When Brian lost his Mallacoota house to bushfire, he went back to trade school

For Brian Mitchell, it was the small things that he missed after losing his house in Mallacoota to bushfire last summer.

“It’s a weird feeling to sit in front of this pile of tin that you’ve got and then realise that you haven’t got a knife or fork,” he explains.

“It’s just a weird feeling, it really is.”

He and his wife Karen were holidaying in New South Wales for Christmas when they learnt their home of 27 years, and everything in it, had been destroyed.

Karen says even a year later, she has moments where she goes to get something, before remembering it’s gone.

“Out of the blue, something comes up and you go…