ the one who was locked up again? I'd just wanted sleep and to not spaz again. I heaved a sigh slouching in my chair. I was never going to get out of here with these two madcap lovelies as my references. They had no idea I was so broken. Or maybe they really _did_ and this was exactly what I needed: _not_ to be made to feel bad about it. Meanwhile, the nurse was signaling that our time was up. "Don't get that out," I whispered to Billie. I could see she had stashed some champers in her purse. "We'll be so busted. Look, people who have seizures are often mistaken for having other things—like being junkies or being mentally ill. All I know is that I'm sad. I miss my _self_...from before and I don't know if she's coming back." "ARE YOU _CRAZY_?" I couldn't believe her. I realize now that this was probably an impolitic question to ask a shrink—especially one with a boyfriend reluctant to commit and her twenty-nine-year-old biological clock ticking, and who was already late to Rosh Hashanah. People in New York will tell a mute person everything. The CIA could use me on terrorists and I'd get the evil masterminds to spill every last secret down to what they're getting their favorite auntie for her birthday.
"Ms. Jones, do you currently have thoughts of harming yourself?" I sighed so hard I could have broken my face all over again. "No. I think there's been a misunderstanding. I just wanted to sleep. I have epilepsy. My last seizure was very bad. I was trying to avert another one by coming into the ER _voluntarily._ If I'd wanted to kill myself, all I would have to do is stay home in my nice, comfy apartment with my books and _not_ take any of my antiseizure meds and my brain would take care of things on its own by burning out like a light bulb." "So, you don't want to die?" How could I get it across to her? "I don't want to have seizures. I'm homesick for my old face and life, but no, I don't want to die. Just please, go to Rosh Hashanah," I pleaded, exhausted, my right to the truth had been completely revoked. "What about grief counseling?" "For what?" "Your face?" "Oh." I half thought she was joking. Then I remembered where I was. "Well, it _is_ like a death, isn't it?" She offered. "Yes, I suppose it is." Oh my God, I thought. That was _exactly_ what I needed: a process for mourning the old me. "Can you give me a referral?"
You can see a small spark of happiness in a doctor's eyes when they realize they've solved something, when they've made a small but significant difference. "We'll get you discharged tomorrow morning," she said. I TOOK MY LOOSE-LEAF celebrity gossip magazines to the TV room where all the other patients were watching _The Bachelor._ There was a vast shortage of reading material on the ward, so I plunked them down on the coffee table for the other inmates, who included a permanently irritated socialite, a schizophrenic philosophy professor, a gangster artist who thought she was Maya Angelou, a fifty-something-year-old teamster guy, and a young bipolar Columbia law student—who made a point of always answering the only phone on the ward. Together we resembled the goofy, misfit cast of a sitcom. I watched as they flocked to the new reading material, sharing sections with pronounced civility. Here was my tribe. I know there's a great deal of stigma to overcome with mental illness and chronic conditions like epilepsy, but I thought to myself in that moment—and I still believe this—maybe sanity is slightly overrated. I'll take these people on the ward with me. And I'll take Billie and Arabella over bland, ordinary folks any day.
17 DNR IN A TEACHING HOSPITAL, surgery is like an office party where the backstory is that everyone in the room is up for a promotion. There's music, there's mingling. Everyone is laughing, being witty and charming and on their best behavior for the boss, which in this case was still maxillofacial program head Walter. There's usually _always_ one cocky-cad-hot-shot in the mix—handsome but also handy with a scalpel. And you are the guest of honor, who no one really knows that well, the one who is held at the door for check-in, questioning, paper signing, and then suddenly they're drawing on your face with a Sharpie so that they don't cut in the wrong place. They really are _terribly_ excited to have someone to cut open. It's a teeny bit creepy. By the fourth surgery and after a hundred or so smaller procedures, I could spot the fear in their eyes, especially the anesthesiologist. She was a young, dear heart, who still had baby fat and dimples. She looked terrified that she was going to kill me. Lord, that breathing/feeding tube thing up the nose and down the throat was just so Guantánamo. Crikey! But there is a deep fatalism as well as a strident optimism that comes with having anything chronic and spending two years with a doctor—week in and week out. Only in New York would this happen. I ran into Walter in the neighborhood right before my surgery and after another patient's funeral. The patient was a jumper who had committed suicide—successfully this time. Walter was so sad. I don't think I'd ever seen him so down. He kept telling me I needed to eat more, that I was too skinny, and I told him I had just had a burger with my friend Debbi and now I was in pain from yapping with her for three hours. He joked, "So, what'll it be, kid, Motrin or heroin?" This had been the banter of my weekly play date with him. I'd gotten used to it. I'd gotten used to _him._ I looked forward to seeing him and everyone in the office there, the glamorous Anna, the hilarious Marie, and the quietly cunning Christine, always a glint in her eye, because it meant progress, even if slow, even if it meant I had become a professional patient. Optimism over the course of years of multiple surgeries and procedures requires a kind of stubborn, willful innocence, a movie-style suspension of disbelief for a really implausible horror film. Fatalism is practical and sensible. One in five epileptics dies from a seizure. What felt most impractical, most delusional, was to try to keep living if your body and brain were done. What people with chronic conditions like epilepsy live with more than anything is the fear of the B word: burden. No one wants to become a burden or a victim to anyone. The whole point of these years is how to learn _not_ to be devastated by every big or little thing that happens to you.
On the table now, I was talking with the surgical nurse, answering her last questions before going under. "And it says here that you have a DNR—a do-not-resuscitate order?" "Uh, yeah. If things go south, just let me go off into the universe with the rest of the star stuff." Walter interrupted, "What do you mean you have a DNR? You don't need a DNR. What, are you depressed?" "Err, uh, no. I'm mean...not today. I just don't want to wake up as a root vegetable and be a burden to people. Is that too much to ask?" He shook his head. "Well, I won't allow it. _Why_ do you need a DNR?" "I-I was just doing like Suze Orman told me..." Suze had been one of our clients and had always preached on the merits of having an advanced medical directive. What can I say? Even if you've heard it before, the woman makes total sense. "Don't you _want_ to live?" All the residents went quiet. "What about the girls?" he demanded. "What about your dumb dog? And what about Ed? You can't just quit!" I'd never seen him so extraordinarily irritated, so thoroughly Oscar Madison-ish.
"Fine, I'll live. Jesus...so touchy." And we started laughing. And I did. Live, that is. 18 A Love Letter from My Brain I GOT THIS LETTER from my brain yesterday. The penmanship was atrocious. She must have been drinking. I think she may be under the impression that she is a young Elizabeth Taylor. You can almost picture her staggeringly violet eyes staring you down as she speaks: > Dear Alisa,> > My dearest love. Yes, I know it looks like a real mess in here right now and I know my writing you this love letter may seem a bit unorthodox in light of the situation but, darling, I couldn't resist. The temptation in me, across my every axon and dendrite, was too powerful. I know you feel betrayed by me, by my electrical taunts, by what seems like faulty wiring between my lobes, but my love for you is boundless.> > It's complicated, but I have evolved and adapted for more than one hundred thousand years across one hundred billion cells to keep you safe, to keep you interesting, and to keep evolving. In truth, I am a secret radical—like Jane Austen or Emily Dickinson. With more than sixty-five million people worldwide living with epilepsy, one in twenty will develop seizures in his or her lifetime.> > These people don't need practical, prescriptive advice for surviving life with seizures or a chronic condition. They need to know how to make meaning of seizures, of epilepsy, and of life. I am more of a process than I will ever be a specific organ with a function, and because of that, I am always becoming something new, something else. Writing about seizures is like writing about the soul. It's forever elusive. Every time you think you've captured it, it shifts form or disappears altogether.> > While we may indeed have to respect _some_ of the cards we've been dealt, we can still recraft the story—to laugh a little. Or a lot. You are never beholden to a shit narrative, my dearest love. Try to take that very same richness and intensity of feeling that comes with this electric condition and apply it to every moment _in between_ and ahead.> > If you feel you have been on the outside of your life for so long, like an uninvited guest hovering at the periphery, and that you can never claim it back, I am writing to tell you that you are wrong. I, your brain, was wired to write multiple futures. When I send you messages that say, "Stop, go back!"; or, "Don't do this! This is dangerous and it will involve pain"; or, "You will get hurt," I need you to listen and hear me and know that I have evolved over all this time to protect you and to perpetuate your species. Every problem I present you with is an adaptive piece to propel the story. Your story. The one you are writing at this very second. If you learn from these adaptations, if you are obsessed by them, take responsibility for them, and ask yourself why they happened, always why, so as to experience them so deeply that they feel like a gift, then you can forgive yourself for these misadventures and move forward. Then you can heal others, and in so doing, heal yourself.> > Now, as your brain, I feel I have a duty to inform you that I have this fantasy that all the nerds and weirdos of the world will read these words here and, bit by bit, even in the reddest, most singular, and closed of rural backwater places and towns, they will grow into radical neurodiverse sleeper cells. Think of them as subversive little tribes of epileptics, autistics, depressives, and other neurotypes all disrupting the stigma. I say this because I want you (and all the differently abled) to experience odd, rare sparks of joy; to be curious about what it means to be electric; and to understand how you can take something that _should_ be really, truly awful and rewrite it to reflect joy.> > Words can spark such fires, and we are only just learning how to torch the ground rather than ourselves.> > Lovingly,> > Your brain (the spaz)
19 The New Rules of You IF SELF-KNOWLEDGE is the key to happiness, then these are the practical things being a spaz has taught me beyond an extreme hatred of yard art and sharp coffee tables. (You only need to hit your head so many times on a garden gnome to know that they serve no purpose for anyone.) We need playlists—be they music, literature, TV, or movies—to remind us who we are and who we _can_ be, to help reinforce our personal myths of self. In my case, I really needed my funny self because my grief needed somewhere to go. I also needed to change my work life considerably, which meant working less, saving more, and learning to live with uncertainty while still making ends meet. So, when freaking out over hormones or seizures or big professional or personal stress, I decided I needed new rules and to try the following: Implement the total high-protein, high-fat diet. Drink bacon. Go on a beef cleanse! Once I could really eat again, that's what I did. From steak tartare to a whole prime rib—it actually made me feel so much better. Also, I stopped drinking. Sobriety can be a lark. I actually felt so much better. I had...what's it called again? Energy! Instead, opt for lots of sparkly things: cream soda, juice spritzers, and playing Bananagrams with Ed.
