My Brother

The picture is of me and two of my brothers. Harold is to the left of me and Mark is to the left of Harold. When I dropped by to see Harold that day, he wanted me to take his Brazilian DiGiorgio classical guitar home. We had discussed previously about me having that instrument since there was a story behind it that related to the both of us. It's a fine instrument that was manufactured in 1976, purchased in 1979. I went to this shop in Belem to purchase three guitars back in 79, 1 for me 1 for Harold and 1 for Mark (Fitting that the three brothers were at Harolds house for that occasion). I asked the retailer if he had any more guitars available since I didn’t see very many on display, he said sure and directed me to the attic of the building. Once in the attic I found the floor was covered with stacks of guitars still packaged up. I spent that afternoon sorting through and picking the best of the lot. Not long there after I left Brazil for the last time and continued living to this day in the USA. I ended up selling my classical to Damon a friend of mine in New Mexico. Anyway, Harold said, “go write a song and use it.” I’ve had writers block lately but what better way to write a song for a reason.

I’ve been dropping by to see Harold every now and then. One time while I was visiting him at the hospital, a friend from Brazil was there by the name of Mike. Mike asked Harold what his best memories of Brazil were and Harold quickly started off how he enjoyed living in a city called Fortaleza, that to Harold and me was a paradise, a place that we were free to jump on our bikes, explore, head down to the beach without worries and carefree. What a life that was and I couldn’t agree more. A lot of memories surfaced when we talked that day about that time in our lives.

Harold is only a couple of years older than me (2.5 years). There wasn’t any competition that I can remember between the two of us like many siblings have. I always looked up to Harold, he was the best candidate for big brother a little brother could have. He was always thinking of me during Christmas and my Birthday. One birthday he got together with our mom and they bought supplies to rebuild an old bicycle that was laying in the storage. Harold painted, rebuilt the bike from the ground up, new seat tires and all and presented it to me for my birthday. I have a vivid memory of that day, he had an old girls bike that he rode, still he fixed up the boys bike for me. We set off riding towards the American School we attended, biked around there for a while and on the way back home we both jumped a curb at the same time, the axel to the tire on Harolds bike came off the fork and when the bike came down off the curb the fork lodged in the spokes, the bike did a cartwheel but Harold landed on his feet. That’s the way Harold is, always landing on his feet.

This story and many more like it are the inspiration to this song.

It's Nice to Know
The ones I'm with
Spending days that came and went

Free to live
Free to care
Shared with one another

The roads we've yet to see
Times spent with my brother

Those days we ride
Then we'd explore
What finds were 'round the corner

The trail path
Another pass
A reason to move forward

An innocence to feed
In common with my brother

My hero paced
This world I know
His life encouraged me

The chance was mine
To grasp that time
Then store it in my heart

It's nice to know
That God has shared

Sees us through
And guides us there

Thanks for folks
The ones I love

The ones who
Really care...

Can't stop myself
From time to time
My mind recalls dreams

Those memories
I cherish more
They won't be drawn from me

© John Luper

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Uploaded: Sep 18, 2014 - 04:55:45 PM
Last Updated: Sep 20, 2014 - 10:41:41 AM Last Played: Apr 23, 2019 - 06:27:31 PM

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