“This is Kathryn Tucker Windham…”

 ”The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.”

– Psalm 90:10

This is the reason Kathryn Tucker Windham’s coffin was in her garden shed for almost twenty-three years. When she turned seventy she went to the funeral home to make arrangements for her eventual demise. When she was lead through the casket showroom, she looked at the prices and asked, “Do you have the boxes these were shipped in?” 

Kathryn had a deep understanding (and a life-long impatience) with absurdity. 

She delighted in telling the story of, later that year, going to the community college to have herself measured by the woodworking instructor so he could make her a traditional six-sided burial box. He had said to the class, “Y’all keep working, I’m just measuring this lady for her coffin.”

A lot of us in the storytelling, Southern literature, and quilt making worlds will be writing remembrances of Kathryn. We have to; she is our true heroine. We all wish we had the courage to be like her.  As a tough-as-nails police reporter, she understood the worst of us. As a wax-paper & comb concert master, she brought out the best in us. 

The first time I met Kathryn was at the storytellers’ gathering dinner (sorry, Kathryn. Supper!) at the 2005 National Storytelling Festival in Tennessee.  All of that year’s Featured Tellers were gathering in the basement of the Presbyterian Church the evening before the festival began.  It was my first year and I was feeling very much like the new kid. Somebody (probably Carmen) had put her up to coming over to me, tapping me on the shoulder with a force that some would call, hitting, and saying, “I hear you make fun of old ladies.”

I had no choice but to say, “Yes, ma’am. I make fun of folks like you.” I knew at that moment we would be friends.

•  •  •

Kathryn was skilled at being a bossy old lady. When we were doing a sound check for a show at the Tivoli Theatre in Chattanooga, she saw me walking on stage with my guitar. She asked, “Where are you going with that thing?”

I said, “They’ve got to sound check my guitar, Kathryn.”

“No they don’t. You’re not playing it tonight. You’re doing “Marguerite.”

I did not play my guitar that night. 

•  •  •

Once Bil Lepp and I were walking Kathryn through the tent to her seat at the Athens Alabama Storytelling Festival. The emcee was reading the list of thank-yous of the various sponsors and volunteers. Charter Communications was mentioned. Kathryn jerked on our arms and said, “Did he say, ‘Charter?’ Charter took over my cable company and got my bill messed up. I called them and got a damn answering machine and they told me I had to send them an email. I don’t do email. I can’t get a person on the phone. I’m so sick of Charter!..”

I said, “Kathryn, Charter is the primary sponsor of this festival. They’re paying your fee.”

Without missing a beat: “I love Charter.”

•  •  •

Kathryn was ever the snazzy dresser. A couple of years ago, Wayne Kuykendall, the director of the Athens festival had the brilliant idea of doing a Kathryn Tucker Windham Roast. Kathryn showed up in a fuzzy coat and a wide-brimmed homburg. Bil said, “Kathryn, somewhere in Selma, there’s a pimp saying, ‘where’s my hat?’”  Kathryn laughed like a child. She could dish it out and she could take it.

She was a lady. She was a curmudgeon.  She was a goofball. The last time I saw her was  October at the end of the National Festival.  She was in the hallway of the hotel toting a pair of those rolling eyeballs that look up no matter how you hold them. She couldn’t wait to show them to storytellers’ kids, Liam Irwin and Noah Lepp. She was in a state of pure delight.

Kathryn was a lover of life.

I join a host of others when I say, I miss her.

Yesterday, I’m sure Saint Peter stuck to the line all of us have been forced to stick to.

“This is Kathryn Tucker Windham.
She’s from Selma, Alabama,
and she tells stories.”

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