Remember your fenced-in area when you're just pissed as hell at white men everywhere and maybe channel rage creatively? Ever thought of macrame? No, not so much. Just remember that emotional regulation is your friend. Channel your rage toward some serious house cleaning. New York is filthy—everything here is covered in a thin coating of feces and takeout grease. Fire the maid and power dust. Throw tampons and pillows, no solid objects or phones, when frustrated. Try a temper tantrum on that Tempur-Pedic. It's actually quite satisfying. Engage in daily exercise at the gym, dance class, or better yet, the park. Make a chronic illness crisis playlist, meaning find your own macaroni and cheese comfort-food equivalent for movies, TV, and music for postseizure times or any time of big, scary, or chronic stress. What makes comfort TV? Hilarity and smaller, more addressable problems. It's all about escapist entertainment that doesn't make you feel you need a shower afterward. You want media fare that's going to make you feel like you ate an okay amount of mac and cheese—but not too much.
My hard and fast rules for things to steer clear of: No politics. No _Billions,_ even though Maggie Siff is a badass! No _Homeland._ No TMZ gossip or reality awfulness. No sad, scary news. No big disasters, nothing with facially oriented fight scenes. Late-night chat shows that are too shouty, angry, or political tend to exhaust this girl, so I pass on those too—as much as I love them during nonseizure, feeling-good, not-so-hormonal days. Most of all, keep it light. You may feel like ugly-crying but _resist_! My playlist is very weird and very specific to me as it reminds me of who I am and what qualities I'd like to project internally and occasionally around the house. It's all temporary, not-too-thoughtful distraction that says everything is going to be okay in my sometime-tumultuous little world (and lately in the greater world as well). And it's totally girly, so apologies in advance. Listicle dropping...now: Movies Anything Nancy Meyers writes or directs is always a safe bet when I'm in postseizure mode, although _Something's Gotta Give_ with Diane Keaton is a clear winner to my mind. Plus, Diane writes out all of her sadness while boffing Keanu Reeves—which is a good for any writer.
Chick flicks where the heroine runs away are always a good bet. Anything where they eat and drink their way across Tuscany or the French countryside or a quaint English village will do. People write this genre off, but after a big seizure or chronic thing, you need a bit of "gay and away!" _Seems Like Old Times_ with Goldie Hawn reminds me of my love for dogs and hapless writers. I also relate to being torn between the impulsive allure of Chevy Chase and the steadfast reliability of Charles Grodin. The last shot in the film _so_ used to be my face back when I could smile. Plus, Ed always tears up when he sees it, which is sweet. TV _Bored to Death_ : There's something about Ted Danson as Graydon Carter teaming up with stuck-writer Jason Schwartzman and comic book artist Zach Galifianakis and running all over New York City that comforts. Maybe it's that they are solving petty crimes and having literary skirmishes that just makes my heart do a tiny dance every time I watch it. _30 Rock_ : I love its awkward beginnings and then how it evolves into some of the tightest writing you will ever see on broadcast television. The pilot where Liz buys all the hot dogs will make you feel good and also want all the hot dogs. The music cues always lift me too.
_The Mary Tyler Moore Show_ : Loveable icon of feminism. Who doesn't adore her hair—at least in the beginning seasons (volume but no frizz)? And the way she always says "Mr. Grant" is like an operatic vocal hug. _Midsomer Murders_ : Who wants to have cream tea and solve convoluted but still _totally manageable problems,_ with handsome gents in the English countryside? I do! Sign me up! Plus, there are nineteen seasons to watch and then forget, and then watch again! _Pushing Daisies_ : The greatest TV love story ever told complete with pie and spinster aunties. The vibrant color of the sets is enough to lift my mood on the darkest of days. It's total visual Prozac. Okay, enough television—you should listen to _Yacht Rock_ (cue Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins) and read more anyway. In the meantime, here are some other new rules of me: See a trauma coach, not to stir up the past but to reimagine the future. Maybe keep this person on retainer? Again, when about to go down the bad spiral and the chain of total mental anguish, ask yourself, WWNMD? Or What Would Nancy Meyers Do? How would she write this movie? Come prepared with crisp, white shirts and un-oaked Chardonnay. (Not too much, though, alcohol lowers the seizure threshold.)
Get your beauty rest. Sleep is the most important piece of the brain equation—especially when it comes to staying seizure free, so know this: Nora Ephron was right. It _is_ that second glass of wine that keeps you up at night, _so don't do it!_ No partying with the Plastics as that kind of bullying will rot your insides and give you wrinkles. Know how to tell the good drama from the bad. Drama gets a bad rap, when people shake their heads and say things like, "She's soooooo dramatic." When is drama good? When is it useful? When it propels you into a new way of seeing. You might end up with an overdeveloped sense of justice. I think it runs in our family. You might feel the need to right many of the world's wrongs in ridiculous and unexpected ways due to a maniacally low tolerance for injustice and petty digs. But here's the thing of it: spoon theory is real. Coined by Christine Miserandino in her 2003 essay "The Spoon Theory," the idea grew out of a conversation in a diner in which a friend asked her what having lupus, a chronic autoimmune disease, felt like. Miserandino grabbed spoons from nearby tables to use as props.
She gave her friend twelve spoons and asked her to recount a typical day, taking a spoon away for each activity she undertook that day. Each spoon, of course, was a finite unit of her own physical and emotional energy and had to be rationed to avoid running out of spoons before the end of the day. The new rule of living with epilepsy is getting real with the fact that I have about four to five spoons in my drawer on any given day. _I decide how to use them._ I can't use them all up on every skirmish—even if my exaggerated sense of what's fair or right or how things should be is telling me to do so. Save your spoons. That said, your cerebral lights could go out like that at any time, so take nothing for granted. Celebrate every holiday, even the little ones like Arbor Day—yes, national tree day—it's the last Friday of every April, every year. Just don't send paper cards because that defeats the overall purpose of conservancy. Believe in and support places in the world that adapt to different neurotribes and neurotypes—places like the quaint village of Purley in Great Britain, which has evolved into a dementia-friendly town where if you get lost or forget who you are, a designated someone will make sure to remember for you and get you to a safe place. Glasgow in Scotland has also proclaimed itself a city morphing to better accommodate individuals on the autism spectrum who might be dealing with sensory overload. Leave it to the Estonian police force to provide on-site teddy bears to children involved in traumatic accidents where the parents are hospitalized. That may sound a bit harsh in the current dystopian political climate, but who would say no to such a small comfort to children in momentary crisis? The new rule of you is to ask yourself how you can be more human in fraught, uncertain moments?
Support neuro-specific design. From the airbag helmet to hearing aids that transition into vibrating bracelets for fire safety at night, these innovations are awesome. The round houses with rounded interiors and softer edges that can be 3-D-printed in a matter of days are perfect for different neurotypes. There are whole industries that can be built around neurodiversity, and we need to start reimagining our everyday world to adapt. Don't be a dick. It's so easy to hop the express train to Dickville. This extends to your various mothers-in-law. It's a universal truth that this will be a fraught relationship, so don't go there; be nice because you'll never win against his/her mother. That forty-nine-year-old dyspeptic person with rapidly developing man-boobs is still your mother-in-law's baby. Let her reign supreme. Health insurance company greed will soon manifest as the cruel embodiment of the corporate state in the form of millions of chronically ill, disabled, differently abled people suffering, so we have to look out for each other. Take care of your fellow humans be they spazzy or otherwise. Lovely weirdos can only make us stronger and save the world. Believe it. Find other people who relate to your brand of crazy, but don't hang out with people who are exactly like you as it can feel like hanging out with _only_ you and then you both morph into even more of a bummer. I'm just saying there are times you might need some vapid, slightly nefarious people in your life for levity, for diversity, and to show you very starkly what you are not.
When you are super sore from a seizure, you may want to take a bath. A shower can be excruciating with how many muscles are used during a grand mal. Many people will tell you not to do this. For my part, I like to sing in the bath so that whoever is around knows that I'm just fine. If I suddenly stop singing, the person I'm with knows to come in and check on me. Beware of the third day after a seizure. This has consistently held true throughout my life with epilepsy. By the third day after a seizure (or a baby) you are probably due for a major meltdown, or what I like to call a HORE—short for HOrmonal Rage Event. It may have nothing to do with my hormones, but it helps to remember that the world may not be ending after all and that tomorrow is a new day. In terms of consistent long-term care, you may need to go on a lot of first dates with different doctors throughout life to get what you need—do it. Remember, you are the boss of your health care. Don't let medical orthodoxy get in the way, and don't wait to start a new treatment if things aren't working for you. If I had pushed harder with my first jerk-neurologist to try the drug I'm on now, I might have been able to avoid breaking my face, jaw, and teeth altogether—but _he_ didn't think it was necessary.
Make a spaz kit so that you feel less anxious about being out and about if you have a seizure or any health crisis. What are the things you need in that moment? For everyone it's different. For me it's a combo: baby wipes, fresh knickers, emergency meds, Advil, bandages with the Neosporin built right in, a tiny toothbrush kit, and a talisman. For me, talismans are a mooring type of object that I immediately recognize, such as a photo, a keychain, or lipstick, that reminds of me and who I am. I tend to wake up afraid, so one key object or person is paramount. Know that you will need to sleep for about two to three days afterward. This sleep will feel like twenty minutes because neurological time travel is exhausting, but this is normal for you. You will be expected to have wisdom, bromides, and platitudes by your middle age, and it's so totally okay to answer, "I have no fucking clue, but let's figure it out. We don't have to be devastated every time something horrible happens—we can even be funny about it." That said, to smooth out the disarray that life may fall into after a diagnosis of epilepsy or anything seriously chronic, sometimes it helps a little to detach. Seizures have taught me that what the mind refuses to face, the body eventually will. To care for ourselves equips us to better care for our loved ones. And sometimes that means admitting the hard thing—that you're ill, that you only have three spoons left in the drawer, and that getting better may stretch out over the course of a lifetime. I always thought that when you got sick, you either fought it and got better, or you succumbed; but what my seizures have taught me most about the gift of chronic crises is that you come to love the in-betweens so much. I never knew their full worth until now.
