A FAMILY AT THE CORNER
This slide photo scanned and uploaded here is by my father, taken in 1962 on the toboggan slopes of Mount Donnabuang – freezing without snow – outside Melbourne. Left to right is my only sister, me and then brother #1. There are two other brothers, one yet to be born [ in Brisbane 1964].
The family was about to leave Melbourne. We would travel 1700 km’s to begin a new life that was humid, had very different ways of talking – and ended every sentence with “eh” or “but” – jumped out of bed at some unearlthly hour [ the earliest in the world some would say] and with everyone outside usually at the beach. There seemed to be no idea of nuance or poetry, new art or modernist architecture, libraries or art galleries. But here, in this wonderful image, my father has caught a moment in time of his eldest three in our immersion in a world we knew and loved, rare though this kind of thing was for our busy family immersed in a world of social justice rescue ventures and regular church and para church life. We were about to leave the known and immerse ourselves in the unknown. There were times of longing for what was left behind attached to adolescent excitement facililated by our sometimes too optimistic but very supportive parents.
My sister in 10year old reflective pose forseeing maybe her carreer as a trauma counsellor, composer and violist, my brother in that far off gaze as he contempled his socialist passions and journalist/academic career and me. There I am, facing the opposite direction, attempting to leap off the toboggan before slamming into the trees maybe indicative of a future of always an outsider, awkward and needing to redo life more than once. And still alive!
This is a precious photo. There is poetry here in how dad captured us. Instant movements, intentions, directions and facial experessions caught. Edge of mouth smile, far away look and a determination to stay alive and ahead of potential disasters.
And we are together. One. Just a little family being given a day with our parents and friends before the big adventure to Brisbane.
Peter Breen
Peteskibreen's Blog 
As one of the three captured in this photo, it is incumbent on me to say thank you to my older brother for sharing the image with the narrative. Aren’t photographs incredible?
There is always a sense of tragedy on discovering unmarked, undated, nameless photographs in opportunity shops, or antique stores or bric-a-brac outlets… or even in old photo albums of our own.
There’s a sense of wonder about how the human effort of creating a memory becomes a vacuum. Who are these people? For me this questions becomes a reflective moment: how will I-we not be the unremembered?
Thank you Peter. And to note that our father Stewart Gordon Breen had an exceptional photographic/visual eye.
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Thankyou Marcus
Peter
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