Half a century and the scene is as vivid as yesterday. Other slides blocked in the reel of the memory movie, the baby toddling with a nasty look on the floor of the house, kicking out of jealousy the father just back home from work, then at the beach screaming as a siren in my mother's arms when he was bitten by a wasp, then rushed to hospital because of earth into his eye, and coming back as a young Captain Hook with tears running down from the one open eye. And again running to hospital because he had been bitten by a dog, and spending all day having painful shots in his belly for the anti-rabies therapy.
He was always having these small accidents, a baby Indiana Jones after new adventures in unexplored lands. Then growing up into an athletic, fascinating teenager, volleyball player, like a god on his skis, a handsome swimmer and girls gathering and looking up at him in shyness hoping to be chosen.
Adult life came, a family, a job, a house, kids, holidays, friends, and always loving his mountains, where he spent each spare moment in winter, and in summer the beloved sea, and the small house in Sardinia near a secret bay, a repeated appointment for decades where he had other friends - always making new friends - among those other hard-headed people.
And among the greatest achievements, the three wonderful kids, all of them in love with their father - my brother. I am really happy and proud to have you as my brother. Yes, there was an earthquake last month, the beloved house was partly ruined, the money lost, and we are in wagons on a journey no one knows how long - but all that you are and can do is here with you, and will be with you for another at least 50 years, when you will be meeting new challenges and reaching new horizons in the unexplored frontier that is waiting beyond, just behind that mountain that covers the sight, and next winter on the other side of that mountain you will again be skiing as a pagan god, as handsome as ever.