EPILOGUE On Being a Narwhal HOW DOES IT ALWAYS come down to unicorns? I don't know why, but it does. And I don't know why I picked the narwhal—otherwise known as the "unicorn of the sea"—as my spirit animal slash metaphor. It was purely accidental. The beast-word fell out of my mouth during a conversation I had many, many seizures ago, with my younger daughter. We were talking about surgery as a solution for my seizures. Sophie came with ready opinions. My careless comment was something like, "Yeah, but I'm just not sure I want to be a narwhal. I'm not ready, yet." I'd said in jest. I was not into the idea of lobotomy scars at the age of forty-two, but right then I could see my daughter was absolutely serious about my life and death. A child should never have to worry about her mother is the constant refrain I hear in my head. I realize now that it was a very vain and selfish retort and probably made me a jerk. Because, of course, you would do anything to assure your child that they will never be left on their own. Never be abandoned. But well, I never claimed I wasn't a jerk, so if you assumed I wasn't, that's a tiny bit on you, my lovelies.
In narwhal lore, its name is derived from the Old Norse word _nár,_ meaning "corpse," in reference to the animal's greyish, mottled pigmentation, created by the creature's summertime habit of lying still at or near the surface of the sea. The Inuit oral tradition is rich in legends about transformation. One such legend holds that there once was a woman with beautiful, long hair who was married to a cruel and abusive husband. One day, she was standing beside a river with her hair down when her husband came after her with great violence. Just as he was about to reach her, she fell backward into the water below and sank out of sight. When she emerged at the mouth of the river, she had transformed into a narwhal with a long tusk. Rapids were forming in the river and, because her hair was spread out in all its length, it began to twist around and around in corkscrew fashion—forever safe now from her abusive husband. This was the mythological reason why narwhal tusks are formed with a corkscrew twist. The spiral horn is actually a long tooth and was believed to possess magical curative properties.
The writer Jules Verne suggested the creature sought to run ships through with its tusk. That seems unlikely in that nerves tunneling through the narwhal's tusk, an upper canine tooth that runs seven to ten feet long, suggest that it is actually a sensory organ. It's believed that the animals use it to collect information about their environment and about one another. Male narwhals, for example, may tap or scrape their tusks together as a means of communication. The tusk might also be sensitive to environmental factors, such as water and air pressure, temperature, and chemical cues, thereby facilitating communication and prey detection. The narwhal lives year round in the Arctic waters around Greenland, Canada, and Russia and can live up to the age of a menopausal lady. They are often killed by suffocation when the sea ice freezes over. Another cause of fatality, specifically among young creatures, is starvation. The current population of the narwhal is about seventy-five thousand, so narwhals, though not technically endangered, are considered a fairly rare species.
Some medieval Europeans believed narwhal tusks to be the horns from the legendary unicorn. As these horns were considered to have magic powers, such as neutralizing poison and curing melancholia, Vikings and other Norse traders were able to sell them for many times their weight in gold. Used for foraging and mating rituals, the tusks were sometimes also crafted into cups that were thought to negate any poison. During the sixteenth century, Queen Elizabeth received a bejeweled narwhal tusk worth more than ten thousand dollars from the renowned adventurer and explorer Sir Humphrey Gilbert, who claimed the tusk was from a sea unicorn. The tusks were considered a staple of various aristocratic cabinets of curiosities at the time, much the same as epileptics. I'd always held an outlandish view of epilepsy surgery. I pictured a horrifically grotesque procedure with my brain split in half and horn growing out of my forehead. It may have been a lack of vision on my part. Most likely it was that my parents just didn't explain things adequately. Back in the 1970s, it was still common for kids to have their tonsils taken out. If you had repeat cases of tonsillitis or strep throat, pediatricians routinely took them out.
I was a total tonsillitis kid. Until age seven, I practically lived on that horrid Pepto-Bismol-colored amoxicillin liquid that grown-ups always tried to convince you tasted like strawberry Nestle Quik (such blasphemy). It's a wonder I have any intestinal flora left. My parents dreamt up every possible bribe to persuade me to have my tonsils out. They dangled ice cream, Jell-O, and popsicles—all the things hippie kids never got, but I was adamant about keeping my tonsils. Plus, and I genuinely don't know how I got this idea into my head, but somehow in my little kid logic I truly _believed_ that in order for the doctor to take out your tonsils, they had to saw off your head. Indeed, in my version of the presumed events, the doctors and nurses gave you loads of shots (which I was not keen on) to make you fall asleep, during which they cut off your head, removed your tonsils with pliers, and then sewed your head back on like Frankenstein. That was a tonsillectomy in my dark imaginings, and no one could convince me it was worth having my head sawed off.
It didn't even occur to me that all doctors really did was just put some long skinny tongs in your mouth, snip-snipped, and then you woke up for ice cream. Why my parents never explained this to me or probed any deeper into my trepidation remains a mystery. But this gets me back to the epilepsy surgery, and the other question Sophie put to me when I was in my cyborg headgear, about whether there was an operation that would make my seizures go away forever? I pretty much did the same thing all over again. When it came to a discussion of surgery for my epilepsy, my imagination went straight back into overdrive like it did with my tonsils. The most common type of epilepsy surgery is called a temporal lobectomy. In this procedure, a very specific, overly electrical, hyperactive part of the brain is removed. The second, less common type of epilepsy surgery interrupts nerve pathways that allow electrical impulses to spread across both the right and left hemispheres of the brain. The term "disconnection" is sometimes used to describe it. This is the kind of surgery I imagined would have me looking like a narwhal with a big horn scar between my eyes, separating my lobes. And I didn't want disconnection inside my brain. If anything, I wanted more understanding outside of it—in the world.
The actual conversation I had with my neurologist about why I wasn't a candidate to have the surgery had to do with the location of my seizures. This was the real issue. There was too great a risk to my language, memory, and my ability to walk. I might be too impaired afterward, and even though my seizures were fierce, they weren't intractable and frequent enough to warrant brain surgery. I didn't know how to explain this to Sophie at the time. I also didn't know how to explain the other risks. Most neurologists don't like to talk about Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP). It's so important that they do because many people with epilepsy are unaware that there's a possibility of unexpectedly dying from the disorder. While it is an uncommon but fatal complication of epilepsy, it affects one in a thousand adult patients and one in 4,500 children with uncontrolled seizures every year. Many physicians are hesitant to discuss this rare risk of death because they don't want to frighten their patients. Of the participants who completed a 2017 Epilepsy Foundation survey, 100 percent felt that adult patients with epilepsy had a right to be informed about SUDEP, and 92 percent agreed that doctors should be required to disclose that information to them. Additionally, the limited survey showed that 81 percent of patients felt that simply _knowing_ about the rare risk of death motivated them to consistently take their medication, and 85 percent said it encouraged them to better manage their seizure triggers—such as sleep, alcohol, and stress. That said, it's also important that we, as people with chronic conditions and disorders like epilepsy, don't get locked into certitudes about it. There is no one narrative for epilepsy or for neurodiversity. Drop the guilt and the shame however you can. Write it off, ride it out, walk it off, and shout it out.
Imagine any number of narrative futures because this is what our brains were designed to do. According to some of the most recent research on how the human brain works, we call our species _Homo sapien_ or "wise man," but this is most likely a very poor moniker. We would be more aptly called _Homo prospectus_ or _Homo possibilitās_ in that our brains are wired to use very different parts of themselves in highly integrated ways to formulate multiple narrative futures for ourselves—collectively and individually. Through the mathematics of space and time, our brains are able to imagine and (sometimes) execute on a wide variety of outcomes and possibilities more so than we are wired to be able to solve or learn from the past. We are, in short, wired for the future, and there is an endless gorgeousness to this idea. A beautiful possible. But now that I sat there with Sophie all these years later, regarding her worried little face, she said very plainly in response to my careless comment, "But _I_ would be a narwhal for you." And inside, my heart just broke, or maybe it grew like the Grinch because I would always be a narwhal for her, for both girls. A big, burly narwhal with an unwieldy tusk, swimming in ever-warming waters, I would always be a narwhal no matter how many surgeries and drug trials I had to go through.
I know she still felt betrayed by me, by epilepsy, but to generalize with wild abandon, we all feel betrayed or wronged by our parents at one point or another in life. I felt wronged by mine primarily because no one had ever mentioned epilepsy as part of our family history. It turns out my grandmother may have dealt with seizures as she aged, but no one ever thought to talk about it. We're still not sure, but what I want, what I hope for, is a more open conversation with my daughters (and theirs one day) about neurodiversity, genetics, new treatments, and what it means to live an "electric" life—to touch the fence, so to speak. There's something awkwardly outmoded about watching a white, privileged, straight-ish woman flail—even absurdly and unabashedly—through personal, social-practical, and professional foibles and expecting a wholesale transformation at the end. My epiphany is, I suppose, that maybe there are no epiphanies. What is the dark alchemy that can turn your vulnerability, contradiction, abjection, and loneliness into light? Maybe it's that you can't just follow the forensic threads of your emotional, neurological, and genetic life back to their different triggers, sources, and origins; maybe it's that you follow them forward and away from comfortable certainties toward different, uncertain, beautiful outcomes.
I'm still revising this idea, but I believe that certitudes keep our own worlds small, confined, and weighted. Possibility, along with hope, is the invisible currency that enlarges and lightens us. Like gravity, you don't always see possibility or hope, but you know its effects: a book falling, our bodies drooping, even straining against it to stay upright. Possibility and hope won't speak to you in your own simple language, because it isn't something that exists outside of humanity. Possibility and hope are only present because we are. It is wired and evolved into us, the same way the electric, epilepsy, and any number of chronic conditions are wired into us. The beautiful possible lives within us, and it's up to us to nurture it and bring it out into the light. Possibility is only as consistent and constant as we are. I grasped at certitudes and it made life lesser and smaller. It's during those times when the beautiful possible seems the least practical thing that perhaps we need it the most.
