Ann Grauso passed way. She and her family lived a few doors down from my family growing up on Riverview Avenue back in the day. I can’t say I knew her, I barely knew her kids. They were older than me and would not want to have anything to do with kids 5 years younger than them.

I couldn’t blame them. I was just struck by a melancholy thought. How things were easier and simpler back then. Nothing to worry about except to get home when the street lights came on, and during the summer that was around 9 PM. Just about all the adults from back then have passed on.

Ann Grausso might have been the last one. Some of their children have passed on, Susan Lucas, Jimmy Grant, Jimmy Williams, Suzanne Williams, my brother Frank, Dorothy Foglio, and Audrey Iwanicki.

I’m sure there are some that slipped past my radar. My world was so much smaller then. I never considered how much it would expand. Then again I never thought I would move from that neighborhood. I never considered that I was desperately want to get out of there.

There is no going back. That world has changed very much. Still recognizable but the residents have changed. I believe the only one left is the heinous Natale named Debbie. She was awful back then and more than likely her awfulness has intensified.

In other news, Clive Davis has passed away. He was 94 and had been cicrling the drain for a few weeks now. I worked for him at Arista Records at 6 West 57th St, a building that no longer exists. I was told he was not easy to work alongside.

He was prone to throwing items at his staff during his Thursday morning meetings. I worked for a woman, Suzanne Savage who worked directly for him as the chief A&R Administrator.

She, too was known to throw items at her staff though not at me since I was at a difficult angle to throw things at. After I left the music business and worked in the corporate world in my then fetish of suits and ties, I was invited to a holiday party where I was told I had Clive’s attention.

I found that out after I shook his hand, thanking him for the wonderful holiday party. That world is gone now, the buildings are gone now, and Clive Davis, perhaps the last of the legendary record men of the second half of the twentieth century is gone now.

I sent a direct message to Miriam who responded with a sad emoji. That world is just a memory and now I am at the fruit stand. Miriam and I have a mutual friend in Corey Williams who is in that world of the music business and seems to be doing alright for himself.

After Meta killed off two of my accounts, I tried to reconnect with Corey Williams but it seems fruitless. He is in a position where he more than likely has thousands of people trying to contact and befriend him in one way or another.