An Interview with Jacob Lesner-Buxton

By Jamie Zimmerman, Newsletter Content Developer/ Writer

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On August 30, 2023, the world lost Judith Lesner, the mother of Jacob Lesner-Buxton, ILRC’s System Change Coordinator. Judith passed away at age 80 surrounded by what most of us would call family and friends, but if you knew Judith, the word family would successfully cover both categories.
 
It wasn’t long after her death that ILRC’s Program Director, Alexa Martin, reached out to me about the exact thing I had planned on reaching out to her about—to write a story honoring Jacob’s mother for the Newsletter.
 
On Thursday, September 21st, 2023, I had the privilege to sit down with Jacob in my home to talk about the woman who shaped him to be the independent thinker and changemaker he is in our community today. Jacob hopped off the MTD bus and arrived at my apartment around 6:00 pm in dark blue jeans and a black t-shirt with the words “Teach Peace” printed across the chest in white. Jacob’s tall stance is one I often don’t get to see, as our conversations primarily take place over email or via Zoom. His lanky frame and nurturing presence remind me of the type of tree that you want to place a blanket at its roots and read a book underneath. He possesses a sort of hopeful sadness in his grief.
 
Prior to Jacob arriving for the interview, I ordered a BBQ chicken pizza for him and a salad for me so we could sit, talk, eat, and really get into conversation. I do not do every interview this way. Looking back, I see my pre-interview research on Judith may have subconsciously influenced this decision. As I scrolled through Judith’s Facebook page, now a page to honor and thank her for the impact she has had on so many lives, I saw photographs of her in her kitchen, sitting around a rectangle table with friends and food and what I imagine was lively thought-stretching conversation.
 
The smell of barbecue sauce and chicken, and the setting of a well-loved table at home seemed to be the perfect place to have a conversation about a woman who so generously herself was the source of nonjudgment and freedom to everyone whose lives she touched. I imagine this dining room table interview is the way Judith would have done this project herself.

Jacob and I started at the beginning. I wanted to know how Judith’s childhood may have shaped the person she became. I learned Judith was born in Brooklyn, New York and at age seven, she, her younger sister, Joanne, and her parents moved to the Bronx, where her parents remained for the rest of their lives. Jacob described the community his mother grew up in to be “close-knit” explaining further that “everybody was everybody’s parent.”  From a young age Judith learned and bought into the concept that family is not strictly fused by the traditional blood bond. Family is your neighbor, the person on the street, the stranger you haven’t met yet because after all, stranger is simply another word for future friend.
 
Judith kept New York City as her home through her college years studying Speech and Theater at Hunter College and got her first glimpse of working in stride with people with disabilities while on a college summer break, working at Camp Jened, a summer camp in the Catskill Mountains of New York for children, teenagers, and adults with disabilities. After graduating from college, she went on to join the Peace Corps, where she served for three years in the Philippines then travelled to places such as Israel, India, Vietnam, and Afghanistan. She met Walter Buxton, her future husband and Jacob’s father while donating blood in Israel. An interesting coming together to say the least. One where Walter came from England to San Francisco with a plan to stay for six months. A plan that got disrupted by airport officials, as they wouldn’t let him into the country with only $300 in his pocket. This one moment could have dismantled the trajectory of Walter’s life had Judith not come to the airport and told the necessary authorities that she and Walter had plans to marry. A sentence uttered with the full intention of helping him be granted entry into the USA. Judith and Walter married one month later and stayed married until Walter passed away in 2015. They were married for 42 years.

When I asked Jacob about how his mother got involved with Disability Rights, I already knew that she was involved in both the Disability Movement and the Women’s Rights Movement in the 1970’s from listening to an interview a college student did with her in 2020. I also knew that Judith was involved in protests including the 1977 Section 504 sit in alongside the Mother of the Disability Movement, Judy Huemann. What I didn’t know was the impetus for Judith to find herself fighting side-by-side as an ally for people with disabilities before Jacob, her child with disabilities, was born.
 
He went on to tell me she got a job in the Bay Area working for the California school for the Blind in 1972 and that her first day of work was actually the evening before her wedding. Little did she know, she would get married in the most traditional sense that week, but also, she would marry herself to a movement. A movement she spent the rest of her life advocating for.
 
As I learned about Judith, I also learned about my friend, Jacob. Jacob grew up in a house in Oakland with his mother, father, and about a half-a-dozen other people. “Tons of people had keys to my house. It was so funny—we were so used to people coming in without keys.”
 