I know I apologized to the girls in advance over both of their goopy little heads, right when they were born. I regret the parent I was not able to be. Sometimes I tried too hard to be their pal. If I had known to take greater care to protect them from the drama of this world and my epilepsy, I would go back and be better for them, for they have been all the joy that I ever need. Their soft, sour-milky breaths, nestled to me, to my chest. If I could protect them from the past, present, and all the different futures, I would have. I will—and will still—try always. At the same time, I want to tell them wise words from an old friend that "caution is a thief" and not to let it or unwarranted fear take away their eccentricity, their electricity, their neurodiversity, their innate juiciness, and their spaz sense of adventure, empathy, and compassion. I don't think it ever will. They are bright, fierce girls who know that in dark times, we all have a responsibility not just to our own single light but to _all_ the neurodiverse lights twinned in a fugitive mind.
Acknowledgments Eric Myers, _my friend, agent, and invaluable guide;_ Don Weise, _for working wonders;_ Joy Kimple, _who told me I could;_ Jacqueline Saint Anne, Holly, _and_ Mac McKeown— _tireless cheerleaders and actual lifesavers;_ Ned Rust _and_ Jim Patterson, _big-hearted, clear-eyed champions;_ The Marina Bykova Literary Institute _and the ever-patient_ Vilma, Carlos, _and_ Angel; _dear ones_ : Alisa _and_ Chris Shadix, Mo Malone, Charles Albert, Camille Semeniuk, Serena Fritz-Cope, Zach Nadler, Marc Blucas, Debbi _and_ Jay Baum— _so much gratitude;_ Dr. Ira Sturman _and his entire surgical team;_ _the teams at_ Imagine, Charlesbridge, _and_ Penguin Random House; Elaine _and_ Edwin A. Wiggers, Jr. _for their deep generosity;_ Eric Guichard, _for riling me to action after that one summer in France;_ my family _and_ friends, _who said I should._ Contents 1. Cover 2. Title Page 3. Copyright 4. Dedication 5. Epigraph 6. Contents 7. Introduction 8. 1. "The Big One" (2015) 9. 2. Everything in New York Is a Little Bit Broken 10. 3. The Unbearable Brightness of Being 11. 4. Where the Hell Is My White Light? 12. 5. Angry Mothertrucker 13. 6. Oh, the Pie-rony... 14. 7. D-day 15. 8. The Cocktail Hour(s) 16. 9. Why Yes, I Am a Cyborg 17. 10. Dostoyevsky's Addiction 18. 11. When Mom Is a Werewolf 19. 12. Everything in New York Is a Little Bit Broken (Part 2) 20. 13. Unspeakable 21. 14. Get Your Freak On 22. 15. I Feel Bad About My Face 23. 16. Gotham Girl, Interrupted 24. 17. DNR 25. 18. A Love Letter from My Brain 26. 19. The New Rules of You 27. Epilogue: On Being a Narwhal 28. Acknowledgment
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88. 89. 90. 91. 92. 93. 94. 95. 96. 97. 98. 99. 100. 101. 102. 103. 104. 105. 106. 107. 108. 109. 110. 111. 112. 113. 114. 115. 116. 117. 118. 119. 120. 121. 122. 123. 124. 125. 126. 127. 128. 129. 130. 131. 132. 133. 134. 135. 136. 137. 138. 139. 140. 141. 142. 143. 144. 145. 146. 147. 148. 149. 150. 151. 152. 153. 154. 155. 156. 157. 158. 159. 160. 161. 162. 163. 164. 165. 166. 167. 168. 169. 170. 171. 172. 173. 174. 175. 176. 177. 178. 179. 180. 181. 182. 183. 184. 185. 186. 187. 188. 189. 190. 191. 192. 193. 194. 195. 196. 197. 198. 199. 200. 201. 202. 203. 204. 205. 206. 207.
1. Cover 2. Cover 3. Title Page 4. Table of Contents 5. Start </s>
Gibbs' Book of Architecture - Gibbs, James; # DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE ALADDIN "BUILT IN A DAY" HOUSE CATALOG, 1917, The Aladdin Co. (0-486-28591-X) CONCRETE COUNTRY RESIDENCES: Photographs and Floor Plans of Turn-of-the-Century Homes, Atlas Portland Cement Company. (0-486-42733-1) BADGER'S ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF CAST-IRON ARCHITECTURE, Daniel D. Badger. (0-486-24223-4) BENNETT'S SMALL HOUSE CATALOG, 1920, Ray H. Bennett Lumber Co., Inc. (0-486-27809-3) BICKNELL'S VICTORIAN BUILDINGS, A. J. Bicknell. (0-486-23904-7) THE GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA: History and Speculation, James Bonwick. (0-486-42521-5) ANCIENT EGYPTIAN CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURE, Somers Clarke and R. Engelbach. (0-486-26485-8) TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSE DESIGNS, William T. Comstock. (0-486-28186-8) THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL, Clarence Cook. (0-486-28586-3) GREAT BUILDINGS OF BOSTON, George M. Cushing, Jr. (0-486-24219-6) THE ARCHITECTURAL PLATES FROM THE "ENCYCLOPEDIE," Denis Diderot. (0-486-27954-5) THE ARCHITECTURE OF COUNTRY HOUSES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-22003-6)
VICTORIAN COTTAGE RESIDENCES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-24078-9) PRINCIPLES OF VICTORIAN DECORATIVE DESIGN, Christopher Dresser. (0-486-28900-1) PALLADIO'S ARCHITECTURE AND ITS INFLUENCE: A Photographic Guide, Joseph C. Farber and Henry Hope Reed. (0-486-23922-5) VICTORIAN HOUSES: A Treasury of Lesser-Known Examples, Edmund Gillon and Clay Lancaster. (0-486-22966-1) PHILADELPHIA THEATERS: A Pictorial Architectural History, Irvin R. Glazer. (0-486-27833-6) 117 HOUSE DESIGNS OF THE 20s, Gordon-Van Tine Co. (0-486-26959-0) MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE, Edward Warren Hoak and Willis Humphrey Church. (0-486-42231-3) FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S FALLINGWATER: The House and Its History, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-27430-6) UNDERSTANDING FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S ARCHITECTURE, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-28364-X) HOLLY'S PICTURESQUE COUNTRY SEATS, Henry Hudson Holly. (0-486-27856-5) LATE VICTORIAN HOUSE DESIGNS: 56 AMERICAN HOMES AND COTTAGES WITH FLOOR PLANS, D. S. Hopkins. (0-486-43598-8) VICTORIAN ORNAMENTAL CARPENTRY, Ben Karp. (0-486-24144-0)
GOTHICK ARCHITECTURE: A Reprint of the Original 1742 Treatise, Batty Langley and Thomas Langley. (0-486-42614-9) THE CITY OF TOMORROW AND ITS PLANNING, Le Corbusier. (Available in U.S. only.) (0-486-25332-5) THE OPULENT INTERIORS OF THE GILDED AGE: All 203 Photographs from "Artistic Houses," with New Text, Arnold Lewis, James Turner, and Steven McQuillin. (0-486-25250-7) THE ARCHITECTURE OF MCKIM, MEAD & WHITE IN PHOTOGRAPHS, PLANS AND ELEVATIONS, McKim, Mead, and White. (0-486-26556-0) BROADWAY THEATRES: History and Architecture, William Morrison (0-486-40244-4) THE BROWN DECADES: A Study of the Arts in America, 1865-1895, Lewis Mumford. (0-486-20200-3) PALLISER'S NEW COTTAGE HOMES, 1887, Palliser & Co. (0-486-42816-8) A CONCISE DICTIONARY OF ARCHITECTURAL TERMS, John Henry Parker. (0-486-43302-1) EMPIRE STYLEBOOK OF INTERIOR DESIGN: All 72 Plates from the "Recueil de decorations intérieures" with New English Text, Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine. (0-486-26754-7) AN ALBUM OF MAYA ARCHITECTURE, Tatiana Proskouriakoff. (0-486-42484-7)
SMALL HOUSES OF THE TWENTIES: The Sears, Roebuck 1926 House Catalog, Sears, Roebuck and Co. (0-486-26709-1) THE FIVE BOOKS OF ARCHITECTURE, Sebastiano Serlio. (0-486-24349-4) TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSES, COTTAGES AND VILLAS: Floor Plans and Line Illustrations for 118 Homes from Shoppell's Catalogs, R. W Shoppell et al. (0-486-24567-5) AMERICAN BARNS AND COVERED BRIDGES, Eric Sloane. (0-486-42561-4) MORE CRAFTSMAN HOMES, Gustav Stickley. (0-486-24252-8) PLANTATIONS OF THE CAROLINA LOW COUNTRY, Samuel Gaillard Stoney. (0-486-26089-5) FORM AND DESIGN IN CLASSIC ARCHITECTURE, Arthur Stratton. (0-486-43405-2) COUNTRY AND SUBURBAN HOMES OF THE PRAIRIE SCHOOL PERIOD, H. V. von Holst. (0-486-24373-7) BRIDGES OF THE WORLD: THEIR DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION, Charles S. Whitney. (0-486-42995-4) CALIFORNIA BUNGALOWS OF THE TWENTIES, Henry L. Wilson. (0-486-27507-8) Paperbound unless otherwise indicated. Available at your book dealer, online at www.doverpublications.com, or by writing to Dept. 23, Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, NY 11501. For current price information or for free catalogs (please indicate field of interest), write to Dover Publications or log on to www.doverpublications.com and see every Dover book in print. Each year Dover publishes over 500 books on fine art, music, crafts and needlework, antiques, languages, literature, children's books, chess, cookery, nature, anthropology, science, mathematics, and other areas.
Manufactured in the U.S.A. Gibbs' Book of Architecture An Eighteenth-Century Classic James GibbsBibliographical Note This Dover edition, first published in 2008, is an unabridged republication of the work originally published in London in 1728 under the title A Book of Architecture, Containing Designs of Buildings and Ornaments. Several of the plates have been slightly reduced to better accommodate the trim size. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gibbs, James, 1682–1754. [Book of architecture, containing designs of buildings and ornaments] Gibbs' book of architecture : an eighteenth-century classic / James Gibbs. p. cm. Originally published under title: A book of architecture, containing designs of buildings and ornaments: London : W. Innys and R. Manby, J. and P. Knapton, and C. Hitch, 1728. 9780486142340 1. Architecture—England—18th century—Designs and plans. 2. Decoration and ornament, Architectural—England—History—18th century—Designs and plans. I. Title. II. Title: Book of architecture.
