Friends of Hollis Hawthorne, Injured In India & Needs Help Returning

guest post by Chicken John

Hollis

So our friend Hollis Hawthorne (who’s part of the bicycle dance team The Bay Area Dérailleurs) falls off a motorcycle in India while exploring the planet. Hits her head and tumbles into a coma. Sad. Scary. Mom flies over, hospitals, information gets passed around… and this thing happens. I’ve seen it before. It’s amazing. Activation. People activate. It’s almost like a hive mind thing. It’s like: boom. All business. Someone found a program at Stanford Medical Center for head injuries that she qualifies for. The program is free. Hollis has no medical insurance. So we just needed to get her from India to Stanford. She would ride in an air ambulance.

$150,000 meter on that cab ride. So fundraising started on Monday.

Today we are somewhere between $60 and $70 thousand dollars.

Huh?

We have collected over a thousand donations from $1 to $5,000. It’s incredible. But that’s not the juiciest part. We contacted the Motorcycle Association. Someone knew someone that was part of that group. Someone else was the ex-boyfriend of the lobbyist of the Head Injury Association. Someone from Senator Dianne Finesteins office called asking if we need a jet that Bank of America’s has jets and are looking for good press… maybe they can donate. Knows a guy. In our small community, we were able to find plane people, doctors, lawyers, lobbyists, immigration people, fundraisers… on and on. I’ve got the cell phone of the #7 guy at Paypal. There isn’t anyone we don’t have access to. Really.

Hollis cast the chains of her respirator aside yesterday, and today is banging out 24 breaths a minute. She forgot how to breathe for a bit. Hopefully in a minute, she’ll remember to wake up. Stretch her legs. Complain about the food. (is hospital food in India terrible? Can that even be possible?) We are all hopeful. She’s young, strong. Did a lotta yoga and all that crap. I think that stuff matters.

It’s just an inspiring and amazing thing to watch unfold. It’s like basic Chaos… possibility turning into actual with no blueprint. And the most beautiful part is that it’s all action and people and emails and donations and 7 fundraisers to be booked and shows and dinners and art auctions and blogs and facebook and mailing lists and on and on and on and on……. all happening whilst this delicate little flower just lays sleeping. A slightly Elven look to her… you could almost see pointy ears tucking out from her hat. Trucks being loaded and unloaded, banks changing money, DJ’s blaring that awful music, artists feverishly applying paint to canvas, the stages being set up, the bloggers ticking away on their laptops in a café, signs being painted, people standing in front of the benefit shows smoking, 20 million phone calls… all this chaos in a million different directions costing billions and billions of calories, and in the center: this peaceful creature. Snoring.

To donate something to Hollis to reach the $150,000 goal to bring her home, or to check in on her, please visit the blog that has been set up:

friendsofhollis.blogspot.com

Or write something here in the comment section. Thanks to everyone who kicked down. It’s really just amazing.

And I’d like to leave you with this:

“The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.”

Friedrich Nietzsche

UPDATE: “This just in, if you give today before 6:00, a donor known only as Mr. Dragon will match your donation… up to $3,000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Please put “Dragon match” in your donation note field… Thank you, Mr. Dragon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Please add your donations to the comments, so we can keep trackk. At this rate, Hollis will be home for dinner on Monday!!!!!!!!!!!!!

photo by unknown

Chicken John
Chicken John