My childhood idol–my older brother–is riding rockets again.

It was lunchtime on a November day in 1977 when I took his Honda CB250–unbeknownst to him–and rode it around the neighborhood where I had grown up. I was twelve then, and my father–his father– had passed away that very morning. The ride was as aimless as it was cathartic. I circled around the block a few times as my friends from school started arriving to be with me. I didn’t understand it then, but it was on that motorcycle, on a motorcycle, that I felt the most alive.

Luis, my half-brother, had parked his red Honda at our house to go to my father’s funeral with my mother. She had been the second Laura in his life, after his own mother, also named Laura. My mother was only seven years older than he was, but somehow, he had always felt that she was more of a mother to him than his own. Luis was older than I was by about 23 years.

Growing up, he was my idol. Over the years, he came and went as he relocated to other states in Brazil for work. It wasn’t until much later, after I had already moved to the US, in 1996, that we reconnected. Now family bond, a sweet love, and the compassion for the passing of time for both of us had replaced the pedestal inside of me where he had lived. We were two human beings, two brothers, both getting old, each at his own speed.

I have a quiet gratitude and love for this friend who was born to the same father that I was, and despite the very different life, we had important things in common. Genetics, yes, although we don’t look alike, but above all, the love of riding. (I always teased him for being responsible for my passion for motorcycles, after all, he had taken my mother on bike rides while she was pregnant with me.) And motorcycles are like cats: either you love them, or you don’t. There is certainly no lukewarm ambivalence about either. 

A few years ago, probably at around 72 years of age, Luis went by himself on his motorcycle from São Paulo, in Brazil, to Tierra del Fuego, in Argentina, a 7000-mile trip. I can only imagine the experiences he must have had. 

Last Fall, when I first contemplated going on my first long motorcycle trip from California to Wyoming, I thought of him. If he had done it at 72 on a Triumph Rocket 2,300cc (the largest displacement engine of any production motorcycle), I could do it at 53 on a BMW R1200GS Adventure. Once more as role model, now as an adult, he had ushered in new possibilities. I went on the trip to Wyoming, which turned out to be one of the most important things I’ve ever done in my life.

We FaceTimed last week. He was very excited with my new upcoming four-month motorcycle road trip across North America, and wanted to know more. The talk was brief, as he had been feeling under the weather. As we were saying good-bye, he promised to send a photo of his bike all loaded up from the trip to Patagonia.

Perhaps my new journey in July is as important to me as Patagonia had been to him. The open road, the runway that allows us to take flight on our motorcycles.

I never got the photo. Shortly after our FaceTime talk, he was hospitalized with kidney and liver failure. The doctors explained that it was related to his struggling heart. His condition rapidly declined.

Luis was an athlete, swimming miles in open ocean until a few years ago when he had a heart attack. Despite the loss of forty-percent of his heart’s functionality after the heart attack, he continued riding his Triumph Rocket until very recently. Last March, when I was visiting my family in Brazil, he showed up on his 770 lb motorcycle.

Today, at 77 years of age, Luis left us. He is riding rockets again.

Inward Ride and Ciro Coelho are supported by:

Aether Apparel website, Facebook and Instagram

NMA Architects website, Facebook and Instagram

Shawn Thomas website, Facebook and Instagram

Luis, last March in São Paulo at 77, on his 770 lb Triumph Rocket 2,300cc (the largest displacement engine of any production motorcycle).