NA966.G53 2008 720—dc22 2007052646 Manufactured in the United States of America Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, N.Y 11501 Table of Contents DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE Title Page Copyright Page TO HIS GRACE \- JOHN Dedication INTRODUCTION. A LIST OF THE SUBSCRIBERS. THE PLATES TO HIS GRACE JOHN Duke of Argyll and Greenwich, &c. One of his MAJESTY'S most Honourable Privy Council, Colonel of the QUEEN'S own Royal Regiment of Horse, General of the Foot, Master General of the Ordnance, and Knight of the most Noble Order of the Garter.DEDICATION. My LORD, THE early Encouragement I received from Your Grace, in my Profession, upon my Return from Italy, and the Honour of Your Protection ever since, give Your Name a just Title to all my Productions in this kind. AS several of the Designs here exhibited have had Your Grace's Approbation ; so Your Patronage will be a sufficient Recommendation to the whole Work. IT is a particular Pleasure to me that this Publication gives me an Opportunity to declare the real Sentiments of Gratitude and Respect with which I am,
My LORD, Your GRACE's Most Dutiful and most Obliged humble Servant, JAMES GIBBS. INTRODUCTION. WHAT is here presented to the Publick was undertaken at the instance of several Persons of Quality and others; and some Plates were added to what was at first intended, by the particular direction of Persons of great Distinction, for whose Commands I have the highest regard. They were of opinion, that fuch a Work as this would be of use to fuch Gentlemen as might be concerned in Building, especially in the remote parts of the Country, where little or no assistance for Designs can be procured. Such may be here furnished with Draughts of useful and convenient Buildings and proper Ornaments ; which may be executed by any Workman who understands Lines, either as here Design'd, or with some Alteration, which may be easily made by a person of Judgment ; without which a Variation in Draughts, once well digested, frequently proves a Detriment to the Building, as well as a Disparagement to the person that gives them. I mention this to caution Gentlemen from suffering any material Change to be made in their Designs, by the Forwardness of unskilful Workmen, or the Caprice of ignorant, assuming Pretenders.
SOME, for want of better Helps, have unfortunately put into the hands of common workmen, the management of Buildings of considerable expence ; which when finished, they have had the mortification to find condemned by persons of Tast, to that degree that sometimes they have been pull'd down, at least alter' d at a greater charge than would have procur'd better advice from an able Artist; or if they have stood, they have remained lasting Monuments of the Ignorance or Parsimoniousness of the Owners, or (it may be) of a wrong-judged Profuseness. WHAT heaps of Stone, and even Marble, are daily seen in Monuments, Chimneys, and other Ornamental pieces of Architecture, without the least Symmetry or Order ? When the fame or fewer Materials, under the conduct of a skilful Surveyor, would, in less room and with much less charge, have been equally (if not more) useful, and by Justness of Proportion have had a more grand Appearance, and consequently have better answered the Intention of the Expence. For it is not the Bulk of a Fabrick, the Richness and Quantity of the Materials, the Multiplicity of Lines, nor the Gaudiness of the Finishing, that give the Grace or Beauty and Grandeur to a Building ; but the Proportion of the Parts to one another and to the Whole, whether entirely plain, or enriched with a few Ornaments properly disposed.
IN order to prevent the Abuses and Absurdities above hinted at, I have taken the utmost care that these Designs should be done in the best Tast I could form upon the Instructions of the greatest Masters in Italy, as well as my own Observations upon the antient Buildings there, during many Years application to these Studies: For a cursory View of those August Remains can no more qualify the Spectator, or Admirer, than the Air of the Country can inspire him with the knowledge of Architecture. IF this Book prove useful in some degree answerable to the Zeal of my Friends in encouraging and promoting the Publication of it, I shall not think my Time mis-spent, nor my Pains ill bestow'd. I shall now proceed to give a short Explanation of the Plates as they stand in the Book.THE Church of St. Martin in the Fields, Westminster, being much decayed and in danger of falling, the Parishioners obtain'd an Act of Parliament for Rebuilding it at their own charges. The Commissioners appointed therein were pleased to make choice of me for Surveyor of that Work; and several Plans of different Forms being prepar'd and laid before them, they fix'd upon the following, as most proper for that Site. There were two Designs made for a Round Church, which were approved by the Commissioners, but were laid aside upon account of the expensiveness of executing them ; tho' they were more capacious and convenient than what they pitch'd upon : I have inserted them likewise in this Book. The Commissioners having sign'd the Plan agreed on, gave me orders to begin the Work; and every thing being ready for laying the Foundation, His Majesty was pleased to direct the Right Reverend the Bishop of Salisbury, then Lord Almoner, attended by Sir Thomas, Hewyt, then Surveyor General, to lay the first Stone of this Fabrick ; upon which was fix'd the following Inscription:
D. S. SERENISSIMUS REX GEORGIUS PER DEPUTATUM SUUM REVdum ADMODUM IN Xto PATREM RICHARDUM EPISCOP. SARISBUR. SUMMUM SUUM ELEEMOSYNARIUM ADSISTENTE (REGIS JUSSU) Dno THO. HEWYT EQU. AUR. ÆDIFICIORUM REGIORUM CURATORE PRINCIPALI PRIMUM HUJUS ECCLESIÆ LAPIDEM POSUIT MART II XIX° AN° Dni MDCXXI ANNOQUE REGNI SUI VIIIvo This Ceremony being over, I proceeded with the Building, and finished it in five Years; which, notwithstanding the great Oeconomy of the Commissioners, cost the Parish upwards of 32,000 Pounds. I have given here seven Plates of this Church. PLATE I. A Perspective View of it, taken from the South-West Corner, shewing the South Side and Weft Front, with the Steeple. PLATE II. The Geometrical Plan of the Church and Portico, shewing the Disposition of the whole Fabrick. PLATE III. The Weft Front and Steeple. PLATE IV. The East End, and the Section from South to North. PLATE V. The Section from East to West. PLATE VI. The Cieling of the Church and Portico. That of the Church is Elliptical, which I find by Experience to be much better for the Voice than the Semicircular, tho' not fo beautiful. It is divided into Pannels, enrich'd with Fret-work by Signori Artari and Bagutti, the best Fret-workers that ever came into England.
PLATE VII. The North Side of St. Martin's Church. PLATE VIII. The Plan of the first Draught of a Round Church, being 95 feet in Diameter. PLATE IX. The West Front and Steeple. PLATE X. The North Side. PLATE XI. The East End, and Section from South to North. PLATE XII. The Section of the Church and Steeple, from East to Weft. PLATE XIII. The Plan of the other Round Draught, being of the Ionick Order. PLATE XIV. The West Front and Steeple. PLATE XV. The South Side. The new Church in the Strand, called St. Mary le Strand, was the first publick Building I was employed in after my arrival from Italy; which being situated in a very publick place, the Commissioners for building the Fifty Churches (of which this is one) spar'd no cost to beautify it. It consists of two Orders, in the upper of which the Lights are placed; the Wall of the lower, being solid to keep out Noises from the Street, is adorned with Niches. I have given fix Plates of it. PLATE XVI. The Plans of the Under and Upper Orders. PLATE XVII. The Weft Front, with the Steeple.
PLATE XVIII. The East End. PLATE XIX. The South Side. PLATE XX. Part of the South Side upon a larger Scale, to shew the Parts more distinctly. PLATE XXI. A Perspective of the whole Building, shewing the South and West Fronts with the Steeple. There was at first no Steeple design'd for that Church, only a small Campanile, or Turret for a Bell, was to have been over the Weft End of it: But at the distance of 80 feet from the Weft Front there was a Column, 250 feet high, intended to be erected in Honour of Queen ANNE, on the top of which her Statue was to be placed. My Design for the Column was approved by the Commissioners, and a great quantity of Stone was brought to the place for laying the Foundation of it; but the thoughts of erecting that Monument being laid aside upon the Queen's Death, I was ordered to elect a Steeple instead of the Campanile first propos'd. The Building being then advanced 20 feet above ground, and therefore admitting of no alteration from East to Weft, which was only 14 feet, I was obliged to spread it from South to North, which makes the Plan oblong, which otherwise should have been square. I have given two Plates of another Design I made for this Church, more capacious than that now built: But as it exceeded the dimensions of the Ground allowed by Act of Parliament for that Building, it was laid aside by the Commissioners.
PLATE XXII. The Under and Upper Plans of the Two different Orders of the second Design. PLATE XXIII. The West End. Marybone Chapell was built at the charges of the Right Honourable the Earl and Countess of Oxford, for the Accommodation of the Inhabitants of the new Buildings in Marybone Fields. It is a plain Brick Building, except the Portico, Coines, Door-cases and the Venetian Window. The Cieling is handsomely adorned with Fret-work by Signori Artari and Bagutti. PLATE XXIV. The North Side , with the Plan in small. PLATE XXV. The Weft Front, and the Section from South to North. The Church of Allballows in Derby is a very large Fabrick, join'd to a fine Gothick Steeple. It is the more beautiful for having no Galleries, which, as well as Pews, clog up and spoil the Inside of Churches, and take away from that right Proportion which they otherwise would have, and are only justifiable as they are necessary. The plainness of this Building makes it less expensive, and renders it more suitable to the old Steeple. I have given two Plates of it.
