Sometimes in these days of instant communications, news still moves slowly. I found that to be the case today when I received a phone call asking if I knew that my Uncle Roger died last week. A couple people had sent me emails to let me know, but they went to an old address that I don’t often check.

Roger was my father’s older brother. He was 83 years old and had been fighting Alzheimer’s disease. The reports are that he died peacefully with his wife of 62 years by his side.

When I was young he and his family lived near Albany, NY. My father’s younger brother lived in the suburbs of Washington, DC, so we referred to our relatives as the Albany Hyneses and the Washington Hyneses. We were not as close knit a family as my wife’s family is, and we would only see the Albany Hyneses a few times a year, and the Washington Hyneses even less.

It was a little over an hour to Uncle Roger’s house. We would all pile in the blue dodge van and head over Petersburg Pass to Albany. My memories of the trips are fuzzy. They lived in a suburban community. We would pull into the driveway and enter into the house through the basement. In the basement as a pool table. Hanging above the pool table where two strings of beads. Every fifth bead had a number on it, 5, 10, 15. They were used for scoring the pool games.

Roger had three sons, Keith, Scott and Craig. Craig, the youngest was four years older than I. He was a year younger than my eldest brother and a year older than my second eldest brother. My younger sister and I were often the odd wheels out at these gatherings.

Upstairs were the stereotypical family reunions; casseroles, macaroni salads, maybe even shredded carrots in Jello. Uncle Roger worked for Armour Meat Packing, so there were probably hot dogs and cold cuts. In our family, alcohol was primarily used for medicinal purposes. There would be a bottle of brandy stuck somewhere in the corner of the medicine cabinet to be taken for various ailments. The Albany Hyneses were different. They drank alcohol for pleasure. I seem to remember them mostly drinking wine, but also I seem to recall times when my mother would have a whiskey sour.

Another thing that was different was television. My memories are that they had a nice color television. We didn’t get a television until I was about seven, and then it was a small black and white set that received three channels. They were Albany stations, and I suspect that it was the same three channels that the Albany Hyneses watched.

Yet they watched different shows. We watched the Wonderful World of Disney and The FBI with Ephraim Zimbalist Jr. They watched The Lawrence Welk Show. It was jovial times at the Albany Hyneses and Uncle Roger always seemed happy.

Another thing that made the Albany Hyneses different was that they were golfers. When I worked as a caddy when I got a little bit older, I got a little bit of a glimpse into their world and found a little common ground. But my caddying was short lived and we still didn’t see them that often.

When Uncle Roger retired, he moved down to Hilton Head, SC, presumably to play as much golf as he pleased. I don’t remember seeing them again after they moved, but on rare occasions I would communicate with one of the Albany Hyneses. Then I heard that he had Alzheimer’s. Every so often, I would here a comment about how the disease was progressing.

My wife’s grandfather had died of Alzheimer’s so I had a good sense of what was going on, even as I just heard snippets from afar. Now, Uncle Roger is dead. The disease slowly took his memory and finally his life. Now, all I have are a few fragile memories of Uncle Roger.

Rest In Peace, Roger Folkins Hynes, Jr.