Ensconced in the recliner, having finished breakfast (it was Rocks ’n Twigs cereal day), I was preoccupied with an attempt to concoct that day’s ultimately unsuccessful ploy to avoid morning exercises when a message pinged on the laptop.

My younger brother decided I needed to see a photograph that had come his way — a picture so alarming and unsettling that, at first glance, I could not filter my reaction.

“Holy crap!” I said … or, rather, words to that effect.

The picture was of five adults and one dog, arranged in a living room tableau the type of which would be familiar to anyone old enough to remember the contestant introductions on “Family Feud,” back when Corporal Newkirk was the host.

“What is it?” came the voice (no, not the cat) from across the room.

She ventured over and considered the group, who wore expressions that would make Nan Graham and Dr. Byron McKeeby seem as joyous as Teletubbies.

“Who,” she asked, “are those people?”

And right there and then, as I struggled to extract a final Twig from the crevice between two teeth, was when it hit me.

“Holy fudge,” I (sort of) said, “what happened to them?”

The adults in the photo were my two older half-brothers, their wives and one of my nieces. Another niece was likely behind the camera. The dog’s family connection was uncertain.

The picture had originated in Florida, traveled to my half-sister’s New Hampshire home, on to Tennessee to my younger brother, and then to me, in my recliner, wiping a milk drop off my shirt.

Locational logistics was just one of the reasons this blast from the past rattled the cobwebs. We five siblings have not be in the same room since Dec. 7, 2003 — when we watched the Patriots beat the Dolphins in a snowstorm, a couple of hours after we’d buried my father.

Nearly 20 years have passed, and what’s amazing is that while my brothers have grown older, I haven’t aged at all.

Time is the quintessential trickster — which Einstein proved, relativity speaking — and it can fool us into believing it only marches on for others.

This isn’t any revelation. You know this, I knew this. Hell, Ferris Bueller knew this, and he was just a Chicago high school smart-ass in a movie that was released 37 years ago. At this point, he and Sloane are old enough to have grandchildren about to become Chicago high school smart-asses.

Time’s effects on my half-brothers sent what’s left of my mind racing through the archives. My half-sister, having been smart enough to be born first, escaped the madness before the four boys were on equal footing when it came to rough-housing.

We broke windows and bones, dented drywall and fenders, were armed with dart guns and Frisbees we wielded like Oddjob’s hat. Our (well-earned) reputation was such that at least one neighboring parent tried (and failed) to keep their own children from coming near us.

One particular wrestling match spilled from a second-floor bedroom, eventually sending the eldest down the stairs — just as our mother’s car pulled into the driveway.

The three of us still conscious dragged him to the living room couch and high-tailed it out the back door, returning a few minutes later to a warning from our mother to “Be quiet. Your brother’s taking a nap.”

Being responsible for things not getting out of control when we were left alone — he never squealed.

Now, he was front and center in this picture, a man in his early 70s having lost his hair, but not the familiar gleam in his eyes. My other brother (middle-child of the five siblings) stood behind him, also recognizable by his eyes, which always held mischief.

I was pretty much lost in such remembering on Rocks ’n Twigs day, to the extent that it wasn’t until we began exercises that time played yet another trick.

“Happy anniversary?” I blurted out.

“Holy crap!” she shot back — in those exact words, since her language does not have to be scrubbed for public consumption.

We had each forgotten, a first for us as the days tend to blend together at this point, with only our breakfast routine to keep us oriented.

I guess life does move pretty fast. If we don’t stop and look around once in a while, we could miss it.

On that, Bueller and Einstein would agree.