PLATE XXVI. The South Side, and the Plan in small. PLATE XXVII. The East End and Section. PLATE XXVIII. The Steeple of St. Clement Danes, which is built upon an old Foundation, at the charges of the Parishioners. That part which is shaded is the new Addition, and that in Lines is the Weft End of the Church, and the Vestry. The Plan of the Steeple is added on this Plate. PLATE XXIX, XXX. These two Plates contain Six of many more Draughts of Steeples made for St. Martin's Church, with their Plans. PLATE XXXI. Five Draughts of Steeples made for St. Mary le Strand, with their Plans. Steeples are indeed of a Gothick Extraction; but they have their Beauties, when their Parts are well dispos'd, and when the Plans of the several Degrees and Orders of which they are compos'd gradually diminish, and pass from one Form to another without confusion, and when every Part has the appearance of a proper Bearing. King's College at Cambridge is now building by order of the Reverend Dr. Snape, Provost of that College, and of the Fellows thereof. The Provost, then Vice-Chancellor, laid the First Stone of this Fabrick. It is built of Portland Stone, and is detach'd from the Chapell as being a different kind of Building, and also to prevent damage by any accident of Fire. The Court could not be larger than is express'd in the Plan, because I found, upon measuring the Ground, that the South-East Corner of the intended East Side of the Building came upon Trumpington-Street. This College, as design'd, will consist of Four Sides, (viz) The Chapell, a beautiful Building of the Gothick Tast, but the finest I ever saw; opposite to which is propos'd the Hall, with a Portico. On one fide of the Hall is to be the Provost's Lodge, with proper Apartments: On the other side are the Buttry, Kitchin and Cellars, with Rooms over them for Servitors. In the Weft Side, fronting the River, now built, are 24 Apartments, each consisting of three Rooms and a vaulted Cellar. The East Side is to contain the like number of Apartments.
PLATE XXXII. The General Plan of the new Building, with the Chapell. PLATE XXXIII. The Weft Side fronting the River, and the Front of the Hall. PLATE XXXIV. The middle part of the West Side, upon a larger Scale. PLATE XXXV. The Sections of the Hall, which is 40 feet wide, 80 feet long and 40 feet high, to be finish'd in Stucco. PLATE XXXVI. The Publick Building at Cambridge, of which I have given but one Plate ; the Front in Perspective, and the Plan in small over it. It consists of a Library, the Consistory, Register Office and Senate-House. The latter is already built with Portland Stone, as the rest of the Building is to be. It is of the Corinthian Order having all its Members enrich'd; the Cieling and Inside-Walls are beautify'd by Signori Artari and Bagutti. PLATE PLATE XXXVII. The Plan and the two Fronts of a House design'd for a Person of Quality in Somer set shire. It is 143 feet in Front and 102 in the End-Fronts. You rife by ten Steps into a Hall of 30 feet by 40 and 20 feet high; and right forward there is a Cube-Room of 30 feet, which has on each fide a handsome Apartment 18 feet high. On each fide the Hall there is a Parlour and a Passage of Communication to a Stone Stair-case: The first Landing of which gives access to Intersoles over the Closets, and the second to the upper Rooms. The Parlour on the right leads to the Chapell, and that on the left to two other Rooms. The Fronts are to be of rough Stone finish'd with Stucco, but the Ornaments of the Windows, Doors, Coines, Cornishes and other Projections, of an excellent Stone dug near the place. The principal Front commands a fine Prospect of the Severne, and the Garden-Front a beautiful view of the Park.
PLATE XXXVIII. A Draught made for William Hanbury, Esq; for a House now building in Northamptonshire. You rife four Steps and enter a Lobby of 13 by 18 feet, and thence pass into a Room of 25 feet by 22, and 22 feet high, which has at each end a Room of 25 by 20 feet. On each fide the Lobby there is a Stair-case, and off of the Stairs a Room of 16 by 20 feet: Over this there are two Stories of Lodging Rooms, and under it convenient Offices all arch'd, and on each fide of the Court the Kitchin and Stables. The Front extends 84. feet by 46, and is to be built of Brick and the Ornaments of Stone. PLATE XXXIX. The Plan and Upright of the Right Honourable the Earl of Litchfield 's House at Ditchley in Oxfordshire. Here are ten Rooms on a Floor, besides two great Stairs and four Back-Stairs. You ascend ten Steps and enter a Hall of 31 feet 6 inches by 35 feet 2 inches, and 34 feet high, enrich'd with Fret-work and Painting. From the Hall you go into a Dining-Room towards the Garden of 23 feet by 31 feet 6 inches, which has a handsome Apartment upon the right hand, and on the left a Withdrawing-Room and a large Room of 36 feet by 21, with a Closet and Back-Stairs. On each fide of the Hall there is a good Apartment, as likewise great Stairs, that lead up to the Chamber-Floor, and over that an Attick Story. The Kitchin-Offices are on one fide of the House, and the Stables on the other, join'd by circular cover'd Passages to the House. The House and Offices are built with an excellent Stone dug in that neighbourhood.
PLATE XL. A Villa built for his Grace the Duke of Argyll at Sudbrooke near Richmond in Surrey, joining to New-Park. Here is a Cube-Room of 30 feet, handsomely adorn'd and lighted from two Portico's. It has two Apartments off of it, and over them Lodging Rooms. There are Vaults and other Offices under-ground. This House is built of Brick, except the Ornaments, which are of Portland Stone. PLATE XLI. The Plan and two Fronts of a large House for a Gentleman in the County of York, 230 feet in Front and 130 feet in the End-Fronts. You rise 10 feet by an easy ascent to the principal Floor and enter a Hall 36 feet square, having an Apartment on each hand, and a Passage 8 feet wide, that gives a Communication between the Great Stairs and Back-Stairs. Right forward from the Hall there is a Salon of 36 feet by 60, and 36 feet high, lighted from Courts 36 feet square, and beyond the Salon a Gallery 102 feet in length and 25 in breadth, with an Apartment at each end. In the middle of each End-Front there is a large Room, one for a Chapell and the other for a Library. This Story is 20 feet high, and underneath are convenient Offices 10 feet high, and over the grand Apartments good Lodging Rooms 15 feet high, cov'd , with a convenient Passage of Communication to render all the Rooms private. This Building is of the Corinthian Order, rais'd on a Rustick Basement.
PLATE XLII. The Plan and Upright of a House 100 feet in Front and 70 feet deep. Here is a Hall of 30 feet by 32, and 15 feet high; and on each hand of it is a Room of 20 feet by 22, off of which there is a Closet, and a Passage that gives a Communication to the Offices. Straight forward from the Hall is a Dining-Room of the same dimensions with it, having on one fide a Withdrawing-Room, and a Bedchamber on the other. There are two Stair-Cases leading up to two Rooms of the same dimensions with the Hall and Salon, but double the height, cov'd and adorn'd with Fret-work. On each side of these Rooms are alcov'd Bedchambers, and over them four other Apartments. PLATE XLIII. A Draught of a House made for a Gentleman in 1720. The Front is 71 feet by 54. in depth. Here is an Octagon Hall, on the right hand of which there is a Parlour and on the left the great Stairs. Right forward from the Hall there is a Dining Room of 28 feet by 25, having a Withdrawing-Room and Back-Stairs on one fide and a Library on the other. This Story is 14 feet high, and the Rooms over them are 18 feet, and cov'd. The Fronts are uncommon, but have a good effect.
PLATE XLIV. The Plan, Front and Section of a House made for a Gentleman in the fame Year, being 91 feet square. You ascend to a Portico of the Corinthian Order by 12 Steps, and enter a Hall of 22 feet by 33 and 20 feet high, and right forward an Octagon Salon of 33 feet and 40 feet high, lighted by Semicircular Windows as express'd in the Section. Beyond the Salon is a Withdrawing Room of the fame dimensions with the Hall. At each end of the Hall and Withdrawing-Room there are Rooms 22 feet square, with Closets 10 feet 6 inches by 15 feet, and Intersoles over them. The Octagon Room may be private or publick at pleasure, because of the Passages of Communication betwixt the Hall and Withdrawing-Room. The Bedchambers over this Floor are also render'd very convenient by Passages, which are lighted by round Openings in the Freeze of the great Room. PLATE XLV. The Plan, Front and Section of a House design'd for a Gentleman in the Country. The Front is 36 by 95 feet deep. You rife by 12 Steps to a Portico, and then enter a Hall of 30 feet by 22, and go straight forward into a Salon of 55 feet by 33 and 40 feet high, lighted from above by 16 Windows; the Sides of the Salon are adorn'd with Pilasters, Niches, Figures and other Ornaments. From it you pass into a Withdrawing-Room towards the Garden, of the fame dimensions with the Hall. There are four noble Apartments on this Floor, each consisting of an Antichamber, Bedchamber and Closet, and Intersoles over the Closets. All the Rooms on this Floor (except the Salon and Closets) are 20 feet high. There are two Stone Stair-cases that lead to the upper Apartments which are 11 feet high; and are render'd private by Passages of Communication between the Stair-cases (express'd by the prick'd Lines upon the Plan) which are lighted from the Freeze of the Salon.
PLATE XLVI. A House intended to have been built at Greenwich in 1720. on a beautiful Situation. It is 130 feet in front by 90 feet deep, rais'd 5 feet above the level of a Court of 50 by 186 feet. You ascend 10 Steps to a Portico, and then enter a Salon of 35 by 30 feet, and 30 feet high; on each Side of which there is a very handsome Apartment. From the Salon you pass forward to a Gallery of 25 buy 76 feet, at each end of which there is an Apartment. There are great Stairs on each fide of the Salon, and a large Room of 22 by 25 feet in the middle of the End Fronts: The Rooms on the principal Floor are 18 feet high, and the Lodging Rooms over them 13 feet. This House was propos'd to have been built with Portland Stone, and finish-d in a very expensive manner. PLATE XLVII. The two Fronts of the foregoing Plan, of the Ionick Order. PLATE XLVIII. The Plan of a House made for the Right Honourable Earl Fitzwilliams to be built at Milton near Peterborough. It is 144 feet in front by 105 feet in depth, and consists of 12 Rooms on a Floor, besides four Closets, two Great Stair-cases and four Back Stair-cases: Here is a large Salon in Front, a Dining-Room towards the Garden and four noble Apartments, besides a Chapell and a large Billiard, Room. You either enter the House upon the Level of the Court, or ascend from the Court to the principal Floor by Outside-Stairs; and from the Garden in the fame manner. I have given two Plans of the House on this Plate; the principal Floor, which is 15 feet high, and that of the Offices underneath. PLATE
PLATE XLIX. The Garden-Front of the foregoing Design, and the Section of it from the Fore-Front to the Back-Front; shewing the finishing of the Salon, and of the rest of the Rooms within the line of this Section. PLATE L. Another Draught which I made for the fame noble Lord, without the projecting Closets and Stairs. It is 168 feet in front by 75 feet in depth, and has the fame number of Rooms and Conveniencies as the other, only varied in form and order. PLATE LI. The Front of the last Plan towards the Court, being of the Ionic Order, raised on a Rustick Basement 15 feet high. PLATE LII. A Draught made for Edward Rolt, Esq; for a House intended to have been built in Seacomb-Park in Herfsordshire; but the Execution of it was prevented by his Death. It is 36 feet in front and 72 feet deep. You ascend by 14 Steps to a Hall of 21 by 31 feet, and from thence enter a double Cube 30 feet wide, 30 feet high, and 60 feet long. It has four good Apartments, and publick Rooms in the middle of each End-Front. The upper Plan fhews the Lodging Rooms one pair of Stairs, which are all made private by a common Passage between the Stairs.
