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| "Not long ago I was sitting on the front steps thinking about life. The porch has chairs and a swing, but I'm always more comfortable when the Earth and me are at eye level." from the essay"Are We There Yet" published in Beginnings, edited by Linsey Elder, 1998.
Judith K. Witherow is a poet, essayist and storyteller. A Native American raised in rural Appalachian poverty, she writes about her life experiences with disability, gender, sexual orientation, race and class from a perspective influenced by her early heritage. |
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"...the articles that I write are about race, class, culture, and sexual orientation. I always mention that I'm Native American. I always mention poverty, because I think it's important that people see it, and read it, and know about it. I don't like it when people say 'we already know about that' or 'we've already dealt with that.' No, you haven't. A lot of people who read this have never experienced this." from "Judith Witherow: A Storyteller" by Carol Anne Douglas, off our backs, January, 1999.
"You People. Every time I hear those ignoble words used I know it isn't going to be good....When you hear those words from birth on, as part of your name, you know which rung of the ladder you're standing on.
'You People should have indoor plumbing. How can you stand that outhouse?' 'You People need to have electricity and running water.' 'Your house looks so small. How many of You People sleep in one bed?' (I shared a bed with two sisters, and in the winter our body heat was probably the only thing that kept us from freezing to death). 'Why don't You People paint your house?' Gee, poverty makes you so damned dumb that none of these things ever occurs to you. Someone pointing them out is like a giant wake-up slap on the forehead." from 'Strained Class Windows,' an article in Sojourner, January, 1994 |
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| A place Judith called home,1950's |
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Judith describes the hunger and cold of being poor in America in brutally honest first person accounts. She suffered along with her five siblings and parents the effects of malnutrition and industrial poisoning as well as various problems with their small town neighbors.
"On closets: The houses I grew up in didn't have any. Instead there were cut down broomsticks wedged into the corner. We did have a dirt floor cellar, but 'coming out' from that doesn't sound quite as elegant." from "Excellent Birds," a profile by Diane Anderson, GirlFriends: The Magazine of Lesbian Enjoyment, July/August, 1995. |
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At seventeen, Judith began working in a textile factory with her mother and aunt. Life finally started to improve for her family. They were able to purchase a home in town with electricity and indoor plumbing. But their peace didn't last for long; the adjacent townsfolk resented their presence in the community. During a suspicious arson, the family house was destroyed.
Longing for children, Judith married a white man from a nearby town. She and her new husband followed the rest of her family to suburban Washington, DC to start over again. |
Judith never returned to live again in the mountains. And although she has never forgotten the hard times there, she also remembers in her writings the natural ways of survival in the wilderness and the overwhelming beauty of the land, the trees, the animals. |
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Judith joined the legions of awakening women in the early 1970's in feminist thought and action. She was an active organizer for the 1976 NOW vigil for the ERA when she fled her soured marriage and joined Sue Lenaerts, a Washington, DC lesbian and political activist. Despite class and race differences, Judith knew she had found her life partner. Together they made a home in Maryland for her three sons, then aged four, seven and eleven.
Judith needed an outlet to share the lessons of her life with others. She began writing poetry and telling stories for the women she encountered. A friend convinced her to work on an article for Quest: a feminist quarterly for their Race, Class and Culture issue. Her first essay, "Native American Mother" was published in the spring, 1977. Since that time, Judith has been published in numerous anthologies, university texts, journals and magazines and on the web. |
But Judith couldn't escape the legacy of the hardships and the strip mining of her youth. Early symptoms of autoimmune disease which previously had been unrecognized blossomed after she endured three arduous surgeries for endometriosis, abdominal surgery to repair a surgeon's mistake and surgery for melanoma. In 1979 Judith was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. Her first major attack left her walking with a cane after several months in bed. Later she developed systemic lupus and several related connective tissue disorders.
"Maybe this is nature's way of slowing me down, but it didn't work. Maybe it made me sit down and write." from "We Are Everywhere," a profile by Emily Pierce, The Washington Blade, August 11, 1995. |
| Judith's attentions to feminist issues were always encapsulated by her greater understanding of class and race. Following the initial excitement of the women's movement was the disillusionment that newly won "rights" were for middle class women who wanted an equal arena with men. Nothing changed for women of her background.
"After decades as an activist, I'm weary of standing on the bottom rung of the ladder below the glass ceiling, steadying it for women who have left others like me behind."
After the first Clinton presidency that unraveled the safety net for women and children on welfare and relegated gays in the military to "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" status, Judith's disillusionment grew even more. In frustration, she initiated her own token campaign for the presidency. |
"A number of feminists were offended by my decision to write myself in. They told me I couldn't do it. I would answer, 'Well, yeah, I can. I know how to spell "Witherow."' My answer appeared blasphemous, to say the least. The horrific absurdity of what was going on in the real world seemed of little relevance. Couldn't these wise women see and feel the terror and helplessness in my decision? Did they honestly believe that I could cause Clinton to lose? Excuse me, but if he was a loser, he was a loser on his own terms and lack of merit." from "Don't Blame Me, I Voted for Myself!," On the Issues, Fall 1997. |
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Judith's sons grew into good, gentle men with feminist sensibilities. Like their mother, all three are accomplished fishers, hunters and trappers. And like their mother, all three are very family identified, living with their wives and children in close proximity to Judith and Sue's home.
Chronic pain and illness have shaped her recent life. But she is still sharing her stories with the world. A "grandmother" who needs a cane to walk, Judith is more readily recognized by her bright tattoos, her eleven earrings, her presence, her laughter. Her storytelling reflects this spirit and offers a rare chance to hear the voices of otherwise silenced women. |
LOOK FOR JUDITH'S WORK IN THESE ANTHOLOGIES |
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| Judith & Sue - 29 Years Together - 8/21/2005 |
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