Australia is so lucky to have Connie and Samuel Johnson

CONNIE Johnson’s story isn’t unusual. But something about this incredible woman has galvanised Australia — even though most of us have never met her.

I DON’T know Connie Johnson but like so many Australians I’ve come to care about her rather a lot recently.

This week I found myself checking and rechecking the Love Your Sister Facebook page, tracking the progress of her fundraising efforts. Yesterday, my editor messaged to say her colleagues had been in tears watching Connie and her brother, Gold Logie winner Sam Johnson, on the Today Show. I’ve visited her website on three separate occasions, compelled to donate just a little bit more.

Connie is one half of the brother-sister duo behind the cancer charity that, on Wednesday, raised more than $2.2 million with their record-breaking love heart, crafted entirely of five-cent coins.

Connie has terminal cancer and is unlikely to live to see Christmas. She has a devoted family, which includes two primary school aged children — and a nation of strangers who’ve fallen in love with her.

As Connie and her brother Sam have said countless times in television, radio, social media and newspaper interviews this week: Cancer sucks.

Most of us know and love someone who has it. Most of us knew and loved someone who has since been killed by the bitch. Many of us will live with cancer at some point in our lives. Many of us will die as a result. This is a disease that does not discriminate.

Tragic and horrific as it is, the experience and effects of cancer are actually pretty normal. Connie’s story is not unusual. There are countless Australians who share her pain, who share her family’s grief, who share the same very human experience of inevitable, eventual loss.

Yet something about Connie has galvanised our community to actually sit up, pay attention, take action and make a donation to fund cancer research.

Perhaps it is the fact that Connie’s brother Sam has put his love, celebrity and sacrifice for his sister front-end-centre in this campaign.

We don’t often celebrate sibling love like this.

We celebrate the love between romantic partners with anniversaries and the love of parents and children with Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. But it’s rare that we pause to celebrate the overwhelming love and affection shared between two siblings. These two are something special.

Or perhaps it’s the fact that Connie has been so open about the realities of her illness and her fears for the future.

The Love Your Sister Facebook page is a window into the heart and soul of a woman who accepts her reality but is honest about her anger at the circumstance. Connie’s candour is both confronting and endearing.

Being part of that online community is a pleasure and reading Connie’s words is a privilege. People who’ve never met Connie talk to her like she’s a friend.

Connie and Samuel Johnson have shared her journey, warts and all, on their Facebook page.

Or perhaps it’s the fact Connie has given the community something to do, while also creating something for she herself to concentrate on. By asking for donations of five-cent coins, whether it was a handful or a truckload, Connie gave everyone a role to play and eliminated any excuse we might have not to.

In doing so she is breathing new life into the fight against cancer and crafting new hope where it might otherwise have waned.

Connie’s dream is for a world that is big enough and brave enough to beat this insidious disease. She is excited by the opportunities that new research will bring. Research made possible by her own phenomenal fundraising efforts.

Connie is looking to the future with hope and optimism, even when she herself doesn’t have much of one left.

And when you think about it like that, it’s hardly surprising that Australia has come to care about her so much and so soon. Connie Johnson is proof that you can fit a whole lot of life into a short space of time. We’re awfully, awfully lucky to have her.

Thank you Connie.

You can donate to Love Your Sister online.

Jamila Rizvi is writer, radio presenter and news.com.au columnist. Her first book, Not Just Lucky is now available for pre-sale. You can also follow her on Facebook and Twitter.