PLATE LIII. The Front of the foregoing Plan, of the Ionick Order, rais'd on a Rustick Basement, with a regular Entablature round the whole Building. The Ornaments of the Outer Doors and Windows, the Columns, Entablature, Coines and Basement, were propos'd to be of Portland Stone, and the rest of Brick. PLATE LIV. The Plan and Front of a Design made for a Person of Quality in 1720. From the Hall you enter between a double Stair-case into a Dining-Room richly adorn'd, having a handsome Apartment on each Hand. The Stairs are lighted from above. PLATE PLATE LV. A Draught made for Matthew Prior, Esq; to have been built at Down Hall in Essex. It is 63 feet in front by 43 feet in depth. From a Court of 90 feet by 78 you ascend three Steps and enter through an arch'd Portico into a Hall 25 feet square, which leads into a Parlour and Withdrawing-Room on one hand, and a Library on the other, with Great and Back-Stairs. The Room over the Hall is a Cube of 25 feet, and has a Bedchamber and Closet on one fide, and two Rooms, each 16 feet square, on the other, as mark'd by prick'd Lines. The Cube Room is lighted on two fides from two Portico's of the Dorick Order. The Offices are on each fide of the Court, having a cover'd Communication from the House by an Arcade. Mr. Prior's Death prevented the building of this House.
PLATE LVI. A Draught made for a Gentleman in Wiltshire. It contains fix Rooms on a Floor, besides four Closets and two Stair-cases. The Offices are on each fide of the Court, which is of an Octagonal form. The Fronts are of Brick. The Coines, Ornaments of the Windows, Fascia's and Cornish are of Stone. PLATE LVII. A House Design'd for a Gentleman in the Country, extending 101 feet in front by 64 in depth. You rife 8 Steps from a Court 160 feet square, and enter a Hall of 25 feet by 35, and pass forward into a Gallery 70 feet long and 22 feet wide, having Closets at each end. The Gallery may be divided into three Rooms upon occasion. On each fide of the Hall there are Rooms of 20 by 22 feet, and Closets, with Passages to the Offices, and two Stair cafes that lead up to fix Rooms and eight Closets one pair of Stairs, and to the fame number of Rooms over them. The principal Floor is 16 feet high, the second 14, and the upper 8. PLATE LVIII. A Design made for a Gentleman in Dorsetshire. It is 77 feet in front and 44 feet deep, having fix Rooms on a Floor, with Closets and two Stair-cases. The Offices are on each fide of an Octagonal Court. PLATE
PLATE LIX. A Design made for the Right Honourable the Earl of Ilay for his villa at Whitton near Hampton Court. It is 82 feet in front by 56 in depth. From a Portico of 30 feet by 10 you enter a Room of 30 feet by 40 and 30 feet high; on each fide of which there is an Apartment. This Building is of the Ionick Order. The Portico, Windows, Fascia's, Entablature, and all the projecting parts were propos'd to be of Stone, and the rest of Brick finish'd over with Stucco. PLATE LX. The Plan of the second Floor, and a Section of the foregoing Design. There are four Bedchambers, two Closets and two Stair-cases on this Plan. The great Room goes two Stories high, as is express'd by the Section by which the height of the other Rooms are likewise shown. PLATE LXI. Two Plans and a Front of a little House proposed to my Lord Ilay for the fame place. Out of a Porch you enter a Room of 20 feet by 40 and 20 feet high; beyond which there are two Rooms of 14 feet by 18 and 9 feet in height, with a Stair-case betwixt them that leads to Rooms over them of the fame dimensions. Upon the 2 pair of Stairs Floor and over the large Room are 4 Rooms 10 feet high. The lower Plan shews the under-ground Story. The Kitchin is in a Court at one end of the House, and the Servants Hall at the other, with a Passage of Communication through the House. The Chimneys of the Kitchin and Servants Hall are carried into the Wall of the House, and the Roof of them is skreen'd by a Wall 10 feet high. Besides three Vaults under the great Room, there are Rooms below for the Housekeeper and other Conveniencies. The Fronts are proposed to be of Brick, plaister'd over, and all the projecting parts to be of Stone.
PLATE LXII. Another Design for Whitton, 72 feet in front by 43. I have given two Plans and a Front of it upon this Plate. You ascend five Steps into a Portico, and thence go into an arch'd Salon of 20 feet by 40, and 25 feet high, lighted from the Fore and Back-Fronts, by Semicircular Lights, and two Windows one on each fide of the Door. There are four Rooms with Closets off of the Salon, and four more over them, with two Stair-cases. The Offices under-ground are manag' d as in the foregoing Draught; as also the Kitchen and Servants Hall, which are in Courts without-doors. PLATE LXIII. A House of 58 by 44 feet, containing fix Rooms on a Floor, with two Stair-cases. The Kitchin is on one fide of the Court, and the Stables on the other, with Rooms over them, and are join'd to the house by circular Arcades. The Rooms on the principal Floor are 12 feet high. The Front is plain, with Architraves round the Windows. The Design was made for a Gentleman in Yorkshire. PLATE LXIV. A Draught done for a Gentleman in Essex. I have given on this Plate the general Plan of it, and two Fronts. From a Court of 115 feet by 93, the Angles sweeping off, you ascend by five Steps into a Hall of 28 feet by 22, and pass forward to a Dining-Room of 18 feet by 28 towards the Garden, having on the right a Withdrawing-Room, a Bedchamber and Dressing Room, and on the left a Waiting Room and a Library of 30 feet by 18. The Body of the house is only 73 feet by 47, the Bedchamber and Closet on one fide, and the Library on the other, going only one Story high. The Rooms on the principal Floor are 16 feet high, and the Chamber Story over them is 12 feet high. On each fide of the Hall, there is a Stair-case, and also a Room out of which you go through a Dorick Colonnade to the Offices on each fide of the Court.
PLATE LXV. The Plan and Front of a house of fix Rooms on a Floor with two Stair-cases, made for a Gentleman in Oxfordshire. The principal Rooms are 16 feet high, and the Chamber Story 11. PLATE LXVI. A Design of a house for a single Gentleman, 61feet in front and 33 feet deep. The Hall is 14. feet 6 inches by 24 feet, in which is the Stair-case. Beyond that is a Dining-Room of 24 feet by 18, having two Rooms at each end. On the next Floor there are seven small Lodging Rooms, all private. The Ornaments of the Fronts are of Stone, and the rest of Brick. PLATE LXVII. The Plan, Upright and Section of a Building of the Dorick Order in form of a Temple, made for a Person of Quality, and propos'd to have been placed in the Center of four Walks; so that a Portico might front each Walk. Here is a large Octagonal Room of 22 feet and 26 feet high, adorn'd with Niches and crown'd with a Cupola. All the Ornaments of the Inside are to be of Plaister, and the Outside of Stone. PLATE LXVIII. A Design of a Building for the Right Honourable the Earl of Oxford's Bowling-Green at Down-Hall in Essex. I have here given two Plans, a Front and Section of it; that on the right hand is the Ground-Plan; the Middle part to be open, for Shelter in cafe of Rain, having a Closet on one fide, and a Stair-case on the other. Over this Plan is the Front: The Rustick Arcade, Coines, Niches, Venetian Windows, and Modillion-Cornish to be of Stone. The Plan upon the left shews the Story one pair of Stairs, wherein there is a Room of 27 feet by 20, and 25 feet high, having a Closet, or little Withdrawing Room, within it of 10 by 20 feet. There are two Venetian Windows to the great Room, and one at each end of the Building which light the Closet and the Stair-case.
PLATE LXIX. Two other Pavillions propos'd for the fame place; the one is an Octagon Room of 30 feet, with a Closet on one fide, and on the other a Stair-case, which leads to the Waiting Rooms underneath. The other is a Cube of 25 feet, having a Waiting Room on one fide, and a Closet on the other. The Fronts of both were to be plain Brick-work; the Cornish, Window-cases and Door-cases to be of Stone. PLATE LXX. A Pavillion design'd for Sir John Curzon for his Seat near Derby. It is a Cube of 20 feet, adorn'd with three Venetian Windows, circular Niches for Busto's, and an Entablature supported by Rustick Coines. There were two of them to have been built opposite to one another, on each fide of a Vista proposed to be cut through a Wood, and to be terminated with an Obelisque upon a Hill fronting the House; the execution of which was prevented by Sir John's Death. PLATE LXXI. The Plan, Upright and Section of a Room built by the Honourable James Johnston Esq; at Twickenham, being 30 feet over, and 34 feet high, richly adorn'd by Artari and Bagutti with Fret Work, and the proper Ornaments gilt. It is built with Brick and Stone.
PLATE LXXII. A circular Building in form of a Temple, 20 feet in Diameter, having a Peristylium round it of the Dorick Order, and adorn'd with a Cupola ; erected in his Grace the Duke of Bolton's Garden at Hackwood , upon the upper ground of an Amphitheatre, back'd with high Trees that render the Prospect of the Building very agreeable. PLATE LXXIII. Two Uprights of another Pavillion built at Hackwood. The Rustick Front looks upon a fine piece of Water, and the other on a beautiful Parterre. PLATE LXXIV. The Plan and Section of the foregoing Pavillion. PLATE LXXV. The Plan, Upright and Section of a Pavillion for the Right Honourable the Lord Viscount Cobham in his Garden at Stow in Buckinghamshire. PLATE LXXVI. Another Design for two Pavillions at Stow; both built of Stone in the fame form without; but within the one is an Octagon Room of 24 feet, the other is divided into Rooms, and made a Dwelling-house for a Gentleman. PLATES LXXVII, LXXVIII. Eight square Pavillions for my Lord Cobham and others.
