In this installment of Listen to Me Good, host Michelle Browder sits down with the woman who started it all — her mother, Buena Vista Browder. A historian, seamstress's daughter, and self-described former beatnik from the South Side of Chicago, Buena opens up about surviving an abusive first marriage, the moment she fled with her infant son and never looked back, and how she rebuilt her life in Denver, Colorado — where she met and fell in love with a young Army medic named Chap.

The conversation traces Buena's decades of quiet, foundational work: serving as an acting prison chaplain at Draper Correctional Center, taking in formerly incarcerated women like the unforgettable "Chaka Red Blood Khan," running the ministry's thrift store for 25 years, and retiring from a career as a historian at the Air University Library. At 86 — and counting her pregnancy months toward "87," as she puts it — Buena talks candidly about aging with purpose, her work at We're Still Here's Village senior community, and why she never experienced a single symptom of menopause. She also shares hard-won wisdom for women still in abusive relationships: get out before it's too late.

Equal parts funny, heartbreaking, and inspiring, this episode is a tribute to the woman who shaped the storyteller, the artist, and the movement — and who's still building something new today.

Support the show