“I am a musician, music is a big part of what I do and it always has been. I love performing! We have a 2 piece band, myself and Rohan Langford called Ruthie Ma Toothie. We do originals and covers from the 1920’s to the 1950’s mostly in a country and western, swing kind of bent with a bit of jazz in there. I play the fiddle and sing and Rowan plays the guitar and sings. We’ve been going for a few years now but are both really busy with all our other things in life, families and full time jobs. We’re pretty slow moving, we don’t even have a recording yet but we play the long game as you do when your parenting. You kind of tick a few things off your list. Music keeps me happy however in a professional capacity I’m a Naturopath. That’s what I do for a job and its my big passion in life. Food and natural medicines and helping people to achieve their health goals, correct nutritional problems, deficiencies, disease etc. and I’m also a mum to two lovely young ones.
I’m from Canada originally. I lived in Canada my whole life and travelled back when I was 19 I lived in Scotland and Europe for about 3 years. I came here to study Naturopathy in 2000 in Sydney then came to Lismore 7 years ago. I’m an Australian citizen now.
What I like about Lismore is it’s not too big and not too small. I’m actually a city person but given my life with 2 small kids just making the rent in Sydney was so difficult and you work so hard. The quality of life wasn’t as good and you can’t take advantage of all the things the city has to offer because you have little ones and you’re running around so it felt like I was spending a fortune to sit in traffic all the time. In Lismore the pace of life is so sustainable, especially as a parent raising kids on my own. I can afford to work, have a comfortable life with access to so much fresh produce that’s so cheap compared to cities. To me access to fresh produce is everything to me and being able to buy directly from farmers 3 or 4 times a week, I feel like the richest person around. However it’s not so small that you can’t get a good coffee.
There’s a variety of people here. When I talk to people who know me about this area..I tell them, you’ve never been in a small town that has so many per capita artists, creative people, the queer community, musicians, the tolerance for the ‘average’ Australian has had to get so much higher than perhaps many other small towns. At certain times of the year we have so many colourful individuals walking the street from all different types, the mix is so varied in such a small demographic that you feel at home. You feel like you can still hide when you’re walking down the street if you’re a bit outrageous. I think in a lot of regional towns you could feel really alone but I think we’re all in good company up here. That’s what makes me think I could live here for however long, while my babies are going to school, till I work out what’s next in life. I’ve often thought if I could wave a wand and live anywhere in Australia where would I go and I can’t think of anywhere or what else I would be looking for.”
(Genna writes a fantastic blog called ‘them green apples’ where she writes Naturopathic and health related articles and she also works at Southside Pharmacy in South Lismore.)