Jacob laughed and smiled the kind of smile that only a pivotal memory can bring you as he recalled stories of the past—the footprints of eccentric people who “didn’t really fit into society” finding a haven at chez Lesner-Buxton.
 
When the time came for Jacob to move out of his childhood home to pursue his own goals, Judith’s home remained a place of solace for those down on their luck, marginalized, and vulnerable. Even as the time Judith had on this planet grew thin, she made sure to make plans for those she had been caring for, plans which included her son Jacob.
 
“My mom gave me a list of people who I have to make sure still have housing after she is gone. Only one person left on the list is alive. The rest have passed on.”
 
While there was understandably some relief in Jacob’s voice that there is only one person left to look out for as he carries quite the responsibility load in his own advocacy pursuits, there was also pride lining the edges of his tone—pride in his mother’s hugely compassionate heart, and I’d like to think a sense of pride in knowing that he will follow through with his mother’s wish.  
 
Jacob spent the next few minutes summing up his upbringing as “really unique”—and for sure, to many, it was. So many people don’t know what it is like to have a rotating door for charitable action as the front door of their home. However, this way of life was not so unique to Judith. Her mother, Jacob’s grandmother, did the same thing. Judith was raised with a literal open-door policy to caring for her community and chose to lead her family the same way. Before Judith had her own family and home, she would give out her mother’s address in New York on her travels to people she met, letting them know if they were ever in the area, they had a safe and free place to sleep. Did they take her up on her offer? Sure did! Jacob smiled again as he told me, “They would show up on my grandma’s doorstep and my grandma would tell my grandpa, we have to sleep on the couch tonight, one of Judith’s friends is here. And they never complained or said anything to my mom at all.”
 
After hearing about the supportive role Judith played in other people’s lives, I wondered more about the role she played in Jacob’s life specifically, and so I asked, “Who was your mom to you when you were a child?”
 
His voice clear and unfaltering, “She was my advocate.”
 
Jacob then told me a story about a dilemma when he was in elementary school.

“When I was in 3rd grade I was in a program for visually impaired students. They were going to move the program to another elementary school on the opposite side of town. My mom would not have that though. She spoke out. “You cannot move my kid; he has friendships here…” Finally, a week before school started – on a Sunday afternoon, a representative from the school left a message saying, “Jacob can stay at the school.”
 
This is just one example of the many times Judith fought against an ableist system to assure Jacob had the same opportunities as other kids. In the years beyond Jacob’s schooling, she used what she learned while advocating for and with Jacob to teach thousands of parents how to advocate for their children’s rights in school settings.
 
As the sun set on my time with Jacob, I thought it would be best to ask one of my favorite questions, a question my best friend always asks me on my birthday, “what are you most proud of this year?” but instead of year, I asked Jacob, “what do you think your mom was most proud of in her life?” Without a moment of hesitation or even a breath, he said, “Me." The sincerity in his voice lingered in my heart.
 
While it was clear talking to Jacob, that his mother had high expectations for him, and like any parent, she didn’t always fully understand his choices, it was always exceedingly clear that the mutual love and respect they had for one another created a 2-way street of reverence and adoration.
 
Jacob and I closed the door to our time together by talking about what his mother wished most deeply for this country moving forward. Because I couldn’t summarize it better myself, I will tell you exactly word for word what Jacob told me.
 
“Her biggest desire was to see the disability movement working in coalition with other movements for social justice. She would often ask while attending an anti-war or women’s rights protest, “Where are the people with disabilities?” She’d email countless lefty activists to ask them why they didn’t mention disability in their book or speech at a rally. She noticed that every other group under the sun got mentioned except people with disabilities.”
 
To close this article, and open a new chapter to Judith’s life’s work, I’d like to propose something to you. I propose that we take the time to address Judith’s desires. I propose we talk about disability issues around the kitchen table with our families, write to our local politicians, ask the why’s Judith has so vigilantly pointed out to us, and insist on answers. Let’s keep the fire that burned so brightly in Judith burning bright for years to come by finishing the work she so bravely got started for us.
 
Let’s start now.
 
A deep-seated thank you to Jacob Lesner-Buxton for sharing his mother’s story with me. May we all find a table to sit at that is as welcoming and loving as Judith’s was, and if we cannot find that table, may we provide it ourselves.