PLATE LXXIX. Four Summer-houses in form of Temples, Design'd for several persons. PLATE LXXX, LXXXI. Eight more of an Octagon form. PLATE LXXXII. Two Seats for the ends of Walks. PLATE LXXXIII. Two other Seats for the fame purpose. PLATE LXXXIV. Two Draughts of a Building for the Menagery at Hackwood The Portico of the one is with Arches, and the other with Columns; having a Room at each end, and two Rooms behind for the person that looks after the Pheasants. That with the Columns is built. PLATE LXXXV. Three Draughts of Obelisques. The Antients have left us in the dark as to the Proportion of these Ornaments with respect to their Height. Those at Rome being all different, there can be no Rule taken from them. I have in these Draughts shewn three different Proportions for them; viz. 8, 7, and 6 times the bigness at the Bottom to the Height. The first (tho' nearest to that before St. Peter's) appearing too high, and the last too low, I should recommend the other, as a Medium between the two Extreams; as likewise the following Rules to be observed in forming them; viz. The Obelisque to diminish one Third, the Diamond Point to form a Rectangle, the Base to be in height half the thickness of the Bottom of the Obelisque, and the Base, Pedestal and Plinth to be three times that Thickness.
PLATE LXXXVI. Three Draughts of Obelisques, more ornamental than the former: They keep the fame Proportion with them; only that upon the left hand has four times the thickness of the Obelisque at bottom to the height of its Pedestal, because of the Ornaments upon it. The top-part may be made in the manner here drawn, or with other Ornaments at discretion. The Antients never placed their Obelisques upon moulded Bases; but Dominico Fontana and others have placed them upon Bases, which, in my opinion, is a great addition to their beauty; however that may be done or not at pleasure. PLATE LXXXVII. Three Designs for Columns, proper for publick Places or private Gardens; viz. a plain Dorick Column upon its Pedestal with a Vase a-top, a fluted Column properly adorn'd, and a Rustick frosted Column, with a Figure a-top, as I have made them for several Gentlemen. The Proportions of them are mark'd upon an upright Line, divided into so many Diameters of the Column for the Height. PLATE LXXXVIII. Six Draughts of Peers for Gates, and three Designs of Iron-work betwixt them.
PLATE LXXXIX· Two other Designs of Peers, with Iron-work. PLATE XC· Two Designs for Peers and Iron-work for large Courts. PLATE XCI. Three Draughts of Chimney-pieces, with Ornaments over them for Pictures, done for several Gentlemen. PLATE XCII. Three Designs of Chimneys done for Mess. Clark and Young at Rowhampton. PLATES XCIII, XCIV, XCV, XCVI, XCVII. Thirty eight Designs of Chimney-pieces, done for several places. PLATES XCVIII, XCIX. The Proportions of Gates and Doors, square or arch'd, according to the five Orders of Architecture. PLATES C, CI, CII, CIII, CIV, CV, CVI, CVII. Twenty four Draughts of Door-cases made for several places; some to the proportion of twice the width to the height, and others to twice the width and a sixth Part. PLATE CVIII. Nine Designs for Windows; some made to the proportion of twice the width to the height, and others to twice the width and a sixth. PLATE CIX. Nine Draughts of Niches differently dress'd: Their Proportion is the width to the height. PLATE CX. Two round Windows made for the Pediments of St. Martin's Church; the lower one is executed.
PLATE CXI. The Monument of his Grace John Duke of Newcastle, in Westminster-Abbey. The Design is very grand, and executed at a great expence; the Marbles are rich, and the Figures well perform'd. This Draught was pitched upon amongst many others made for this Monument, and was executed by Mr. Francis Bird, the Sculptor. PLATE CXII. The Monument of Matthew Prior, Esq; in Westminster-Abby. The Marbles are very good, and the Masonry is well perform'd. The Figures, representing the Muse Clio on one side, and History on the other, with the Boys a-top, are very well perform'd by Mr. Rysbrack, an an excellent Sculptor. Mr. Prior's Busto was done at Paris by M. Coizivaux, Sculptor to the King of France. PLATE CXIII. A Monument now making to the Memory of Edward Colston, Esq; to be erected at Bristol. The Figures are by Mr. Rysbrack. PLATE CXIV. A Monument erected at Bolsover in Derbyshire, by the Right Honourable the Earl and Countess of Oxford, to the Memory of Henry Duke of Newcastle, and others of the Cavendishe Family buried there.
PLATE CXV. A Monument for Mrs. Catharina Bovey, placed in Westminster-Abby. The Figures are very well handled by Mr. Rysbrack. PLATE CXVI. A Design for a Monument for His Grace the late Duke of Buckingham. PLATE CXVII. A Monument for a Gentleman in the Country. PLATE CXVIII. A Monument for a Noble Lord and Lady, executed with some variation. PLATE CXIX. A Design of a Monument for a Person of Quality. PLATE CXX. A Monument erected in Westminster-Abby for the Right Honourable the Marchioness of Annandale. PLATE CXXI. A Monument set up by Montague-Gerrard Drake, Esq; in the Church of Agmondesham, for his Father and Mother. PLATE CXXII. Three Monuments. The middlemost is Mr. Smith's in Westminster-Abby ; the Figure and Medal done by Mr. Rysbrack. The two others are done in the Country; the one for a Lady, the other for a Gentleman. PLATE CXXIII. Three Monuments: The middle one is Sir John Bridgman's set up at Ashton in Warwickshire, and the others for two Ladies. PLATE CXXIV. Three Monuments: The middle one is Ben. Johnson's, erected at the charge of the Right Honourable the Earl of Oxford, in Westminster-Abby ; that upon the right was design'd for another Poet, and the other for Mr. Wanley, his Lordship's Librarian.
PLATE CXXV. Three Monuments made for the Country. PLATE CXXVI. Three Monuments Design'd for several places. PLATE CXXVII. Three Monuments with Pyramids: The middle one is fet up for Robert Stuart, Esq; in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster. PLATES CXXVIII, CXXIX. Six Compartments for Monumental Inscriptions, upon black Marble grounds. PLATES CXXX, CXXXI, CXXXII. Nine large Compartments for Inscriptions, or Coats of Arms. PLATES CXXXIII, CXXXIV, CXXXV. Eighteen small Compartments for Monumental Inscriptions. PLATES CXXXVI, CXXXVII. Sixteen Designs for Sarcophagus's, or Monumental Urns, in the Antique Tast. PLATE CXXXVIII. Three Designs for Vases, done for the Right Honourable the Earl of Oxford. There are two Vases well executed in Portland Stone according to the middle Draught, which are set upon two large Peers on each fide of the principal Walk in the Garden at Wimpole in Cambridgeshire. PLATES CXXXIX, CXL, CXLI, CXLII, CXLIII, CXLIV. Fifty four Draughts of Vases, &c. in the Antique manner, made for several persons at different times. Many of them have been executed both in Marble and Metal.
PLATE CXLV. Eight Draughts of Marble Cisterns for Buffets. PLATE CXLVI. Six other Cisterns rais'd upon Pedestals, which may also serve for Fonts. PLATE CXLVII. Eight Designs for Marble or Stone Tables, for Gardens or Summer-Houses. PLATES CXLVIII, CXLIX. Eighteen Designs for Pedestals of Dyals. In my Opinion it is much better for Gentlemen to have Pedestals of this fort, than to have their Dyals supported by Figures, unless they be very well executed: These may be done by a common Workman, and are equally useful and less expensive. PLATE CL. Fifteen Pedestals for Busto's. A LIST OF THE SUBSCRIBERS. A. DUKE of Argyll, &c. Duke of Athol. Earl of Abingdon. Earl of Aberdeen. Earl of Aylesford. Alexander Abercrombie, Esq; Mr. William Adams, Architect. Mr. William Aikman. James Anderson, M. A. Mr. John Anderson, Merchant. Mr. John Andrews. Sir John Anstruther, Bart. Col. Philip Anstruther. Andrew Archer, Esq; Thomas Archer, Esq; Richard Arnold, Esq; Mr. David Audfsley. Sir John Austen, Bart. George Aylworth, Esq; B. DUKE of Beaufort.
Duke of Bolton. Duke of Bedford. Marquis of Blandford. Lord Bolingbroke. Lord Bathurst. Lord Bingley. Lord Byron. Lord Binning. Thomas-Sclater Bacon, Esq; Sir Walter-Wagstaffe Bagot, Bart. Mr. John Bagutty. John Barber, Esq; Mr. John Barnes. Sir John Barrington, Bart. Mr. John Basset. Mr. John Bates. Benjamin Bathurst, Esq; Thomas Beake, Esq; Mr. Daniel Bell. Richard Bellasyse, Esq; Mr. John Belshaw. Mr. Bennet, Carpenter. Benjamin Benson, Esq; Hon. Col. Henry Berkeley. Hon. Henry Bertie, Esq; Dr. John Betsworth. Mr. Richard Billinghurft. Mr. Francis Bird. Stephen Bisse, Esq; Major General Bisfet. Martin Bladen, Esq; Mr. John Blake. Mr. John Blow. Charles Bodenham, Esq; The Bodleyan Library. Dennis Bond, Esq; John Boulter, Esq; George Bowes, Esq; William Bowles, Esq; Sir Roger Bradfhaigh, Bart. Orlando Bridgeman, Esq; Mrs. Bridgeman of Hanover-Square. Mr. Charles Bridgeman. John Brinsden, Esq; Robert Bristow, Esq; Sir Charles Buck, Bart. Alexander Burne, Esq; Mr. Thomas Bufs C. DUKE of Chandos. Marquis of Carmarthen. Earl of Cardigan. Earl of Carlifle.

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