I rarely watch television, but was compelled to last year after a number of people insisted that I would enjoy Alone season 1 set in Tasmania. They were right – I love the Tasmanian wilderness and I loved that an unassuming middle aged women beat a load of blokes at a survival contest while being real and vulnerable. That was my first encounter with Gina Chick. 

Music grows into crips, sonic flowers. Harmonic fragrances weave and bloom. It’s an anthem I know and my heart grows wings.

At my last book group meeting, Gina’s memoir, we are the stars, was selected for our monthly read. I can say that it exceeded my expectations and at various times made me laugh and weep. Her writing voice has a lovely poetic magical realism quality to it that captured me.

I’ve lost connection with the girl who danced with storms and talked to birds. Forgotten what it is to follow a flickering shadow, tracking the scalloped breast of a hunting eagle, primary feathers splayed, micro adjustments to keep its body suspended on a cushion of air. I can’t remember the last time I walked barefoot in the bush, lit a fire and slept beside it, caught starts on my tongue, let the booboo’s haunting refrain circle my dreams.

Gina grew up in Jarvis Bay and was, in her own words, a strange kid. She had a greater affinity with animals than other children and was ostracised by her peers at school. Fortunately she had a loving family, a love of reading, and an endless stream of critters to look after, to fortifier her from loneliness during her childhood.

When did I abandon the fey creature who saw worlds of wonder hiding beyond the membrane of the real, and brimmed with love for every living thing?

As a young person at university in Sydney, she found her people in the queer community and at dance parties. But she also possessed a naivety, and that, along with a lingering sense of ‘otherness’ and desire to be liked, meant she was vulnerable to exploitation and found herself in a relationship with a con man who left her with a large debt to pay off. 

Every heart is a house of cards, easily undone by the right lever. The right words. The con whispers a spell, the mark activates it and confers the power to self-destruct, simply by believing it. That’s the kicker with a con. They set things up so we willingly take the gun they’ve so lovingly prepared, turn it on ourselves, and pull the trigger.

Her mother suggests to her that she could be autistic, which makes sense given her narrative about her childhood, forthrightness and vulnerability to exploitation. Despite the setback, soon her extraordinary resilience kicked in and she found a way to clear herself of debt and find her way back to herself through reconnecting with the wilderness. 

I’ve never been able to hate Grayson. He behaved in his nature and I in mine. I wonder if my curse follows him; the consequences of his actions a slow, creeping raft of misery and loneliness. A long life looking out of his own eyes, hearing only the hollow rattle of his stories in the echo chamber of his castle of lies. 

Gina’s mother was adopted. When Gina was 18 her mother discovered her birthmother was writer Charmain Clift, another unconventional women, who’s discovery helped Gina to make more sense of herself.

Stooped into itself, a piano beckons with sweet purity. I’m grateful for the balm of music. 

True love found Gina in the US in a man she met on a wilderness survival course. The two married and had a child called Blaize. Tragedy struck the couple when their daughter died, aged three. Gina shares her deep grief with an extraordinary vulnerability in her memoir – this is the point where I found myself in tears on an plane on my way to Canberra. 

Our only true safety lies in our own resilience and honesty, in being able to look our darkness in the eye and say, yes, you are part of me, a segment of my deepest mystery, even if I don’t understand you yet. Safe is being willing to reach through our fear to clasp the hands of our demons and welcome them in. Not hiding from any part of ourselves.

I think parts of Gina’s story will resonate with many women who grew up in the 80s, and it’s wonderful to see a woman living boldly in mid life. There are so are so many moments that present opportunity for connection for readers – from her love of nature, challenges growing up, finding her people and partying, her losses and grief as an adult, and her life-force that endows her with an extraordinary human resilience and a strength to carry on. We are the stars is a beautifully crafted memoir that inspires reflection on life and what is important. Highly recommend it.

In the magnificent wilderness of my body I’ve become a gardener, hands buried to the elbows in earth and mud and the rot of compost, churning and turning the soil, uncovering small, sad seeds of belief that I’m not enough. It takes tenderness to plant them, right side up, water them with benedictions and whispered spell of forgiveness. With enoughness.