I freaked myself out yesterday ...

G. Edwin Osborn,
my maternal grandfather

I don't know why, but I was just sitting in the coffee shop, thinking about my maternal grandfather, G. Edwin Osborn. The "G" was for George--a name he never used, a name he apparently hated, a name I never heard anyone call him. Always "Edwin"--and, no, not "Ed" for short. (That was my dad's name!)

I knew my grandfather before I knew my father. When I was born--November 11, 1944--Dad was off in Europe with the U. S. Army. World War II and all. Mom, my older brother (by three years--Richard--"Dickie" at the time), and I were living in an apartment above my grandparents' place at 1609 E. Broadway Ave., in Enid, Oklahoma.

1609 E. Broadway Ave.
Enid, Oklahoma
Dickie and Danny in the snow

I don't remember when my dad came home (I was too young), but he'd been gone long enough that Dickie didn't recognize him and had to ask Mom who that "strange man" was.

Anyway, we lived with my grandparents throughout the war. A bit later, we moved a block down the street to 1709 E. Broadway.

Then ... the Korean War. And Dad returned to active duty, stationed at Amarillo AFB in the Texas Panhandle. We were there nearly two years.

Then--back to Enid we went in 1953. We bought our first house--1706 E. Elm Ave.--only a few blocks from my Osborn grandparents' place. We saw them all the time. Pretty much every day. Their phone # was 5630-J.

He had a Ph.D. from Edinburgh (yes, in Scotland) and was teaching at the Disciples of Christ seminary at Enid's Phillips University (RIP). He'd once been the minister at University Place Christian Church near the university--and there he baptized me. He wrote books about Christian worship (you can find them on ABE.)

In the summer of 1956, Dad took a job at Hiram College, and we didn't see my Osborn grandparents much after that.

Grandpa died on September 30, 1965, the fall of my senior year at Hiram College. We drove out to Columbia, Missouri, where he and Grandma had retired in a retirement community--Lenoir--established by the Disciples of Christ. When we entered their cottage, Grandma was there with some neighbors; she saw me and said, "And this is the one with the Osborn name."

And so I was. Daniel Osborn Dyer. I passed the name along to our son when he was born in 1972: Stephen Osborn Dyer.

Grandma--Alma E. Osborn--died at age 80 in 1978. She was a wonderful woman--devoted to her husband, to her children (my mom, my uncle Ronald), to her grandchildren. Bright and funny, she liked to write silly poems on special occasions ... hmmmmmm. I still have one she sent me when I got my first teaching job at the Aurora (Ohio) Middle School, fall of 1966. I hate myself for not saving them all.

When she died in May 1978, the Aurora teachers--I among them--were on strike. I left for her funeral, and when I got back, the strike was over. An odd, odd feeling for me.

Anyway, how I freaked myself out ...

As I was sitting in the coffee shop yesterday, I was thinking about Grandpa for no particular reason, and I wondered how old he was when he died of his second heart attack. I checked my Find-a-Grave app and saw that he was 68 years old.

And so I freaked.

I had always (of course) thought that Grandpa was ... old. Ancient.

He died at 68.

I am 73.