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His name is Peter, he is in the pursuit of family

8 January 2008, around 2pm... Peter opens the door to a third cousin he has never seen before. He knows her grandmother and her mother (as a toddler), and knows her name from his years of digging, researching and writing up an extensive family tree.

They are directly related through their great-grandmothers. Sisters Maisie and Lina were the daughters of Christina Minogue who was adopted by a pioneering Irish woman who in the mid-1800s settled on a piece of dry land near where the Murray and Darling Rivers meet.

Granny Minogue was a midwife. Her adopted daughter was rumoured to be the illegitimate child of one of the well-known horse-racing Power family.

Tall, thin Peter with the long and white Ned Kelly beard stands in the wide doorway of his red-brick, two-story Thornbury home and searches the third cousin for family resemblance. She is dark-haired, like her grandmother once was. She has her mother's mouth, but is taller with green eyes instead of blue.

"Yes, you are Robyn's daughter aren't you," Peter's sister Wendy says from the hallway.

Leading the way down the wide early 1900s hallway filled with book shelves, odds-and-ends and a very large dolls-house, Peter shows his sister and third cousin into the kitchen before ducking into the kitchen to fetch tea and cake.

"It was such a shame that Robyn couldn't make it to the family reunion last year," Wendy says as her brother returns with tea in fine china cups on top of saucers, as well as small slices of chocolate cake.

The third cousin hands Wendy an envelope of her grandmother's photographs which arrived that Tuesday morning. There are pictures of the third cousin's grand-mother as a young woman and her mother as a child. Her present for her grand-mother's 90th birthday next month will be a DVD slideshow of her old photographs and a short story of her life.

Peter leaves the room, returns and places two photo albums on the table in front of his third cousin. Most of the photographs from Granny Minogue's era the third cousin has already seen before, from the letters Peter had sent to her grand-mother over the years. Her grandmother is the last of her generation still alive. Joan, Peter and Wendy's mother, passed away just a few years ago.

They swap stories and knowledge of family history. Peter's eyes widen with interest. "You are the first of your generation to show an interest in family history," he says after telling the story about how his mother would call him "dear, kind Peter" in letter sent to family and friends.

Time is limited - Peter is due to pick up his daughter's boyfriend from the airport in just a couple of hours - so the just-met family members gather around a lone Macintosh in a large, front-room study filled with evidence of hobbies and grand distractions.

"I haven't seen that picture of me before," Wendy says, pointing at the screen to a picture of five small children sitting around in an outback picnic setting. "Oh, that is wonderful."

Peter eagerly copies the 250-plus scanned photographs from his third cousin's portable drive onto his computer. There are pictures of people he hasn't met and may never meet, but he doesn't care, he wants them all. His collection is growing as his family network widens.

Pictures of Granny Minogue, Christina and Maisie and her young family are copied from the Macintosh back onto the portable drive. He is eager for his third cousin to see the footage of her grandmother Jean taken by his own film-student daughter the year or two before.

"She doesn't like having her picture taken," Peter says, his eyes sparkling as he watches his aunt Jean shifts uncomfortably in front of the camera from her favourite kitchen chair. "We told her that the camera wasn't on and she relaxed after that."

He hopes he will soon get the time to edit the footage to post on his website along with the audio stories from his now-gone uncle Des. The website has a family tree and all the family stories he has collected over the last decade, including the tale of the theft of Granny Minogue's Christmas pudding.

Time is scarce in Peter's world. He also runs a business and is also writing about The Big Bang. Time is scarce in his third cousin's world. She is juggling work, a hands-on 90th birthday present and writing a first book. She often wonders what their now-gone family members juggled and did in their spare time.

Peter promises more pictures and help as he walks his third cousin and sister to the door. "I would like to go back to see Jean and find out more about the early years," he says.

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